City Council Member Julie Menin announced Wednesday that she has secured enough support to become the next speaker of the New York City Council, setting up a new era at City Hall where Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani will face a seasoned, centrist counterweight from within his own party.

Menin, a Jewish Democrat from Manhattan’s Upper East Side, released a list of 35 council members backing her bid — a decisive supermajority in the 51-member chamber. The coalition spans five boroughs and includes moderate Democrats as well as Republicans, offering a striking contrast to Mamdani’s base among the Council’s Progressive Caucus.

Her victory announcement, long before the Jan. 7 formal vote, is the earliest in modern Council history.

Yet Menin’s tone Wednesday was neither combative nor confrontational. Instead, she emphasized partnership, even as she is widely viewed as a balancing force to the incoming mayor’s agenda.

“With this broad five-borough coalition, we stand ready to partner with mayor-elect Mamdani’s administration and deliver on a shared agenda that makes New York more affordable through universal childcare, lowers rent and healthcare costs, and ensures that families across the city can do more than just get by,” she said in a statement.

Menin represents a bloc of Democrats who opposed Mamdani’s rise during the primary, including many Jewish and centrist voters wary of his left-wing platform. Her selection signals that Mamdani will not govern with unchecked progressive momentum. However, unlike previous mayors who intervened aggressively in speaker races, the incoming mayor has remained deliberately neutral, refusing to endorse a candidate or whip votes behind the scenes.

That has allowed Menin to build a coalition of traditional power players: labor unions such as the Hotel and Gaming Trades Council and 32BJ, congressional heavyweights like Rep. Gregory Meeks, and borough political leadership, including Bronx Democratic Party chair Sen. Jamaal Bailey.

While the race once appeared deadlocked, Menin’s camp sealed support during a late-night meeting in Southeast Queens this week, after which they moved quickly to collect public commitments. Some members privately described the blitz as aggressive, but effective — a sprint to claim the narrative before the holiday lull.

Menin, 58, has built a career navigating some of the city’s most sensitive challenges. A former corporate lawyer, she rose to prominence as chair of the lower Manhattan community board after 9/11. She later served as Commissioner of Consumer Affairs and head of the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment before leading New York City’s record-breaking 2020 Census effort.

Her Jewish identity and Upper East Side roots have long aligned her with constituencies more skeptical of the city’s socialist-leaning movement, and her supporters believe those ties will help maintain institutional stability at City Hall.

Whether Menin becomes Mamdani’s governing partner or moderating brake remains to be seen. For now, she is offering an olive branch backed by a coalition powerful enough to demand a seat at the negotiating table.

If her support holds through January, New York will enter the Mamdani era with a dynamic rarely seen in City Hall: a far-left, anti-Israel mayor-elect counterbalanced by a Jewish moderate speaker who promises cooperation — but is fully prepared to say no.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)