Latest news with #TheBulwark
News18
4 days ago
- Business
- News18
Zohran Mamdani's City-Owned Grocery Plan Faces Scrutiny After Viral Kansas City's Store Video
Last Updated: Mamdani has promoted his plan for state-owned grocery stores as a way to shift public funds away from corporate retailers. Zohran Mamdani won the Democratic primary last month and has since emerged as one of the leading contenders for the position of New York City mayor. Currently focused on his campaign, Mamdani has outlined several proposals, one of which includes the creation of city-owned grocery stores. However, just weeks after his victory, a viral video has cast doubt on the feasibility of such an initiative. Footage of an empty public grocery store in Kansas City, Missouri, has attracted criticism online. The video, reportedly filmed at KC Sun Fresh, shows rows of bare shelves, as reported by KSHB 41. New York Times. Speaking on The Bulwark podcast, Mamdani said he plans to open one store in each of New York City's five boroughs. He estimated the total cost of the project at $65 million. Acknowledging the experimental nature of the idea, Mamdani said, 'if they work, they work. And if they don't work, c'est la vie, then the idea was wrong." This is not the first time a public official has proposed city-owned grocery initiatives. In 2023, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson introduced a similar concept following the closure of Walmart and a Whole Foods in his city. His administration is now exploring the possibility of launching a city-run farmers' market, where vendors could sell their produce directly at one centralised location. view comments First Published: July 25, 2025, 19:37 IST Disclaimer: Comments reflect users' views, not News18's. Please keep discussions respectful and constructive. Abusive, defamatory, or illegal comments will be removed. News18 may disable any comment at its discretion. By posting, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
New York Post
5 days ago
- Business
- New York Post
Zohran Mamdani's NYC grocery stores scheme draws fresh scrutiny as video of empty, city-owned Missouri market goes viral
He could be biting off more than he can chew. A viral video showing a desolate publicly-funded grocery store in Missouri has drawn fresh scrutiny on socialist mayoral contender Zohran Mamdani's signature proposal to bring city-owned markets to the Big Apple. The eerie footage showed virtually bare shelves inside the Kansas City, Miss. store, with local outlet KSHB 41 reporting this week that a rancid odor also wafted inside the shop. Advertisement 6 A viral video shows the poor conditions inside the city-owned Sun Fresh Market grocery store in Kansas City. KSHB 6 Empty shelves seen inside Sun Fresh Market. KSHB The lack of produce and other goods came despite the store being in a city-owned building and receiving millions of taxpayer dollars since opening in 2018, the report said. Advertisement 'I can tell you today right now it's damn near dead,' one outraged local told the outlet. Many viewed the video as prophetic for New York City, with one X user posting, 'Watch this, Mamdani supporters.' Mamdani helped clinch the Democratic mayoral nomination by running a campaign focused on affordability, including a promise to create a network of city-owned grocery stores to the Big Apple. 'It's like a public option for produce,' he said in one of his slick TikTok videos. 'We will redirect city funds from corporate supermarkets to city-owned grocery stores whose mission is to lower prices, not price gouging. Advertisement 'These stores will operate without a profit motive, or having to pay property taxes or rent, and will pass on those savings to you. They'll partner with small businesses and nearby farms and sell at wholesale prices.' 6 Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani has proposed opening city-owned grocery stores. Zohran Mamdani / TikTok The proposal inspired an explosion of handwringing among some New Yorkers, with some warning of Soviet-style groceries and billionaire John Catsimatidis threatening to close his Gristedes grocery chain. 'We can't compete with Mamdani opening city-run supermarkets for free,' Catsimatidis has told The Post. Advertisement But Mamdani's plan is largely vague on details, such as whether the city itself will actually run the stores or hand off operations to a private or nonprofit partner. He has interchangeably used the terms 'city-owned' and 'city-run' to describe the stores during his campaign. 6 A local TV station also reported a rancid smell in the Kansas City store. KSHB Mamdani said he envisions the initiative as a pilot program that's more of an experiment. 'That would be one store in each borough – five stores across New York City,' he said on 'The Bulwark' podcast. 'It would cost $65 million,' he said before the podcast host Tim Miller interrupted to jokingly call them 'five communist stores.' 'It might be an interesting test case to see how poorly it does compared to its neighbors,' Miller said. 6 Sun Fresh Market has recieved millions of dollars in taxpayer funds since opening in 2018, according to the report. KSHB Advertisement Mamdani contended that he was more interested in testing a potential practical policy than pushing an ideological agenda. 'No matter how you think about the idea, I do think that there should be room for reasonable policy experimentation in our cities and in our country, where we actually test out our ideas,' he said. 'And if they work, they work. And if they don't work, c'est la vie, then the idea was wrong.' The Queens assemblyman has pointed toward the government-owned grocery store in St. Paul, Kansas, a community of roughly 600 people, as a success story. Advertisement Brittain Ladd, a supply chain logistics and retail consultant, said government-run grocery stores in New York City could break even, but they could only offer a limited number of basic products and would need to be operated by grocery 'experts.' 6 The report noted a lack of fresh produce available in the city-owned grocery store. KSHB 'The program will fail if people who don't have expertise set it up,' Ladd said. 'These would be very specialized grocery stores. This would not look like a grocery store. It would be a very bare bones operation,' Ladd said. Advertisement 'It would be to really just provide the things that people need the most.' Nevin Cohen, director for the CUNY Urban Food Policy Institute, said Mamdani's proposal isn't so far-fetched, noting the city has six public retail markets, such as Jamaica Market, with a history going back to Mayor Fiorello La Guardia in the 1930s. 'They still operate in neighborhoods all across the city, and there, the Economic Development Corporation of New York City owns and manages the building and sets the rents so that there is a mix of neighborhood-serving vendors with rents that are affordable so they can provide low cost food,' Cohen said. Advertisement Cohen envisioned a public-private model would prevail if Mamdani wins in November and moves forward with the experiment, adding he didn't think city-owned grocery stores would impact existing businesses. 'In New York City, with 1,000 supermarkets, I don't think it's likely that the five public markets that Mamdani has been talking about would in any way undermine existing food retailers,' he said.
CNN
22-07-2025
- Politics
- CNN
‘The president is in a real quagmire here,' says reporter on Epstein files
Will Sommer, Senior Reporter for The Bulwark, talks to Bianna Golodryga about the MAGA base putting pressure on President Trump over the Epstein case.
CNN
22-07-2025
- Politics
- CNN
‘The president is in a real quagmire here,' says reporter on Epstein files
Will Sommer, Senior Reporter for The Bulwark, talks to Bianna Golodryga about the MAGA base putting pressure on President Trump over the Epstein case.
Yahoo
19-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Ex-RNC Spokesperson Says Trump Is In 'Deep Trouble' With This Key Group
Former Republican National Committee spokesperson Tim Miller on Friday argued that Donald Trump's support is weakening in the so-called 'manosphere' — an online community of hyper-masculine, anti-establishment comedians and podcasters that were a key component to his election win. Miller, now with the anti-Trump conservative site The Bulwark, joined MSNBC to address Trump navigating backlash from his coalition over his administration's handling of files tied to late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Miller, citing Trump's famous Fifth Avenue comments, predicted that the president's main base would 'come back around to him' but the manosphere's support has been fading because 'they don't like being played for fools.' 'They're not in the cult, they were with Trump as a matter of convenience,' he told host Nicolle Wallace. Podcasters like Theo Von, Andrew Schulz, Joe Rogan — all of whom hosted Trump on their shows last year as the campaign looked at young men as a key voting cohort in the lead-up to the election — are among those whohavecriticized the administration over the Epstein files in recent weeks. Miller, while arguing that Trump's support with the manosphere is dwindling, pointed to comedian Shane Gillis' ESPY Awards hosting gig where he quipped that a joke about Epstein got 'deleted' from his opening monologue. He noted that Gillis has appeared on Schulz's 'Flagrant' podcast. 'So he's in deep trouble with that crowd,' Miller stressed. Moments earlier, Miller declared that Trump 'totally misjudged' whether his base cared about the Epstein case. Elsewhere in the segment, Wallace claimed that Trump's 'miscalculation' may have been his lack of appreciation for 'the depths' to which FBI director Kash Patel and FBI deputy director Dan Bongino were invested in Epstein conspiracy theories. She added that Trump also may not have appreciated what animates the manosphere: conspiracy theories and 'distrust of institutions.' 'It's not that they liked Trump, they liked Trump to the extent that he was adjacent to the conspiracies, that he seemed like a fellow traveler in helping them get to the bottom of them. They didn't like him for his policy positions or his looks,' Wallace said. Related... 'Blackmail': Rosie O'Donnell Rips CBS For Kissing 'Madman' Trump's Ring After Colbert News Trump's WSJ Lawsuit Has Social Media Users Cheering For 1 Unexpected Reason Trump Sues WSJ Reporters, Murdoch For Libel After Epstein Birthday Card Story
