Zohran Mamdani’s inspiring campaign is a huge breath of fresh air
By CALEB SILVER —chsilver@ucdavis.edu
The race for the next mayor of New York City, though the election isn’t until November of this year, has been unpredictable, hope-inspiring and sort of hilarious.
The short list of the important characters include the incumbent mayor, passionate liar and convicted criminal on charges of bribery and fraud, Eric Adams. He is rerunning — not as a Democrat, like he did the first time — but as an Independent, which he announced shortly after the Trump administration’s Department of Justice (DOJ) dropped Adams’ bribery and fraud convictions. There is also disgraced former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who currently leads all candidates by polling with 39%. In his decade in office, he oversaw some progressive marriage equality and gun control legislation; However, he also sexually harassed at least 13 women.
Politico reports that “the Justice Department found Cuomo ‘repeatedly subjected’ women in his office to non-consensual sexual contact, ogling and gender-based nicknames. Top Cuomo staff ‘were aware of the conduct and retaliated against four of the women he harassed.’”
The last important person to consider in the race is Zohran Mamdani, who is currently polling behind Cuomo and is an openly socialist candidate who is staunchly pro-Palestine and is by far the most unique runner in the race.
Mamdani feels like a breath of fresh air from the moderate, pro-Israel, criminally convicted Democrats like Adams and Cuomo. His campaign strategy is also unique. He is extremely technologically savvy and he appears to actually understand how social media, video editing and short-form content creation works. His videos are punchy, entertaining and to-the-point. Perhaps this is the case because he is further left than the other candidates, or more likely it’s the case because he is younger and not an institutionalized Democrat. His $8 million in donations come in small amounts from a large swath of New Yorkers across the city — further proving his appeal to actual people living in New York. His supporters are not politicians, corporations or the country of Turkey; He just feels like a real person.
I truly believe that candidates like Mamdani are the answer to the existential question facing the Democratic party post Trump’s victory last November. Even if his politics don’t fully align with mine, his passion, frustration, hope and problem-solving are all conveyed very tangibly. In The Guardian’s profile of him, they discuss his hunger strike, which went on for a grueling 15 days, to protest the unjust loans that targeted cab drivers who need to purchase medallions. This marks one of two times he was arrested (the other instance was for protesting rent spikes of rent-stabilized tenants).
Mamdani might also be unique because he clearly lays out his plans as a prospective mayor of New York, and they seem to be pretty directly correlated to an increased well-being of the population. These plans include, but are not limited to, free and more-effective buses, freezing the rent for all stabilized tenants and lowering the cost of groceries by removing tax and rent requirements on a chain of city grocery stores.
Mamdani is receiving more donations and support than expected. I’m not sure he’ll win, and, honestly, I am not very optimistic about it. What I do know is that his policies could work to address the real issues facing New Yorkers and Americans alike and that they are, unsurprisingly, popular. Governing with a left-leaning populist agenda is frowned upon by Democrats, who either have to admit to themselves that they won’t be able to make close ties, connections and receive donations from large corporations or that they sincerely believe it isn’t a winning strategy — Mamdani is clearly proving that it could be.
Written by: Caleb Silver — chsilver@ucdavis.edu
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