Zohran Mamdani is the disastrous far-Left future progressive New Yorkers deserve
Fancy family names tend to give a false sense of electoral security – think Hillary Clinton in both 2008 and 2016. And now there's Andrew Cuomo. The one time governor of the state of New York was electorally trounced in the Democratic primaries in New York City on Tuesday by 33 year-old upstart Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist who could very well become the city's next mayor.
Mamdani's victory seemed almost unimaginable when both he and Cuomo first entered the race. With Cuomo's iconic last name – his father, Mario, was also governor of New York – and his billionaire backers, he appeared truly too big to fail. None other than Bill Clinton endorsed him as the race entered its final loop.
But was Cuomo's loss really such a surprise? Having resigned from office in 2021 amid sexual harassment allegations, he came to the campaign with the type of baggage that would have kept most men from running in the first place. Add on his controversial leadership during the Covid pandemic – which saw thousands of nursing home patients die – and Cuomo was decidedly damaged goods.
Whispers that he only wanted to be mayor in order to mount an eventual race for the White House didn't help. Nor did Cuomo's surprisingly low profile during the final days of the campaign. While Mamdani was literally everywhere – he recently walked seven hours from the top of Manhattan to its bottom meeting voters – the New York Post ran a piece last week asking of Cuomo 'where the hell is that guy?'
On Friday night, we walked the length of Manhattan, from Inwood Hill to Battery Park.
New Yorkers deserve a Mayor they can see, hear, even yell at. The city is in the streets. pic.twitter.com/gbOLz78Fta
— Zohran Kwame Mamdani (@ZohranKMamdani) June 23, 2025
Cuomo certainly had little financial reason to hide, having considerably outspent Mamdani. But in many ways, voters also had little reason to vote for Cuomo – except for the fact that he wasn't Zohran Mamdani. And look where such thinking got Kamala Harris in her race against Donald Trump last year.
Of course there were plenty of reasons to not want Mandani to win. His ultra-socialist agenda promotes policies – rent freezes, state-run grocery stores – so outlandish that even the New York Times declared them 'uniquely unsuited to the city's challenges'. In a stark warning a few days back, The Chicago Tribune cautioned New Yorkers that choosing a socialist mayor would turn that city into theirs: going broke thanks to far-Left mayor Brandon Johnson's reckless policies. And Mamdani is even further to the Left of his potential Chicago counterpart.
So how did a city so sensitive to taxes, crime and political poseurs rally behind a kid whose only real job – besides Queens assemblyman – was a brief stint as a rapper? In a sense, how could they have not? Handsome, charming, Muslim, Mamdani is the inevitable outcome of the decades of identity politics that have seeped so deeply into every element of American society.
His appeal – intersectional, anti-Israel, youthful and anti-authoritarian – is the political manifestation of everything from DEI to the nearly two years of violent pro-Palestinian protests that have convulsed the nation. And nowhere have those protests been more violent – or youthful or intersectional – than in New York City. With his slick social media posts and elite education, Mamdani cannily understood the most potent weapon of wokeness and identity politics – its ability to trick folks into acting (or, in this case, voting) against their own best interests. And New York voters have made the far-Left proud. Very proud.
So what happens now – besides the likelihood of rising crime and fewer housing starts under a Mamdani administration? He is not yet mayor – far from it. Still to come is the general election in November, pitting him against incumbent Eric Adams, now an independent following his own brush with a corruption scandal last year.
Like Cuomo – who himself could continue campaigning as an independent – Adams is also damaged goods. Beyond the allegations of cosying up to Turkey in exchange for fancy travel perks, Adams has found a champion in president Trump. This would be an asset in much of America, but New Yorkers – despite voting for the president in record numbers last year – generally despise the man. Along with those who align with him. Trump's Department of Justice dropped its case against Adams when the president returned to office earlier this year; Adams has no political future without him.
Which means this remains Mamdani's race to lose, a chilling thought for fans of civic basics such as a functioning housing system and law and order. Much like the White House last summer, New York City is politically rudderless – overseen by a nominal leader, Adams, desperate to retain power as he campaigns on dubious legitimacy. There's talk of the arrival of some 11th hour dark-horse wild-card to upset the race once again. But whatever the anti-Mamdani forces do next, they must be as calculating and disciplined as Mandani himself.
David Christopher Kaufman is a New York Post columnist
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Daily Mail
29 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
John Fetterman warns that likely new 'Democratic socialist' NYC mayor is 'Christmas in July' for the GOP
Unlike some members of his political party, Pennsylvania Democrat John Fetterman isn't looking at Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani's victory in the New York City mayoral primary through rose-colored glasses. 'I'd describe it as Christmas in July for the GOP,' Fetterman said Wednesday. Mamdani - a state legislator - appears to have beaten out a field of other candidates in the Democrat Mayoral primary Tuesday, including former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo who resigned from office in 2021 over sexual harassment allegations. The official results of the election won't be confirmed until July 1 due to the city's ranked choice voting system. One of Mamdani's fellow New York Democrats was also, like Fetterman, unsettled by his victory. Laura Gillen, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Long Island denounced the win in a statement posted on X. 'Socialist Zohran Mamdani is too extreme to lead New York City. His entire campaign has been built on unachievable promises and higher taxes, which is the last thing New York needs.' 'Beyond that, Mr. Mamdani has called to defund the police and has demonstrated a deeply disturbing pattern of unacceptable antisemitic comments which stoke hate at a time when antisemitism is skyrocketing. He is the absolute wrong choice for New York,' Gillen added. Zohran Mamdani's socialist, defund the police platform is wrong for New York City. I joined @EVargasTV tonight to discuss how Mr. Mamdani lacks a realistic fiscal plan or the legal ability to deliver on his many campaign promises. Watch the full interview here: — Laura Gillen (@LauraAGillen) June 26, 2025 Still, Mamdani was backed by a number of Fetterman and Gillen's Capitol Hill colleagues including Independent Senator Bernie Sanders and far-left Democrat Congresswoman Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. Both lawmakers congratulated him on the primary victory. Sanders wrote: 'Congratulations to Zohran Mamdani and his thousands of grassroots supporters for their extraordinary campaign. You took on the political, economic and media Establishment- and you beat them. Now it's on to victory in the general election.' Ocasio-Cortez, who beat out an establishment Democrat in her own party primary seven years ago and became a household name almost overnight wrote: 'Congratulations, @ZohranKMamdani. Your dedication to an affordable, welcoming, and safe New York City where working families can have a shot has inspired people across the city. Billionaires and lobbyists poured millions against you and our public finance system. And you won.' Mamdani's campaign promoted socialist ideas like rent freezes for rent-stabilized apartments, grocery stores that would be owned by the city, and free public buses. He has also advocated for defunding the city's police department, defended pro- Palestine slogans like 'globalize the intifada' and said he would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Former President Bill Clinton was another Democrat who applauded Mamdani's win: 'Congratulations @ZohranKMamdani on your victory in yesterday's primary election and a well-run campaign. I'm wishing you much success in November and beyond as you work to bring New Yorkers together to tackle the city's challenges and shape a stronger, fairer future,' Clinton wrote on X, in a post to which only people he followed could reply. Congratulations @ZohranKMamdani on your victory in yesterday's primary election and a well-run campaign. I'm wishing you much success in November and beyond as you work to bring New Yorkers together to tackle the city's challenges and shape a stronger, fairer future. — Bill Clinton (@BillClinton) June 25, 2025 Mamdani has vowed to 'fight back' against president Donald Trump, saying that he is the Republican's 'worst nightmare' because he is a 'progressive, Muslim immigrant who actually fights for the things I believe in'. Trump himself responded to Mamdani's apparent victory, calling him a 'communist lunatic' in a post on social media site Truth Social he made Wednesday. 'It's finally happened, the Democrats have crossed the line. Zohran Mamdani, a 100% Communist Lunatic, has just won the Dem Primary, and is on his way to becoming Mayor,' Trump wrote. 'We've had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous. He looks TERRIBLE, his voice is grating, he's not very smart, he's got AOC+3, Dummies ALL, backing him, and even our Great Palestinian Senator, Cryin' Chuck Schumer, is groveling over him. Yes, this is a big moment in the History of our Country!' Trump has repeatedly tagged Schumer, a Jewish longtime supporter of Israel, as a 'Palestinian senator.' The president's remark that Mamdani is 'on his way' would appear to count out current Mayor Eric Adams, who is seeking reelection as an independent. The Justice Department called a halt to a criminal prosecution of Adams soon after Trump took office this year and put in new leadership. Schumer, who declined to endorse in the mayoral primary, was also among the Democrats who commended Mamdani on the victory. 'I have known @ZohranKMamdani since we worked together to provide debt relief for thousands of beleaguered taxi drivers & fought to stop a fracked gas plant in Astoria. He ran an impressive campaign that connected with New Yorkers about affordability, fairness, & opportunity,' Scumer wrote on X. He also added that he looked forward to 'getting together soon' with Mamdani. I have known @ZohranKMamdani since we worked together to provide debt relief for thousands of beleaguered taxi drivers & fought to stop a fracked gas plant in Astoria. He ran an impressive campaign that connected with New Yorkers about affordability, fairness, & opportunity. — Chuck Schumer (@chuckschumer) June 25, 2025
Telegraph
37 minutes ago
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How $29 sandwiches pushed New York to socialism
As New York baked under a record-breaking heatwave this week, Wall Street was left sweating for an entirely different reason. 'It's officially a hot commie summer,' hedge fund billionaire Dan Loeb said on social media, sounding the alarm after Zohran Mamdani's unexpected triumph in the Democratic mayoral primary. Donald Trump, in typical fashion, went further. 'A 100pc Communist Lunatic … is on his way to becoming Mayor. We've had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous,' he said. By defeating centrist Andrew Cuomo ahead of November's election, Mamdani is promising to shake up the city with a package of policies straight from the Jeremy Corbyn playbook. Whether it be rent freezes, tax hikes on companies and high earners, free childcare or a city-run chain of grocery stores, the firebrand young socialist's proposed policies have sent Wall Street financiers and Big Apple property developers scrambling. However, for many others in the city, the cricket-playing, first-generation Muslim-American has struck a chord. New Yorkers almost always return a Democrat mayor, but seldom have they strayed this far from the political mainstream. How did Mamdani coax voters away from the centre ground? 'New Yorkers are struggling' The answer lies in the queues of young people outside the door of every vacant flat to rent in central New York, and in the Reddit forums where New Yorkers moan about paying $20 plus (£15) for a sandwich. The cost of living has soared and wages aren't keeping up. And while the squeeze is universal, it's Gen Z who are feeling it the most. 'The New York City that I grew up in was a middle-class city, and it was also a manufacturing city,' says Steven Cohen, a public affairs professor at Columbia University. 'We don't do any of that now.' Young people come for the attractive jobs, but nowadays they move away to raise a family. Only in the outer boroughs, Cohen says, is New York still a conventional town of blue-collar and white-collar families. 'The economic changes to New York City over the last half-century have resulted in a different kind of city, and a different kind of politics. And it is extremely expensive to live here, even on a high income.' Eric Adams, the incumbent mayor – elected as a law-and-order Democrat but now, after a corruption scandal, running for re-election as an independent – issues a slew of stats suggesting New York is in a better place than before the pandemic. But the numbers that New Yorkers can see and feel around them tell a different story. Andrew Kimball, the chief executive of the city's Economic Development Corporation, admitted as much in a report earlier this year. 'We know that many New Yorkers are still struggling,' he said. 'We've added many jobs but not enough homes. Top earners in New York City are beating the rest of the country, but lower earners aren't doing much better here than they could elsewhere. 'If we can't blunt the sharpest disparities between soaring highs and stubborn lows, between communities of colour and white New Yorkers, we may lose what makes our city so magical: our people. 'We must make our economy work for everyone.' In an attempt to rescue the narrative, Kimball also pointed to the record highs that New York posted last year for the number of people in employment and the labour force participation rate. But jobs growth is slowing quickly. Mamdani, meanwhile, has zeroed in on the disparities lurking beneath the headline figures. The unemployment rate among Black New Yorkers was 8.5pc in the third quarter of last year, while for Hispanics it was 6.7pc. But among whites, the rate last year averaged 3.3pc. The inequalities aren't just between ethnic groups, but also between different parts of the labour market. The median shop assistant in New York earns almost 13pc more than the national median for retail, but the median lawyer makes 56pc more than lawyers nationwide. Price politics Prices in New York are climbing faster than in other big cities. The inflation rate in New York has been hovering around 4pc, almost double the 2pc recorded nationwide. By comparison, Miami and San Francisco have inflation rates of 2.2pc and 1.3pc, respectively. Figures show that pay packets aren't keeping pace with these prices. Inflation-adjusted wages in New York fell 3.7pc in 2023, compared with 0.9pc nationwide. This trend created a ready market for one of Mamdani's most eye-catching TikTok videos: his lament over 'halal-flation' – the price of a street-van doner kebab. After hanging out at the vans, he told followers that the vendors were being punished by the New York permit system, which he could sort out. Crucially, he said this would cut the cost of a kebab from $10 to $8. His other remedy was to suggest that the city could set up and run its own chain of lower-cost grocery stores. Retail billionaire John Catsimatidis has already told CNN that his Red Apple Group grocery chain would leave New York if this were the case. 'We don't want to do business with socialists,' he said. But the cost of a kebab is small change next to the biggest financial headache for New Yorkers: sky-high rents. In a city where two-thirds of people rent, the vacancy rate of 1.4pc is the lowest in decades. And it keeps getting worse: in the past decade, for every 5.7 new jobs created, only one new housing unit was built. And in a supply-demand crunch, rents rise faster than incomes. 'Households at the 40th percentile of the income distribution in New York City may have Chicago or Dallas incomes, but they are expected to pay New York City prices for market-rate units,' Kimball said. Mamdani's answer is to 'freeze the rent'. More than half of New York rents – mostly relating to blocks over 50 years old – are already subject to rental controls, known as 'rent stabilisation'. This limits rent increases to 3pc. But the proportion of units that are rent-stabilised has dropped from two thirds in 1999 to just above 50pc. The rest are at market rate. To afford a median asking rent, a household must earn $120,000 per year, well above what a typical 20-something would earn. Mamdani's people The people caught in this trap are, in theory, Mamdani's people. 'We have won because New Yorkers have stood up for a city they can afford,' he said in his victory speech. 'A city where they can do more than just struggle. One where those who toil in the night can enjoy the fruits of their labour in the day.' But although Mamdani has evidently won over the idealistic young, his appeal, like many socialists, does not necessarily extend to the working-class districts for which he claims to speak. Figures compiled by The New York Times showed that Mamdani's strongest support – where he captured 40pc or more of the vote – was in higher-income and middle-income neighbourhoods, and among college graduates. Although he also hit 48pc support in precincts with more Hispanic voters, that dropped to 38pc in lower-income districts and 34pc in heavily Black neighbourhoods. The other question mark over his broader appeal is that barely 10pc of New York voters participated in the Democratic primary, and they are likely to be the most ideologically motivated of electors. 'In the general election, this is why [independents] Bloomberg and Giuliani won,' Columbia's Cohen says. 'You've got a much different ideological composition. Even Trump did a lot better last election than he did the first time in New York City.' This has left those fearful of Mamdani with an avenue to beat him, particularly if they can coalesce around a single candidate. This is most likely to be Adams, the centrist Democrat, who can run again as an independent after Trump quashed his federal fraud indictments. But a couple of opinion polls, taken well before this week's result, suggest Mamdani is rating in the mid-30s – enough to win a first-past-the-post encounter. Mamdani's challenger will win the fundraising battle, and also perhaps the political argument. What remains unclear is whether they can match Mamdani in proposing punchy policies to assuage New Yorkers' cost of living concerns. 'The centrist candidate has to present himself as having some of the same authenticity that Mandami was able to present,' Cohen says. 'I think the Democrats nationally should learn from that freshness, youth and the direct communication. But the ideological content of it is probably not as attractive as Mandani might think it is.'
Reuters
40 minutes ago
- Reuters
'Shadow' Fed chief would not influence policy debate, Goolsbee tells CNBC
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