While Democrats are in the midst of an identity crisis with no real leader for the party, the first new “rising star” of the second Trump era is hitting the stage in New York City.
Zohran Mamdani, a New York assemblyman running for mayor of New York City, is the subject of the newest Democratic love affair. He has already received a standard glowing profile in the New York Times and an even more enthusiastic profile in Politico. Mamdani also has grassroots support among leftwing voters who previously backed Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-VT) two presidential campaigns, maxing out New York City’s fundraising limit of $8 million, driven by small-dollar donations.
Like Bernie, Mamdani is a socialist. One of his grand affordability proposals is government-run grocery stores. Instead of decreasing taxes for residents, Mamdani would rather get an inefficient government bureaucracy into an industry with already slim profit margins, where all the losses will be thrown onto taxpayers. Mamdani also wants to increase the corporate tax rate, yet another cost that will be passed on to city residents.
Mamdani is a top promoter of the antisemitic “pro-Palestine” movement, including being arrested at a protest outside Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-NY) home shortly after the Oct. 7 attacks, where Mamdani and others were calling for Israel not to respond to Palestinian terrorists murdering 1,200 civilians. Mamdani peddles claims about a fictional “genocide” against the Palestinians, opposed former President Joe Biden for not being tough enough on Israel, and is backed by antisemitic activist Linda Sarsour.
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This is all part of the appeal. Mamdani is as unapologetically left-wing as they come, but he has fun doing it. Politico’s gushing profile details the “humor” and entertainment factor of Mamdani’s campaign, juxtaposing the scolding progressivism of former Vice President Kamala Harris and the mainstream Democratic Party’s attitude of constant misery. As such, Mamdani offers “another path” where Democrats don’t have to move to the center to meet voters where they are. Why wouldn’t Democrats and liberal media love a campaign they can use to pretend their far-left politics weren’t a driving factor in Democrats’ terrible election performance?
Mamdani is an antisemite and an adherent to a failed economic ideology that wants to bring that ideology to a city that has been in constant decline thanks to repeated left-wing failures. He is also the model that many in the Democratic Party and liberal media want to replicate at the national level, with Democrats rejecting moderation and instead masking their loony progressivism with positivity rather than the smarmy lectures that have become the core messaging of the party.