Mamdani’s Movement Interests May Collide with His Mayoral Interests

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani audaciously backed left-wing U.S. House primary challengers to two Democratic incumbents and a third candidate whose main opponent was backed by a retiring incumbent. At the same time, he successfully pressured City Councilor and fellow socialist Chi Ossé to abandon his campaign against the Democratic Leader of the House, Hakeem Jeffries of Brooklyn, by convincing the city’s chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America [DSA] to withhold any endorsement. 

Yet at the victory party for one of Mamdani’s candidates, Claire Valdez of New York’s Seventh District, supporters jeered when Jeffries appeared on the TV screen and began chanting “You’re next.” On X, when Ossé chimed in, “omg this is so fun! Who’s next???” several of his followers proposed he revisit his planned challenge. 

After just six months in Gracie Mansion, the democratic socialist mayor has been astounding at picking his battles. Not only did he hit all three of his primary targets this month, but back in February, he played against type and endorsed the moderate incumbent, Governor Kathy Hochul, cutting off political oxygen for her primary opponent, Lieutenant Governor Antonio Delgado, who soon quit. Mamdani then leveraged his newly forged relationship to help close a projected budget deficit in his first budget, with Hochul providing state aid and new tax revenue from luxury second homes in New York City. 

But can Mamdani control the anti-incumbent fervor among his followers and continue to spare the most powerful New York government figures? And does he want to? 

The odd aspect of Mamdani’s endorsement strategy is not that he sometimes helps socialists and sometimes moderates. It’s that he appears torn between two competing objectives: what will help him succeed as mayor and what will help build DSA’s ranks. 

Mayors don’t have unlimited powers and often need state and federal help to shore up their finances and advance big projects. Recognizing that Hochul was likely to win re-election—Delgado never polled higher than 16 percent in primary polls—Mamdani got on the winning team to strengthen his position during budget talks.  

Beyond his endorsement strategy, back in February, Mamdani set aside partisan and ideological differences to meet with President Donald Trump and pitch him on securing a $21 million federal grant for the city to kick-start a rail yard in Queens, the borough where Mamdani lives and where the president was raised. The meeting generated tons of favorable press for both men, but Mamdani has yet to reap any monetary rewards from Trump, and the project has not moved forward. 

What Mamdani could really use is Democrats in control of the White House, the House, and the Senate who are sympathetic to New York City’s interests. While a full trifecta can’t happen until  the 2028 elections take place, in the 2026 midterm elections, Democrats appear to be on the verge of taking over the House and have a puncher’s chance at the Senate. And in an amazing coincidence, Mamdani became New York City mayor when the Democrats cued up to lead each congressional chamber are also from New York City! Any other mayor would be stupefied at being the beneficiary of such incredible luck.  

But DSA has declared its opposition to the Brooklyn duo of Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. Shortly after Trump’s return to office, the national organization issued a statement that said the Democratic Party’s “leaders, like Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, have failed to meet the moment and mount a credible defense against Trump. This is no surprise from the party that handed the White House to the Republicans, campaigning on a failed status quo instead of fighting to raise wages and stop price gouging. To beat fascism, we need socialism.” That the two have longstanding relationships with the American Israel Political Action Committee (AIPAC) is surely not lost on DSA, which has an official position supporting “the end of Israel’s colonization and occupation of all Arab lands” and “the right of all refugees to return to their homes and properties,” effectively supporting the end of Israel as a Jewish state.  

New York leftists have long looked forward to a 2028 primary challenge to Schumer, and the chants heard Tuesday night indicate they want to take on Jeffries, too. Would Mamdani intervene again to prevent such challenges? We cannot assume. Mamdani’s interest in supporting House challengers this time around was clearly not informed by mayoral interests but by movement interests.  

Middle East politics loomed large in all three House contests in which Mamdani endorsed. And, like the DSA, Mamdani clearly relishes taking on AIPAC, referring to the group as one of “monsters that we are up against” during a rally this month for his endorsed candidates. Some argued the harsh language was tantamount to antisemitism and ensnared Jews broadly. At the same time, Mamdani maintained his criticism was fairly targeted: “when we ask ourselves how such death and destruction is happening overseas, we also name those who allow it to take place.” As far as the ballot box is concerned, Mamdani won the argument. 

One of his defeated targets, Adriano Espaillat, chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, sits on the House Appropriations Committee and is not the sort of lawmaker a mayor typically wants to lose. But Mandani preferred to see him replaced with Darializa Avila Chevalier, a 32-year-old DSA member with no experience in elective office and a checkered social media past that includes blistering attacks on establishment Democrats. Mamdani can’t expect Chevallier to get her first choice of committee assignments, let alone bring seniority to bear. 

This is not a strategy designed to bring home the earmarks in the short run, but to build up the DSA ranks and validate DSA arguments in the long run.  

As well as the left has been doing in primaries this year, this so-called “Democratic Tea Party” will still only amount to a small faction of the next Congress. Including Mamdani’s three House endorsements, Senator Bernie Sanders and the Justice Democrats political committee have combined to endorse 24 non-incumbent House candidates. Thirteen have won primaries so far, including two that advanced in California’s “top two” primary system and face Democratic incumbents in November. (Seven have lost primaries, and four candidates await their primary election day verdicts.) Seven of the 13 winners are general election shoo-ins, per Cook Political Report ratings, and will join nine incumbents backed by Justice Democrats (not all of whom are DSA members). In a hypothetical narrow majority of 218 or slightly more—as Republicans learned these past two years—a loose-knit faction of at least 16 insurgents could give Democratic Party leaders agita and perhaps set the stage for further inroads by leftists in subsequent elections. But it is unlikely to help steer additional dollars into New York City coffers before Mamdani faces voters again in 2029. 

This week’s successes aside, Mamdani could conclude that taking on one or both top congressional Democrats in 2028 is a bridge too far that could complicate his ability to govern. But even in this scenario, after DSA’s smashing successes this year, could Mamdani successfully intervene once more and block a DSA endorsement? He may have created his own monster, an incumbent-devouring Frankenstein that he can’t control.  

Mamdani alone sets his priorities and must assess the extent to which his mayoral and movement interests are in tension. But to my eye, Mamdani’s greatest value to the socialist movement lies in his ability to govern effectively. Considering his outreach to Hochul and to Trump, on some level he grasps that the more state and federal help he gets, the greater his chances of administrative success. He escaped one budget season with Hochul’s help, but the city’s structural deficits are worsening, and he would rather not balance his future budgets by cutting services and abandoning promises. He needs as much additional funding as possible to build more housing, support public education, and maintain city infrastructure. If the city’s economy turns sour, whether it’s Mamdani’s fault or not, and the public views him as more preoccupied with national and international politics than the price of food cart halal chicken and rice, he won’t get re-elected. That would be a huge blow to his brand of “sewer socialism” and negate any endorsement wins. 

Mamdani flexed some serious political muscle this week, but that may not be what he and his movement need the most.  

The post Mamdani’s Movement Interests May Collide with His Mayoral Interests appeared first on Washington Monthly.