Six months ago, many New Yorkers did not know Zohran Mamdani’s name. But that has changed.

Mr. Mamdani, a state lawmaker from Queens and a democratic socialist, has emerged as one of the front-runners in the mayor’s race, along with former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, by focusing on affordability.

His campaign released a series of populist plans, pledging to make buses free and to freeze the rent on rent-stabilized apartments. He won the top endorsement of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and of the Working Families Party.

His opponents say he is too far to the left and does not have enough experience, and they have drawn attention to his criticism of Israel and his past calls to reduce the police budget.

Ahead of the June 24 primary, the leading Democrats in the race visited The New York Times for interviews. We are publishing excerpts from those interviews, and this is the fifth in the series; our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

We asked Mr. Mamdani, 33, questions about 10 themes, with the occasional follow-up, touching on his somewhat surprising admiration for former Mayor Bill de Blasio and why he’s been too busy to finish Season 3 of “The White Lotus.”

We’ve written previously about his plan for city-owned grocery stores, his relatively thin legislative record in Albany and how he has more donors than any other candidate.