The accidental Zorhan Mamdani

Mamdani isn’t a mandate for socialism, he’s just the luckiest politician alive — but he’s still a major threat

Zohran Mamdani is an accident. His improbable rise to the summit of U.S. politics reflects more the desultory state of the Democratic Party than his political skills — which are formidable — much less his ideas. As recently as six months ago he was barely an afterthought, polling in the low single digits. His greatest strength was the rest of the field. The incumbent, Eric Adams, was irredeemably tarnished by scandal. Andrew Cuomo came with more baggage than a 747, and Curtis Sliwa was a caricature. New Yorkers, particularly the younger ones, were understandably desperate for an alternative. Enter Mamdani.

While Adams and Cuomo spent months beating the political tar out of each other, Mamdani skated along as the young, charismatic alternative. His numbers steadily grew, bolstered by one of the slickest political operations in recent history. It raised $13.5 million, compared to Cuomo’s $8.5 million and Adams’s $4 million. He received substantial PAC support, including from the some of the billionaires he’s said shouldn’t exist. Aside from admittedly eye-popping social media, Mamdani’s was a thoroughly conventional political campaign.

Which is a big part of the reason that, even as leftists and “democratic socialists” dance in the streets and Republicans take to their fainting couches, the correct reaction to his victory is: Meh. As Jonathan Chait recently noted in The Atlantic, his nine-point victory in Democrat-dominated New York is “deeply unimpressive.” He won because the competition was fatally, historically flawed. Standing on debate stages, Cuomo played Richard Nixon to Mamdani’s JFK (then again, with apologies to Lloyd Bentson, Mamdani is no Jack Kennedy). Adams waited too long to drop out. Curtis Sliwa wouldn’t get out of the way.

History repeating

The Democratic Party establishment, which is in the midst of a civil war with the party’s far left flank, couldn’t do better than Adams (who ultimately left the party to run as an independent) and Crusty Cuomo in the biggest and most consequential mayoral election in the country. That’s deeply worrisome. The establishment is hopelessly flawed, but it’s a sight better than the DSA. If they can’t hold the line, the consequences are dire for the entire country.

I’ve written previously about Mamdani’s bigotry and hypocrisy, which along with his preternatural charisma are his animating qualities. From a political standpoint, Mamdani actually doesn’t pose much of a threat. New Yorkers may vote liberal, but when it comes down to it they’re a pragmatic lot. He’s already caved on some of his more outlandish campaign promises. Well before election day, “defund the racist, homophobic NYPD” gave way to a promise to increase the department’s headcount and retain the decidedly establishment Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch. If he doesn’t follow through, New Yorkers will punish him swiftly. He’s had nothing to say about his free city-run grocery stores in weeks. He’s even jumped aboard the thoroughly capitalistic “abundance” agenda, which these days is what passes for a centrist Democrat platform.

Likewise, aside from stirring the culture war pot on the weekend talk show rounds, Mamdani will prove anything but a radical in office. Far more than the typical mayor, he will depend on his staff. And that staff mostly will come from the professional bureaucracy, the ones who actually know how to work the levers of city government. They’re generally terrible at their jobs, but they know where the bathrooms are and where the bodies are buried. In a modern Democrat city, that’s pretty much all that matters. They keep the place running, barely, by not rocking the boat. He’ll be less Fidel Castro and more Karen Bass.

Building the plane as he’s flying it

The biggest threat he poses is his inexperience, which is magnified by his arrogance. At 34 he’s never had a real job in his life aside from an abortive rap career as — I’m not making this up — “MC Cardamom.”  He doesn’t have any scars, physically or metaphorically. He doesn’t know what it’s like to fail. He’s never taken a punch. The hardscrabble Upper West Side life of the son of an Ivy League professor and a globetrotting Hollywood director. He’s a manchild of the most extreme privilege who cosplays as a radical because it’s safe to do so in the freest, most diverse country in the world. The political class in his home country of Uganda would eat him for lunch. 

He whinges about the tribulations of growing up Muslim in New York, a city that’s home to nearly a million Muslims, because that’s all he’s got. Like virtually all woke non-white leftists these days, he weaponizes his identity for political gain. Any criticism is automatically transmogrified into racism and “Islamophobia.” He uses it even to deflect his own bigotry, particularly his antisemitism. Again, it’s all he’s got.

Unfortunately for Zorhan, race baiting doesn’t get the job done. It doesn’t keep the streets safe, the garbage collected or the lights on. It’s one thing to be an inexperienced city councilor or state lawmaker. Even an inexperienced member of Congress. Those institutions are designed to train neophytes. Sure, you’ll get swindled and double crossed, but that’s part of the learning curve. It isn’t fatal. In a year or two you figure out the game, settle in, and take your place in the system.

It’s something entirely different to be a chief executive. From the moment you take the oath you’re required to make decisions, often in the heat of the moment. The margin for error is vanishingly small. That’s why even experienced lawmakers often fail. For example, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is a very smart woman and a deeply experienced lawmaker who served in leadership roles in the California state senate and the United States Congress. Yet she’s been a third tier mayor at best. She simply doesn’t have the skill set. 

In the days before the January L.A. firestorms,  the city needed leadership more than ever as a historic set of circumstances came into alignment and warnings flashed across the southland. Bass responded not like a chief executive but like a legislator, dashing off as part of a U.S. delegation to the swearing in of a foreign head of state. Her mismatched instincts cost the city dearly.

Though I’ve spent a good deal of time in New York in my life, as a Californian and Angeleno I’ve never particularly liked it, or even really understood it. I could never live in a place in which Central Park counts as nature. However, I’ve never wished ill on Gotham, nor do I now. It’s the country’s biggest, most consequential city. I want only the best. That’s why I sincerely hope that Mamdani’s tenure is crisis-free. I also hope it’s a single term.

Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing

Mamdani’s tenure likely will mirror that of the OG Boomer “democrat socialist,” Senator Bernie Sanders, who has spent nearly 35 years in Congress with absolutely nothing to show for it other than voting with the Democrats a whopping 95%-99% of the time, reliably bringing home the pork to his adopted state of Vermont and selling enough ghostwritten books to purchase a dacha on the banks of Lake Champlain. Funny how socialists tend to make terrific capitalists.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss….

What little sheen Mamdani had already is starting to tarnish.  A recent poll found that his national favorability rating is a dismal 21 percent. Senator Chuck Schumer, one of the least liked members of Congress, polls better at 25 percent.

I laughed out loud during his victory speech when he talked about how he’ll be a fighter for the working class, for people with “fingers bruised from lifting boxes, palms calloused from delivery bike handlebars, knuckles scarred with kitchen burns.” An Amazon driver, a bicycle courier, and a chef are his idea of the beleaguered working class. This is peak urban Millennial. There are no ironworkers, machinists or boilermakers in Mamdani’s world. There are, however, plenty of hipsters with manbuns dashing about town on fixies.

That’s Mamdani’s real base, and his ultimate limitation. Still, New York is about to take one for the team. The rest of the country can only watch, and hope the crash isn’t too bad.