On July 1, it was announced that Zohran Mamdani, the 33-year-old New York State Assemblyman and member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), had won the New York City Democratic primary election for mayor of New York City. He won decisively over his fiercest rival, former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, by 12%. To become mayor, he must now defeat Cuomo again, since Cuomo is now running as an independent. Mamdani is currently ahead in recent polls and, even after current mayor Eric Adams dropped out of what had been a three-way race, is still likely to become mayor of the largest city in the United States.
His primary victory has been nationwide news and has set off an explosion of contrasting reactions. For many rank-and-file Democrats, self-proclaimed progressives, poor, working-class and cash-strapped renters, people of color and Muslim New Yorkers, there has been a wave of excitement. The same is true for many DSA members and others more or less on the left. They believe they finally have a candidate who cares about them and will stand up to the powerful billionaires and economic forces that dominate the city. Among these big capitalists, their conservative allies and the reactionary right wing, the reaction has been the exact opposite. They immediately labeled him a communist and a Muslim extremist and have stoked fears that his policies will turn the city into a post-apocalyptic wasteland. The billionaire capitalists and business interests that dominate the city and nation fear that he will actually make them pay more taxes and challenge their political and economic dominance.
But beyond these conflicting and dramatic reactions, there are real questions about what Mamdani’s election means. Why and how did he win the election? Will he and the DSA change the Democratic Party? Are there practical and ideological limitations to his politics? And will he be able to accomplish some or all of his agenda if elected?
How Mamdani won
Zohran Mamdani won the primary election first and foremost because his two most well-known opponents had been widely discredited among the Democratic voting base. Cuomo, a pro-billionaire establishment figure, mishandled the Covid-19 crisis in New York and was forced out of the governorship after numerous documented cases of sexual harassment. His economic policies kept low taxes and minimal regulations on business interests and did nothing to help poor and working-class New Yorkers. Former cop and current Mayor Eric Adams didn’t even run in the primary because he had been indicted and was likely to be convicted on a variety of corruption charges and, to get out of jail free, he made a deal with the Trump administration. He is also on the side of billionaire Zionists, has cracked down on student protesters; and now about a dozen of his aides, staffers and big fundraisers are also charged with corruption. With one major rival disgraced and unpopular and the other out of the primary race entirely, Mamdani had an opportunity.
Mamdani also benefitted from ranked-choice voting, in which voters can rank their candidates and give their original vote to their second choice if their original choice isn’t a leading vote getter in the first round of voting. In this way, Mamdani and other relatively progressive candidates didn’t cancel each other out, but in effect were able to pool their votes into one progressive bloc of support for the most successful, which was Mamdani. Especially important was the cross-endorsement arrangement with Brad Lander, the respected liberal New York City Comptroller. While many Landers supporters might have ranked Mamdani second anyway, the official support for each other without question brought in votes for Mamdani.
Mamdani also won the support of a number of small unions and union locals in the city. He also encouraged members of smaller progressive parties, like the Greens and the Working Families Party, to register as Democrats just to be able to vote in the primary. Thousands of DSA members conducted a grassroots canvassing campaign that connected Mamdani and his supporters with working class New Yorkers in a way rarely done, even bringing ethnic communities like South Asians into the voting equation significantly for the first time. This base of union and progressive support combined with the forces of the DSA and allowed his campaign to use social media effectively, knock on doors citywide, and maintain a high energy campaign. Mamdani himself contributed to this effect, as his optimistic attitude and his genuine demeanor contrasted starkly with the Cuomo’s meanness, cynicism and fearmongering.
But the key factor in his victory was undoubtedly his broad platform of progressive social and economic reforms claiming to aim at making NYC affordable for working people. He proposed free bus service citywide (more than 300 bus routes), a rent freeze on rent-stabilized apartments (more than one million apartments), the expansion of early childcare, higher property taxes on luxury homes, a two percent income tax increase for those earning over one million dollars per year, construction of 200,000 affordable housing units, one city-owned grocery store in every borough, as well as tax increases statewide and a doubling of the state’s minimum wage to $30 per hour.
At least 545,000 voters believed that these reforms would directly improve their material conditions, protecting them at least in small ways from the crushing financial burdens of living in New York City. The enthusiastic support from many New Yorkers was yet another sign that working people are frustrated and fed up with politics as usual. Sick and tired of seeing the rich dominate the two major political parties, more than half a million were willing to vote for someone different. In fact, he even won some districts that in past elections have supported Trump.
The Democratic Response
The response within the Democratic Party has been mixed, ranging from excited support from more progressive members to disdain from the party elites. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and those like her endorsed him quickly and have tried to help spread his politics among other progressive Democrats. Moderate Democrats have complimented his campaign style and success while condemning his politics. The tops of the party apparatus have been outright hostile, viewing him as a direct challenge to the billionaire capitalists who finance and shape both the Democratic and Republican parties. With the exception of the few who already hold his politics and portray themselves as challengers of the Party apparatus, it is clear that the Democratic elites have no intention of turning against the big business interests they serve. They may endorse him officially but then work diligently to limit his reforms and the perceived damage to the capitalists they represent. As of now some Democratic leaders have begun to endorse him and offer their support, while others have still held off on backing him publicly.
Mamdani’s politics and their limitations
The political program of the DSA is thoroughly reformist, meaning that despite the occasional radical or even revolutionary pronouncement, it is otherwise a long listing of the many reforms that the DSA would make to capitalism as it currently exists. While the DSA and its membership more or less genuinely aspire to make more fundamental changes, they are following the same well-worn path of reformism followed first by the Socialist International (1889-1914) and by many socialist parties since. Although they claim socialism to be their goal, none of these parties have ever led working people anywhere near getting rid of the capitalist and class societies that pillage our world. In fact, they have often paved the way for more violent forms of reaction, most notably in opening the door for World War I and then the rise of fascism in Europe in the 1920s and 1930s.
Tragically, the DSA has more or less followed these same failed politics. In New York, the party is working energetically to build an electoral apparatus that can win positions in the existing government. They are committed to channeling the energies of their working-class and middle-class supporters into elections, hoping to win a few elections and get at least some of their members into office. This reflects the unrealistic hope that with a few elected officials, they can start to nudge the city, maybe the state, then maybe the U.S. towards socialism.
Even worse, in the United States today, they seem to believe that working within the Democratic Party is the way to move towards their goals. This often means watering down even further their core proposals for reform in order to satisfy Democratic donors and the party’s more liberal base. Mamdani, although a DSA member, said openly on the campaign trail that his platform is not the DSA platform, thus already distancing himself from even the reformism of the DSA. Mamdani has made clear that he is trying to work within and change the Democratic party. He said on a podcast this spring that, “There is a battle right now for the soul of the Democratic Party… I, as a Democrat…” He not only identifies and runs as a Democrat, he has encouraged independents to join the Democratic Party. He supported Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election, despite her complete support for Israel’s carnage in the Middle East and a plan for mass deportations not much different from Trump’s. Even his cross-endorsement agreement with Brad Lander, a liberal Democrat, shows again his affinity with the Democratic Party and just how close to the center he is. He and many in the DSA are clearly committed to operating within the Democratic Party in an attempt to move it to the left.
It is highly unlikely that the Democratic Party will dramatically change, or that this change will come because of Mamdani or another charismatic progressive politician. The Democratic Party has mastered the art of taking energetic social movements, putting into law watered-down versions of what those movements want or have already won in the streets, and then pulling their leaders and energy into the Democratic Party where their vision and energy are stifled. This happened to a great extent with the union movement of the 1930s and the Black freedom movement in the following decades. Despite being movements of millions of people, both were drawn into the Democratic Party where the needs of millions of poor working people and Black people were then left to be ignored.
Mamdani is already showing that, even before rising in the Democratic apparatus, he may be more than willing to water down his own platform, lessen his own willingness to challenge the status quo, or make compromises in order to get even some of what he claims to stand for.
Mamdani has begun what a recent New York Times article called “a full-scale charm offensive of private meetings, phone calls and public promises aimed at wooing top party leaders, donors and activists.” He has won the endorsements of Democratic stars like Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, who was also willing to vocally support Kamala Harris despite Harris’ regressive policies and complete support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza. A number of his new aides and advisors are longtime Democratic Party operatives.
Even worse, he is conducting the same charm offensive with New York’s business community. Since winning the primary, he has had at least three meetings with business organizations in which he worked hard to convince them of his pragmatism. At one meeting sponsored by the Partnership for New York, a group of 150 representatives of the biggest banks, real estate developers, law firms and corporations in the city met privately with Mamdani, with billionaires like former mayor Michael Bloomberg in the room. While a few of New York’s ruling class left the meeting committed to standing against him, at least some were impressed with his pragmatism and took the meeting to mean that his platform and policies were negotiable and not rigid. If they play their cards right, they may contemplate support for Mamdani in a way that would channel rising anti-capitalist sentiment right back into the Democratic Party where it can die a slow death.
Can he even accomplish his main goals?
Beyond his own limited political perspective, there is the larger structural question of what he (or any mayor and city council of New York City) is actually able to do within the constraints that exist in the system as is.
The mayor of New York, for example, does not have full control over the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA), which runs all the buses and subways in the city. The board that manages the transit system has 17 members, only four of whom are chosen by the New York City mayor. The rest are chosen by suburban counties and by the governor, who in effect controls the system. In other words, Mamdani is severely limited in his options of how to manage or pay for any transit initiatives.
To pay for the other progressive initiatives he proposes, like free childcare for children younger than six or the 200,000 new units of affordable housing, he will have to increase revenues. The only revenue stream that New York City has the legal right to increase on its own is the property tax. If that was raised and reformed in significant ways (for example, an increase in rates on properties that have increased in value dramatically over the past decades without a similar increase in property taxes), the city could raise at least $1 billion, perhaps a few billion.
Beyond that every other conceivable source of revenue — income taxes, sales taxes, business taxes, and excise taxes — are off-limits without the approval of the governor and state legislature in Albany. And since Mamdani’s full social housing program alone may cost as much as $100 billion over a 10-year period, we can see that the city has no hope of raising that on its own. When that reality is combined with the intransigence of Albany and other state political forces, we can further see that New York City has little reason to expect significant help from Albany towards furthering Mamdani’s goals. Governor Hochul herself is one of those Democratic leaders who only recently endorsed Mamdani, and she likely did so only to be able to maintain a wide base among Democrats during her upcoming gubernatorial campaign. In other words, Mamdani is again severely constrained in any attempts to pay for his housing, pre-K, free busing and other initiatives.
And even if he or other New York City politicians looked to borrow for the expansion of these programs, that too is constrained by and needs permission from Albany. And even if he received the go-ahead from the state, would major banks even lend to the city and a politician to further goals that they have no interest in supporting? Or would they instead withhold financing to make Mamdani and the city squirm, using it as another chance to point the finger at the reformist Mamdani and gleefully say, “Look, another example of socialism failing!”
Beyond these very clear fiscal constraints, there also lurk the effects of federal budget cuts. The Trump administration could simply withhold federal transportation money, or perhaps housing funding for Section 9 subsidies. While this is probably illegal, the current administration has been eager to violate laws that it doesn’t like, and probably wouldn’t think twice about cutting funding to New York City. In this scenario, it is possible that Mamdani could end up overseeing and managing austerity, with actual cuts to some or many public services rather than their extension and improvement.
And, in an even worse scenario, what would Mamdani do – or be able to do – if Trump were to flood the city with National Guard or federal troops? And if Mamdani did actually try to resist federal intervention, what would the New York City Police Department do? Would they stand behind Mamdani, or would they welcome and support a takeover by state or federal troops on New York streets?
What should be obvious is that even if Mamdani and his supporters are genuine in their desire for free buses, more affordable housing, higher taxes on the rich and more, it is unlikely that they will be able to accomplish even these limited goals. Not only does the city have limited resources on its own, other levels of government that would be needed to carry out his proposals won’t allow the proposals to be implemented or financed. And, at some point, the raw force of the U.S. capitalist state could be used directly to further constrain or outright destroy the Mamdani/DSA project.
What would it really take to accomplish his goals?
To truly have a chance of accomplishing even the modest reforms that he proposes, Mamdani would first need to directly challenge the people he’s currently trying to make nice with. Meeting with and conducting “charm offensives” with New York’s ruling class and Democratic elites won’t get them to accept heavy tax increases or tougher regulations or to loosen their grip on the city government, at least not significantly.
To accomplish his stated goals, there would need to be a real mobilization of working people that goes far beyond the electoral support and the support for modest reforms that he has assembled up to this point. What is needed is a real social movement, actively organizing to stop the rising reaction in the U.S. and to struggle for social progress on all fronts. It would take a social movement that doesn’t stop at the ballot box or support for politicians working within the system that constrains us. It would take a social movement that goes beyond single issues and single politicians and recognizes the interconnections between capitalism and most of the suffering that exists throughout our world. No one politician, no one political campaign, can substitute for an organized mass movement that can exercise real power in society.
In fact, as crucial as New York City is to the national and global economies, they are also essential to the well-being of the city and its residents. As big as the city is, it is not self-reliant. Its economy and its people are inseparable from the wider world. We are not going to solve our big problems in one city at a time. People in New York are at risk of climate catastrophe, nuclear war, and pandemics, like all people around the world. We need a politics that addresses all the crises we face.
The kind of social movement needed both in New York and the broader world would mean workers in workplaces organizing to stand up to their managers and bosses and corporate owners. It would mean organizing and striking to challenge the right of the capitalists to own and profit from the production of food, clothing and shelter that everyone needs. It would mean working-class people uniting across racial, ethnic, immigration status, and national boundaries. It would mean workers’ organizations forming defense committees and preparing to defend not only their members but all working-class people and the immigrant workers who work alongside them. It would mean entire working-class neighborhoods and maybe even whole towns and cities standing strong against raids and attacks on workers that are intended to divide us and intimidate us. It would mean mass marches on the streets of major cities but also organized mass resistance in smaller cities and towns throughout the U.S. and elsewhere. It would take strikes that start in a few industries but then spread to many more industries. It would take workers on a large scale withholding labor, bringing the system to a halt, and ending the generation of profit that drives the system and on which the capitalists depend.
No electoral campaign can do that, and no politician can do that. Particularly not in one city, surrounded inside and out by hostile forces. The most Zohran Mamdani and those like him can do is manage the suffering caused by the capitalist system in less painful ways or perhaps minimize the suffering that comes along with it.
Zohran Mamdani’s campaign has reflected the pain and fear of millions of working-class New Yorkers with the conditions of their lives, as well as their frustration with business-as-usual politicians, whether Democrat or Republican. To have real hope for the future, we need to organize ourselves and not rely on politicians of the Democratic and Republican parties, no matter what they say or how well-meaning they may seem.
