On Friday afternoon, Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic minority leader in the United States House of Representatives, officially endorsed Zohran Mamdani, a member of his party, before the mayoral elections in New York City. That support should have been a mere formality, an obvious choice. But nothing surrounding Mamdani, the first Muslim candidate and the second socialist in history, nor anything surrounding the Democrats, is normal right now, politically speaking.
Mamdani, born in Uganda, son of immigrants, leftist, and a complete unknown in the US until just a few months ago, will be the next mayor of the country's largest city, if nothing really strange happens by November 4. All polls give him a lead of between 11 and 25 points over his rivals, the Republican (but not MAGA) Curtis Sliwa and former governor Andrew Cuomo, who is running as an independent after losing the Democratic primaries and has become the favorite and last hope of millionaires, a good part of Republicans but also of Democratic figures. And this is where everything starts to get very strange.
Mamdani won those primaries, very clearly, at the end of June. With a speech focused on the cost of living, advocating for taxing the wealthiest, trying to freeze the rent of the poorest households, creating something similar to municipal stores to help low-income families combat inflation, or making buses free. Since then, he has become one of Donald Trump's favorite targets, who insults, criticizes, and threatens him non-stop, saying he is a "dangerous communist" and a "left-wing lunatic" who will ruin the city, so he will cut off federal funds.
He is also the target of one of the most brutal xenophobic campaigns, with the MAGA universe and the far-right constantly referring to the city forgetting 9/11 and comparing his victory to a new attack. Not to mention those calling for him to be stripped of his nationality or deported.
During all this time, his Party, in general, has remained silent. With almost no relevant support (the State apparatus is divided), without infrastructure. Neither Jeffries, who is in Congress for Brooklyn, nor Senator Chuck Schumer, who is also the minority leader and from New York, had given him their support. Just a handful of national figures. On the contrary, there were notable efforts to distance themselves, criticize his ideology. And even maneuvers to boost the chances of his rival, Cuomo, who resigned after a decade in power due to numerous allegations of sexual harassment. Jeffries is not only one of the national leaders the party has right now, but also one of the most prominent black politicians in New York, but he has chosen a very critical line with the Democratic Socialists of America, of which Mamdani is a part.
In a written message this Friday, the minority leader has insisted that there are "areas of principled disagreement," but that Mamdani won "free and fair elections" in the Democratic primaries and emphasized that the party needed to unite against the "existential" threat of President Trump. One of the poorest and least heartfelt endorsements imaginable. Almost in the same unenthusiastic terms as Kamala Harris, the former vice president. "Zohran Mamdani has tirelessly focused on addressing the affordability crisis and has explicitly committed to being a mayor for all New Yorkers, including those who do not support his candidacy," Jeffries simply stated.
This afternoon, Mamdani will be in the Queens neighborhood, with the slogan 'New York is not for sale' alongside the only two Democratic politicians who have clearly stood out, encouraged, supported, and propelled him: Senator Bernie Sanders and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Not by chance the most famous politicians of the left wing of the Party, the two most well-known faces, who have been traveling together for months across the country to denounce Trump. The figures who most clearly advocate for moving the party to the left to defeat Republicans who have embraced Trump and the MAGA world.
It is no secret that Democrats shy away from the label "socialism" like the plague. Since at least the days of Jimmy Carter, but especially of Bill Clinton, their economic discourse has 'centered', arguing that the Government should be much smaller and not there to solve all people's problems. Their economic interpretation of the electoral landscape is that Americans will always lean towards a supporter of the free market and low taxes, a "moderate," rather than someone who openly presents themselves as a social democrat or socialist. And that is why they prefer not to associate with Mamdani, whom they themselves consider a radical, even if he brings victory in a city with eight million inhabitants and significant housing, wage, and price issues.
In the past, that debate would have been similar. But now, there is much more at stake. The Democratic 'soul' is on the line, deciding which path to take for the 2026 elections and the 2028 presidential elections. Trump defeated Hillary Clinton and lost to Biden, but last year it seemed clear that the president could not do it again. There was a bet, stumbling and against the clock, on Harris, and it went wrong. The party's core seems to think that neither women nor minorities will be enough in three years, and that it is necessary to appeal to the center to mobilize those who leaned towards Trumpism in the past. But more and more voices see it as inevitable, the opposite, to go head-on, with a very left-leaning option, with more redistributive and interventionist policies. They argue that Trump has already shown that the issue is not the state's action, but how it is presented.
The problem, according to the establishment, is that the policies Mamdani proposes, as good as they may sound to their ears, are expensive, difficult to finance, and almost impossible to push through with the opposition of state politicians and an open war with the White House. The likely future mayor has charisma, does not carry the baggage of the past, has the potential to be a heavyweight in the Party and achieve a national role. But without money, his program would be, they reproach him, "more cultural warfare and wokism." The path everyone seems to want to avoid right now, except for the most popular ones. The path that paved the way for Trump to sweep.