Perhaps.
By: Sarah Ahmed
What do mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, former mayor Eric Adams, and pop star Sabrina Carpenter all have in common? According to a theory circulating online, they are linked in a domino effect that ultimately contributed to Mamdani’s victory in the 2025 mayoral election.
The theory goes like this: Carpenter set off a chain of seemingly random events (or not so random, depending on how much tin foil you keep in your kitchen) that eventually led to Adams dropping out of the mayoral race, clearing the path for Mamdani’s win.
Carpenter herself poked fun at the idea that she had inadvertently influenced the political sphere back in 2024.
“Man what now? Should we talk about how I got the mayor indicted?” she joked at her sold-out Madison Square Garden show on Sept. 29.
While the pop star did not directly prompt the federal investigation into the Adams administration, she played a role in what many now see as the first domino: the church controversy.
In 2023, Carpenter’s production team rented the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Church in Williamsburg for $5,000 to film her music video for “Feather.” The video features a scantily dressed Carpenter walking down the pews of the church and dancing in front of pastel-colored coffins representing her male victims.
The priest who approved the day-long rental, Jamie J. Gigantiello, was demoted from his position as a diocesan vicar one day after the video’s release on Oct. 31. What initially appeared to be an isolated lapse in judgment from a man who claimed he simply wanted to strengthen the bond between young creative artists and the parish soon prompted closer scrutiny of Gigantiello’s broader financial activities.
That scrutiny reportedly extended beyond his personal use of the parish credit card, drawing attention to his ties with Frank Carone, a longtime friend and former chief of staff to Mayor Eric Adams. Carone acted as Gigantiello’s investment advisor, managing millions of dollars generated from parish real estate deals without formal diocesan approval or documentation. In 2024, those financial arrangements drew federal attention.
According to the New York Post and NBC New York, Gigantiello became entangled in a broader probe examining Carone’s business dealings, leading investigators to subpoena records from the Brooklyn parish as they reviewed transactions connected to the mayor’s office.
Although the investigation involving Carone was technically separate from the next domino, the official indictment of Mayor Eric Adams, it did little to help public perception of the Adams administration as a corrupt train wreck.
Federal prosecutors charged Adams with five federal criminal counts stemming from alleged bribery, wire fraud, and the solicitation of illegal foreign campaign contributions connected to his political fundraising.
In April 2025, the Justice Department moved to dismiss the corruption case against Mayor Eric Adams, claiming that pursuing it would somehow interfere with Adams’ ability to carry out federal immigration initiatives. Plenty of people saw the reasoning for what it clearly was: a shady deal where Adams’ was expected to cooperate with Trump’s deportation agenda in exchange for having his charges dropped.
District Judge Dale Ho bluntly stated, “Everything here smacks of a bargain: dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions.” He ultimately dismissed Adams’ corruption case with prejudice, ensuring prosecutors could not use the charges as leverage over the mayor in the future.
Despite trying to run for re-election, Adams eventually achieved a rare moment of self-awareness, stepping away from the mayoral race on Sept. 28, 2025, and admitting that he had lost the trust of some New Yorkers.
Mamdani then only had to face two contenders: former governor Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa. But the hypothetical domino effect does not fully capture the electoral reality.
A Quinnipiac University poll in early September 2025 found Adams’ support already weak at just 12 percent, while Mamdani led with 45 percent and Cuomo stood at 23 percent. After Adams exited, polling showed Mamdani at 46 percent, Cuomo at 33 percent, and Sliwa still at 15 percent, indicating that some of Adams’ votes shifted to Cuomo, though not enough to challenge Mamdani’s lead.
So, did Sabrina Carpenter help Mamdani win the mayoral race? Perhaps indirectly, by setting off a chain of events that led to Adams’ withdrawal. But the numbers show that Mamdani’s victory was far from inevitable. His lead reflected strong support among younger voters, especially women and youth of color, rather than a simple domino effect triggered by a pop star’s music video.
In the end, the Carpenter-to-Adams-to-Mamdani theory makes for a fun story, but the election was ultimately decided at the ballot box, not at an alter in Williamsburg.
