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Former NYPD cop Eric Adams is leading the race to win the New York City mayoral primary as Maya Wiley and Kathryn Garcia battle for second according to a last-minute poll released hours before today's vote. 

Adams remains the front-runner in the Democratic mayoral Primary Election according to the poll, with 26 per cent of likely primary voters saying they would vote for him as their first choice. 

Meanwhile Wiley, one of the most liberal candidates in the mayoral race, is coming second with 21 per cent of votes but rival Kathyrn Garcia is very close with 18 per cent of votes, according to the survey conducted by Democratic firm Data For Progress. 

The results of the latest poll came as New York City residents prepare to cast their ballots in the Democratic primary today in a vote which will select the candidate almost certain to take over as mayor. 

Former NYPD cop Eric Adams is leading the race to win the New York City mayoral primary in a last-minute poll

Maya Wiley (pictured) and Kathryn Garcia battle for second according to a last-minute poll released hours before today's vote

Kathyrn Garcia is in third place in the poll but is very close to Wiley with 18 per cent of votes, according to the survey conducted by Democratic firm Data For Progress

Registered Democrats will choose from a diverse group of 13 candidates for the job often called 'the second-most difficult' in the US after that of the president. 

But in a positive result for Adams, he maintains his No. 1 ranking in the most recent poll for the Democratic mayoral primary. 

Meanwhile former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang is ranking fourth with 12 per cent of votes while Comptroller Scott Stringer is in fifth place with five per cent of votes. 

With undecided voters excluded from the poll, Adams remains at the top with 28 per cent of votes, while Wiley remains second on 23 per cent and Garcia reaches 20 per cent. Yang remains in fourth place with 13 per cent of votes and Stringer stays in fifth with five per cent. 

But six per cent of the 1,354 likely New York City Democratic primary voters surveyed are still undecided, meaning there is still all to play for.

Former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang is ranking fourth with 12 per cent of votes

The new voting system, which asks voters to rank up to five candidates in order of preference, also makes predictions almost impossible.

Unless a candidate immediately garners more than 50 percent of the votes - an unlikely scenario - the candidate who came in last is eliminated, and the ballots cast for them are redistributed to voters' second choice, and so on until a candidate finally exceeds the 50 percent threshold.

This may not produce a clear winner until mid-July.

And in this most recent poll, Garcia, a former city Sanitation Commissioner, is the clear favorite among likely primary voters for their second preference with 22 per cent of voters, which could play a key role in determining the result due to the new voting system. 

Meanwhile Adams has just 13 per cent of second preference votes while Wiley, who was endorsed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, received 15 per cent and Yang got 11 per cent of the votes.   

Wiley, who was endorsed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (pictured together on June 5), received 15 per cent of second preference votes

In a result which could cause Adams some alarm, the polls shows he is the eighth favorite for the third preference votes with just nine per cent of voters saying he would be their third choice. 

Stinger is ranking top of the poll or third preferences with 16 per cent while Garcia and Wiley both have 14 per cent each and Yang is only one percentage point behind with 13 per cent of voters. 

For Adams, who has been endorsed by George Floyd's brother Terrence, there is still all to play for as the poll shows he has a large advantage over the other candidates with African American voters as 44 per cent say he is their first preference. 

Terrence made his endorsement on Wednesday at an event with Adams. The election will be held on November 22.  

Adams worked in the NYPD for 22 years and is the only Democratic candidate who is taking a decidedly pro law-and-order approach to his campaign.  

George Floyd's brother Terrence is backing the only law-and-order candidate in the Democrat  

Meanwhile Wiley's camp will be looking closely at the small gap between Wiley and Garcia.   

Wiley's 'defund the police' platform is worrying some New Yorkers as the city faces a summer crime wave with random attacks on fearful residents both in the streets and on the city's subway. 

In what could have been her chance to put those fears to rest, during a final debate between the candidates last week, Wiley decided not to raise her hand when the candidates were asked if they would put more cops on subway cars, despite a violent rise in stabbings and attacks. 

Earlier in her campaign, Wiley was forced to deny that she intends to disarm NYPD cops after refusing to commit to a position during an earlier debate. 

Wiley - a former de Blasio administration official and member of the Civilian Complaint Review Board - presents herself as a reformer, and advocates cutting one billion dollars from the NYPD's budget and reform how the department operates. 

Wiley, who has been endorsed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Elizabeth Warren, responded at the time: 'I am not prepared to make that decision in a debate.

'I am going to have a civilian commissioner and a civilian commission that is going to hold the police accountable and ensure we're safe from crime but also from police violence,' she said.

New York Mayoral candidate Maya Wiley is gaining in the latest mayoral poll 

She has spoken openly of her plans to overhaul the New York Police Department that she claims is filled with bureaucratic waste.

Wiley has said she wants to move $1 billion from its budget to community resources. 

She also plans to appoint a civilian as the NYPD commissioner and reduce the department's 35,000 officers by roughly 2,500.    

'Black and brown New Yorkers both experience higher crime rates, lower resolution in solving crime and more bad experiences with police officers,' Wiley said to the Wall Street Journal during an interview.  

NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea has said the department is including hiring more people of color as officers and has urged against spending cuts.  

Amid a deluge of criticism, Wiley has attempted to insist that she does not intend to strip cops of their service weapons. 

On Tuesday, voters head to polls with Covid-19 still casting a long shadow over New York, the epicenter of America's early outbreak, and which has lost 33,000 people to the virus.

But the city is now coming back to life - virtually all coronavirus restrictions have been lifted, and 66 percent of adults have received at least one vaccine dose.

A crowded field of progressives and moderates face off in a race made all the more uncertain by a new ranked-choice system of voting that has clouded all predictions.

The winner of the vote is unlikely to be known for several weeks and the mayoral election will be held on November 22.

Since New York is a Democratic stronghold, though, they are virtually guaranteed to win November's mayoral election against whomever Republicans choose as their candidate.

'There's a lot at stake here,' said Columbia University politics expert Lincoln Mitchell, citing issues ranging from the post-pandemic recovery to climate change.

Unemployment, homelessness, shootings and homicides have all surged since the coronavirus struck. Thousands of businesses have closed, tens of thousands of wealthier residents have fled and many employees are still working from home. 

The pandemic, demonstrations sparked by the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 and attacks on Asian Americans have also highlighted the extent of racial inequalities in the city of 8.5 million.

New York's first new mayor in eight years will have to contend with projected budget gaps of several billion dollars each in the next few years.

They will succeed unpopular far-left Democrat Bill de Blasio, who has been mayor since January 2014.  

More than 191,000 people have already cast ballots during the nine-day early voting period that ended Sunday. Tens of thousands of absentee ballots will also need to be counted.