What are we to make of the socialist hero of New York City, Mayor Zohran Mamdani, suddenly becoming a moderate in the eyes of at least one progressive analyst?
Once upon a time, Mayor Zohran Mamdani was a socialist hero, whose upstart campaign showed how New York City and potentially the entire nation was hungry for progressive policies, even if establishment Democrats refused to acknowledge it. A former member of the Democrat Socialists of America and an unapologetic foe of Israel, the future Mayor was widely depicted as the heir to Senator Bernie Sander’s movement. As ABC News described it shortly before his 2025 election victory, “Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani could be New York City’s next mayor. Here’s how it happened.” To explain a rise many considered sudden if not outright meteoric, they shared the perspective of the cochair of the NYC DSA, Grace Mauser who had just graduated from college after President Donald Trump’s upset victory over Hillary Clinton in 2016. “I was very much a part of the liberal establishment — more on the progressive side — but totally believed that Hillary Clinton was going to win,” she, now 31 years old explained. “Like millions of other people, I was totally shocked and really dismayed.” Ms. Mauser turned to Senator Sanders for inspiration in the aftermath, or as ABC claimed, “Searching for a way to turn her disappointment into action, Mausser recalled the energy behind Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign that year — and how he referred to himself as a democratic socialist on the campaign trail.” “I think people are stuck in a very old way of thinking. You know, Trump’s in his 70s. Maybe he still thinks we’re in the Cold War,” she explained, “referencing the Soviet Union’s promotion of the socialist ideology in the years following World War II.” Modern socialism in her view, was different however. Instead of Soviet style authoritarianism, “Democratic socialism is a political movement that calls for the establishment of a decentralized socialist economic system within a democratically run political system. It differs from socialism, which is sometimes associated with communism and does not necessarily include a democratic form of governance” according to ABC.
Though candidate Mamdani hadn’t won yet, they were bullish on his prospects. The DSA was generally strong in the city and “using a strategy of pursuing the Democratic ballot line to show that socialists can govern.” Even as they didn’t endorse Mayor Mamdani’s predecessor, former Mayor Bill de Blasio in 2021, “I think the issue in 2021 was that there was no candidate like Zohran,” explained Greg Krieg, Democratic strategist and media director of the New York-based political consulting firm, Slingshot Strategies, this time it was different. As everyone knows, Mayor Mamdani prevailed and almost immediately became a progressive superstar. CNN proclaimed him a kingmaker earlier this year when the DSA-affiliated candidates he endorsed won their primaries against more moderate candidates, and former Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton, Robert Reich, an unabashed progressive gushed, that he was the “future of the Democratic party,” the “brightest light in the Democratic party is Zohran Mamdani…Mamdani is talking about what matters to most voters…he’s inspiring a new generation of young people. He’s got them excited about politics.” He went on to claim, he’s “authentic,” “passionate,” “care[s] about real people,” “want[s] to make America fairer,” “advocate[s] practical solutions that people can understand.” At the time, no one doubted his progressive bonafides. Indeed, his radical DSA roots and progressive policies were seen as a strength, a model to be emulated across the country if Democrats hoped to win.
For better or worse, this socialist excitement lasted until earlier in the week, when Jonathan Chait, writing for The Atlantic, who had previously admitted the Mayor was a democratic socialist, actually “the most powerful elected democratic socialist in American history,” suddenly proclaimed him a moderate. He reached this conclusion by asking and answering a question, “Where is the Democratic executive who has the media savvy to inspire his own cultlike following while making pragmatic governing decisions and ignoring the incessant demands of progressive activists? At last, the moderates have found such a Democrat. His name is Zohran Mamdani.” After dismissing the socialist rhetoric of the campaign as though it didn’t happen and didn’t matter, including the Mayor’s own belief that New York City was now living under “the warmth of collectivism,” Mr. Chait declared that the reality “has been far more mundane” including “several gestures to moderates.” Rather incredibly, among these gestures is the belief that the government should run with some level of efficiency, instead of bloat and waste. “This might sound like an ideologically neutral goal, and it has been embraced at times by the leaders of left-wing governments—including Milwaukee’s ‘sewer socialists’ during the early to mid-20th century. But efficiency creates tension with progressive interest groups, which generally care less about maximizing taxpayers’ bang for the buck than maintaining secure jobs and high wages for public employees.” In addition, Mayor Mamdani has “retreated from some of his progressive ambitions,” though whether this was because rhetoric met reality or an actual change of heart is left completely unsaid and unconsidered. Regardless, “It’s possible that, in his heart, Mamdani would rather be leading a genuine socialist revolution than making hype videos of city workers filling potholes. But enacting socialism is notoriously harder than calling for it at a rally.” Either way, “Mamdani has discovered that socialism can succeed in New York through one simple trick: abandoning socialism.”
To make matters even more confusing, Mr. Chait had previously argued Democrats might be moving too far left in general. Last October, writing for the same publication, he covered a progressive conference, noting “The purpose of this conference was to reassert the left’s strategy for regaining control of the Democratic Party and, at least in theory, a national governing majority. Yet beneath the bold proclamations, one could detect an undercurrent of defensiveness. After almost a decade of nearly unchallenged supremacy, the progressive movement’s hold on the party is no longer certain. At the end of the Obama era, most Democrats (myself included) saw liberalism’s ascent as nearly inevitable. Accordingly, they saw little cost in getting ahead of where public opinion was obviously headed. When Senator Bernie Sanders challenged Hillary Clinton from the economic left in 2016, she replied by outflanking him to the left on social issues while breaking with the Obama administration’s moderate positions on trade (she opposed President Barack Obama’s Trans-Pacific Partnership) and education (she backed away from his support for charter schools and other reform measures).” Ultimately, he concluded, “Rapidly transforming the American public’s beliefs is a daunting task—all the more so if you dismiss their current values as unacceptable. The Democratic Party’s pragmatic wing has been pleading to broaden the tent, ideally before the Trump administration stamps out all opposition. The party’s progressives seem determined to reeducate the public rather than compromise for their votes. This is a seductive approach if the goal is ideological purity. It is a problem only if the party hopes to win elections.”
What are we to make of this cognitive dissonance? Even if we set aside that reading too much into famously progressive New York City politics is likely unwarranted, there remains the reality progressives are a party in search of an answer to the disconnect between their increasingly leftward base – Mayor Mamdani’s victory was followed by DSA candidates across the country in the midterm elections – and the centrist nature of the American electorate. Rather than confront this directly as President Clinton himself did with the Third Way movement which swept him into power for two terms, wherein triangulation, that is picking off strategic positions of the opposing party to appeal to a broader coalition and bring new voters into the fold, they are seeking some alternative solution to a long-term, some would argue structural problem that allows them to both please their base and have broader appeal at the same time. Unfortunately for us all, the solution is essentially lying to the electorate about who they are and what they really want to do. Hence, a would-be champion of the far left is now a moderate and candidates who were considered far-left in the primary, suddenly become moderates in the general election. What they actually believe and what direction they want to take the country is irrelevant, so long as they win and maintain power. The fact that the same person has been on all three sides of the issue tells you all you need to know.
