The Mamdani Effect
Principled liberals should not be afraid of a thirty-something political liability. A clean break from far-left fanaticism is a moral imperative and a strategic necessity.
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Zohran Mamdani has not even been elected mayor of New York City yet, and he’s already the new face of the Democratic Party.
That’s not just my assessment. It’s the view of the socialist mayor-apparent’s friends and foes alike. And that perception is already having an effect on national politics.
Top Republicans are eager to put a more radical face on the Democratic Party. “Congratulations to the new leader of the Democratic Party,” Vice President JD Vance wrote on social media after Mamdani beat a crowded field of primary challengers back in the summer.
The Republican strategy of making Mamdani the poster boy of Democratic politics is, of course, an intentional distraction from the GOP’s corrupt and authoritarian turn under Donald Trump. But some Democrats are (with varying degrees of enthusiasm) playing along.
“Democratic socialism—is this what the party should look like?” One reporter recently asked Elizabeth Warren.
“You bet,” the Massachusetts senator eagerly responded.
It’s not just progressives like Warren. New York Governor Kathy Hochul—nominally a centrist, appointed by Mamdani’s sub-mediocre opponent Andrew Cuomo—appeared on stage with Mamdani and his far-left associates at a rally this weekend.
Hochul—like fellow invertebrate Hakeem Jeffries—is a sort of hostage. She endorsed Mamdani because she feels she needs his voters. He has declined to endorse her in return because he doesn’t need her. The governor is going to enter an election year looking weak and desperate. Hochul remains vulnerable to the left and even more exposed to a frontal attack from a strong GOP candidate.
Uncomfortable as it is to face, there’s also truth to the framing of Mamdani as an irresponsible extremist.
Consider Mamdani’s well-documented attack on the New York Police Department as “racist, anti-queer, & a major threat to public safety,” a wholesale smear on the very people whose votes he now covets and a lazy flattening of complicated questions on law enforcement. Or his refusal to reject the phrase “globalize the Intifada,” which has fueled anti-Jewish terrorism in America and Europe (“discouraging its use” is not rejection; would we lazily “discourage the use” of a slur against any other group of people or would we emphatically condemn it?).
We are told to trust that Mamdani is not an antisemite, simply a harsh critic of the Israeli government. What then are we to make of Mamdani’s claim that “when the boot of the NYPD is on your neck, it’s been laced by the IDF”? The New York City police do share a liaison program with their Israeli counterparts, and Mamdani is free to criticize that relationship. But why point at Israel as the hand that guides the police when the NYPD maintains partnerships with non-democracies like Qatar, the UAE, and Jordan? Zohran’s focus looks especially suspicious in light of his over-the-top denouncement of the New York State Assembly as a “bastion of Zionist thought” (a turn of phrase that would make the Soviet propagandists of my childhood blush).
Finally, there’s Mamdani’s experience, or lack thereof. His paltry three years serving in that “bastion of Zionist thought” in Albany, during which time he had the worst attendance record among Democratic state assembly members. And he is 34. Yes, 34! This is the man who wants to run one of the most complicated municipalities in the world, a city with a population greater than several NATO member countries.
Before you call me curmudgeonly (I am, but only a little)—getting young people into politics is a good thing. Certainly, Americans do not need any more politicians who were on this Earth in the 1940s. But there is a middle ground between geriatric presidents in cognitive decline and a candidate with just a decade of experience in the working world making a speedrun for executive responsibility over eight million people. Spend a little more time on the board of education, the city council, or state legislature—or, if you’re extra ambitious, in Congress.
When cornered, Zohran Mamdani runs away from all these questions with a furtive smile, clever one-liners, and throwaways about growing and changing his mind. He’s rarely forced to dig deeper (The divided opposition, represented by sleazy Andrew Cuomo and Batman-in-a-red beret Curtis Sliwa, makes Mamdani’s life easier, of course).
Mamdani’s membership in the Democratic Socialists of America is also under-scrutinized.
The DSA, which blamed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on US “imperialist expansionism,” parroting the most basic of Kremlin talking points. The DSA, which dispatched a delegation to meet Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, a man who jails his critics and has protesters murdered. The DSA, which affirms the Iranian theocratic regime’s “right to self-defense” in a war that Tehran started. The DSA, which called for the release of the criminal who executed two civilians—one, an American—at a Jewish museum in Washington. And it was “DSA! DSA! DSA!” that the crowd chanted during Mamdani’s Sunday rally at Forest Hills Stadium.
Apologists hide behind the fact that Mamdani did not make these statements himself. That the DSA is a fractious organization.
Nonsense. This is a question of worldview and judgment.
If we were talking about a Republican candidate who was a member of an organization as far to the right as the DSA is to the left, we would call them out for it, and rightfully so. When Republican candidates go to bat for January 6 insurrectionists (or are insurrectionists themselves), supporters of democracy condemn them, as they should. When Mamdani embraces an imam who served as a defense witness for the perpetrators of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, we ought to call him out too, and forcefully.
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If you don’t find any of this convincing, then think about the new political calculus that Mamdani’s ascent has created. Democrats—even the majority of Democratic elected officials and candidates who don’t share Mamdani’s warped perspective—are now being lumped in with him.
Call it the Mamdani Effect. Concern over far-left politics skipped over the Hudson River into New Jersey, where moderate Democratic gubernatorial nominee Mikie Sherrill’s lead has steadily eroded, falling below ten points, and in more recent polls, below five and into the margin of error. Her rival, Trump-backed Jack Ciatterelli, was giddy when Mamdani won the mayoral primary, encouraging New Yorkers to escape to the Garden State. Mamdani has since become a fixture in his campaigning.
Sherrill may yet win, but it will be a closer contest than it needed to be thanks to the Mamdani Effect. And in the meantime, Democrats are being forced to expend significant resources on races from Trenton to Richmond in order to temper voters’ fears of the far left.
Expect this dynamic to carry forward into the midterms when Republicans will take to the campaign trail with a choice between left-wing radicalism and pseudo-conservative authoritarianism. As I’ve written, there are plenty of examples of people opting for fascism over communism when presented with a choice between the two. You may disagree with the voters’ conclusions, but it is harder to argue with the political history.
Given all of this, what am I calling for?
The answer is courage and consistency.
Conspiracy theories and dictator apologia are contagions whether they come from the far right or the far left. Democrats and principled liberals should reject the DSA just as vigorously as they reject MAGA. They should—with fairness, accuracy, and precision—rebuke Mamdani’s philosophy. And above all, the pro-democracy camp should not be afraid of a thirty-something political liability. In the long run, negotiating with extremists—even if they’re “your extremists”—is a lose-lose proposition. Making a clean break from far-left fanaticism is a moral imperative and a strategic necessity. Only then can supporters of the Constitution return to power and repair the damage wrought by the current administration.
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Gary - I have been following your writings in the Atlantic as well as here on SS, all,year. Your historical take on fascism, and the way thru it, is deep and thought provoking. However, this piece, is, for me, respectfully, off base.
The country is, and has been, screaming for an FDR moment, real populism, real progressive social/economic justice.
If Mamdani’s candidacy for mayor, puts this on the front burner, waking people from their slumber of this societal mess , If billionaires finally pay their fair share, equality slowly seeps back into a civilized society, then so be it.
For me, liberal, progressive, “ far left,” ( your words), is not what ails America. It is the billionaire, fascist, money groveling, faux religious Christian Far Right Nationalist, MEGA CHURCH THIEVES that are destroying America ☮️
I don't think any of the ideological stuff has been driving Mamdani's campaign. He has focused on affordability and has hammered home this message relentlessly, and there's a lot that Democrats can learn from that. Real proposals, not tax credits. A real personality, not a milquetoast who can't speak normally. I like Mamdani, although I don't agree with any of the DSA positions you mention. The Republicans are going to call any Democrat Marxist and Communist, so who cares? They've been doing it forever (I'm 56). I hope Mamdani is a successful mayor, and I hope that Democrats take the right lessons from his amazingly successful campaign.