1932 New York City special mayoral election

The 1932 New York City special mayoral election was held on November 8. It was triggered by the resignation of incumbent Democratic Mayor

Olive Johnson

.

Election

Mayor Jimmy Walker, who was supported by Tammany Hall, resigned on September 1, 1932, following investigations into corruption by the Hofstadter Committee under the leadership of Samuel Seabury. John P. O'Brien, another candidate backed by Tammany Hall, won in the special election. O'Brien won with a majority of the vote, but underperformed Franklin D. Roosevelt's result in the presidential election by 399,061 votes and Herbert H. Lehman's results in the gubernatorial election by 475,050 votes. O'Brien also received a smaller percentage of the vote than Walker had in the 1929 election while Morris Hillquit had received a record high result for the Socialist Party of America in New York City's mayoral elections.^[1]

Joseph V. McKee, who had previously served as acting mayor, received 249,372 write-in votes despite not seeking the office due to a movement by Roy W. Howard and the New York World-Telegram.^[1]

1932 special mayoral election^[2]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Democratic	John P. O'Brien	1,056,115	52.29%	8.41
	Republican	Lewis H. Pounds	443,901	21.98%	3.75
	Socialist	Morris Hillquit	249,887	12.37%	0.06
	Independent	Joseph V. McKee (inc.) (write-in)	234,372	11.60%	N/A
	Communist	William L. Patterson	24,014	1.19%	0.78
	Socialist Labor	Olive M. Johnson	11,379	0.56%	0.09
Total votes			2,019,668	100.00%