Immigration has continued to be a central issue in local politics this year, particularly with New York City’s sanctuary city status under intense pressure from President Donald Trump’s administration.
Mayor Eric Adams has pledged to collaborate with Washington’s orders, allegedly in exchange for dropping criminal charges against him. And while many New Yorkers will have the opportunity this June to express their view on this and other Adams’ policies, the people at the center of this issue — undocumented immigrants and those who are not U.S. citizens — do not.
However, there are still legal ways for noncitizens to participate in the upcoming election.
Perla Silva, the senior civic engagement coordinator at immigration-focused nonprofit Make the Road New York, says as an undocumented person herself, she believes that mobilizing volunteers to educate those who can vote is crucial.
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“We will be directly impacted by voters’ decisions, so we take a lot of time to make sure voters understand what is on the ballot, why they should go out and vote,” she said.
If you are not a citizen of the U.S. but still want to make your voice heard as a New Yorker in our local election this year, here’s a guide on how to do that:
Can noncitizens vote in New York City?
As an immigrant, if you have become naturalized since moving to the U.S., you can vote. If you are not a citizen — whether you have a green card, some kind of visa or no immigration status — you cannot vote.
You may have heard about a law passed by the City Council in 2022 that did allow noncitizens to vote in local elections. However, since then, the courts have slapped down that law, and it is currently not in effect.
The Council appealed the decision to the state’s highest court in the hopes of bringing back their policy. The Court of Appeals heard the Council’s arguments last month and will make their decision over the next few months. But until then, noncitizens in the city still cannot vote.
Can noncitizens donate to political candidates?
It depends. Alongside U.S. citizens, permanent residents (aka anyone with a green card) can also donate to city candidates.
But if you are neither a citizen nor a green card holder, you cannot donate.
New York City also has public matching funds, where small-dollar donations from people who live in the city (and meet the other criteria) are matched 8-to-1 by the city. So a donation from someone inside NYC goes farther than one from someone in Buffalo, or in California.
The legality of donations is one of the issues at the heart of the federal corruption case against Adams: the Adams campaign allegedly accepted illegal donations from foreign nationals in the Turkish government that were funneled through U.S. donors in the form of “straw” donations.
Can I sign a petition for a candidate?
Noncitizens cannot participate in petitioning, neither as witnesses nor signatories. Petitioning is the process where candidates gather signatures in order to appear on the ballot in June (and it’s happening right now).
“You can’t witness [petitioning] because you have to be a registered voter enrolled in the party and the state,” said election attorney Sarah Steiner. Since noncitizens can’t register to vote, they also cannot petition.
Can you work on a campaign?
Through our election newsletter, we received this question from a reader, Manjari M.: Can one campaign for a mayoral candidate if one is not a U.S. citizen?
The short answer: Yes, you can campaign!
“Campaigning for someone is freedom of speech, and if you are in the United States you (theoretically) have freedom of speech,” said Steiner.
Anyone can volunteer for a political campaign regardless of their immigration status — and if you have a work permit, then there’s nothing preventing you from working on a campaign.
Lots of volunteers, especially in the early part of a race, help get out in the street to gather signatures through petitions, which noncitizens can’t do. But there are many other opportunities to mobilize behind a specific candidate.
“Organizing candidate forums, or even sharing primers about if they could vote, who they would vote for” are just some ideas, suggested Wennie Chin, the senior director of community & civic engagement at the New York Immigrant Coalition.
Chin understands that people may be hesitant to share their experiences, but believes that if someone is comfortable, sharing the human impact of political decisions can be valuable.
“Sometimes, the issues that we talk about become just issues, and we don’t remember that there’s a lot of livelihood behind these decisions,” she said.
“Being able to share a face, a voice, a story is really impactful,” Chin added.
Other paths: Issues, turnout and budgeting
Lots of civic engagement organizations approach election season from a non-partisan standpoint: they support issues rather than candidates, or just focus on registering as many voters as possible.
“Even though some of us cannot vote, we’re still able to do a lot, we’re able to make a huge change,” said Perla. “We’ve done it in the past with just civic engagement: Talking to neighbors, just giving them the date, the information.”
This year’s primary election is June 24 with early voting beginning on June 14, which is also the deadline to register.
Voter turnout in the five boroughs is usually a very small percentage of registered voters. Even in the 2021 mayoral primary, which had the highest turnout rate in decades, only 26.5% of registered voters actually made it to the polls.
“I’ve had a lot of conversations with folks who are like ‘I’ve been a citizen for five years but yo no voto,’” Silva said, or “I don’t vote” in Spanish.
She says that immigrants, regardless of their status, are essential in doing the work of reaching people where they are — especially due to language barriers.
“We work in the areas where folks are like, ‘Oh thank you so much — hundreds of people came to my door, I didn’t understand what they were saying,’” described Perla. “‘But you look like me, you sound like me.’ That’s the feedback I receive when my volunteers go out.”
Chin says that voter outreach is especially important now that the city has instituted ranked choice voting, since the system is new and can be confusing.
“Educating people on what ranked choice voting is — how to use it and how to leverage your vote for a candidate you want or don’t want — is really important,” she said. “There’s a lot of different ways people can creatively plug in.”
Chin points out that there are other initiatives where people can affect citywide policy — including where money is allocated, which can have a tangible impact on peoples’ lives and neighborhoods.
Participatory Budgeting is run by the City Council, and allows people in individual districts to create proposals for how to spend capital funding, which is used for improving infrastructure like schools, libraries, and parks. The People’s Money is a similar project, but allows people to propose projects related to social services, events, or awareness campaigns — not physical construction. Both are open to all New Yorkers regardless of immigration status.
“Very often, the people who live in those communities have the greatest ideas — but might now know how to enact it or have the resources,” said Chin.
What else do you want to know about elections, local politics or voting? Write to ask@thecity.nyc.
