TJ Walker examines Zorhan Mandani's NYC mayoral campaign, which drew Bernie Sanders and AOC to a packed rally. Mandani's platform includes universal child care, free buses, city-owned groceries, and a rent freeze. Walker frames the race as a test of whether progressive populism can actually deliver city services and balance a budget.
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The left's stadium moment now comes the governing test. Zorhan Mandani packed Forest Hill Stadium in New York City with Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez at his side, casting his New York City mayoral bid as movement versus money. According to the Times. Lisa Allaire Sanders called Mamdani Nguyen a Mamdani win Trump's worst nightmare while AOC vowed there will be a day after Maidani told supporters we have a movement of the mass and promised universal child care, free buses, city owned groceries and a rent freeze. Here's the context that I want to focus on here for a moment with you. In European democracies, new parties can surge overnight and win big. In the US we rarely meant new parties, but once radical factions instead capture new majority party machinery. If Mandani wins, the rally turns into a stress test. Trash pickup, crime, school budgets and whether progressive populism can deliver. Even allies warn governing is not easy. The question isn't crowd size anymore. It's whether Tuesday garbage day and Friday paychecks still arrive on time. We've seen surging rallies supporting Zoran Mandami in New York City. Is it significant? Yeah, it does show people are excited about guess it's good when citizens are excited about their leaders and actually support them. So stop pretending it doesn't matter. Let's dig a little bit deeper here. So the United States is different from most other democracies in the world. We have this sort of rigid two party system that other countries things are much more fluid now. This creates positives and negatives. It makes things much more status quo oriented. But it also makes it harder to really screw up things and go too far in any one extreme. What we are seeing in the United States now is a resurgence of the true left. Let me step back here a minute. Some of you are going to disagree and think this is crazy by every objective standard. From a political scientist looking at worldwide democracies, the Democratic Party in the US is considered to be a centrist party, even a center party right party. I know that sounds crazy to some of you. What are you talking about tj? Everyone knows the Democrats are radical leftists. Well that's his political spin. That's convenient for the Republican Party. The Democratic Party by and large is a centrist right of center party in America. Now there are some exceptions. Senator Bernie Sanders is someone who is very much part of the left. He would be more at home in a social Democratic party in Europe. Same with Mamdani and aoc. They actually are a part of the left. And by all accounts, it seems like they're gaining in power and support. They're certainly energizing crowds. Now, here's the part a lot of people forget. So many prognosticators are saying, well, Donnie is going to be a horrible failure and everyone's going to move out of New York City and it's going to be this unmitigated disaster. There's actually a huge track record, a lengthy track record of social. And I'm not endorsing socialism, it's not my cup of tea. But mayors of cities who called themselves socialists, social Democrats, sometimes even communists who were seen as good. Mayor Bernie Sanders was a mayor before he was in the Congress. Milwaukee has had a socialist mayor before, and there have been plenty of examples of mayors call themselves socialists, social Democrats and been quite successful. So. So I'm not one of those. Even though Mandami uses labels I don't personally use for myself, I wouldn't call myself a democratic socialist or a socialistic Democrat. Doesn't mean he can't be successful. The other idea, that everyone's going to move away, that's sort of assuming he can just come in and give every rich person a 90% income tax. He can't do that. He is going to be judged in part, as I mentioned in the newsread. Does the garbage get picked up ultimately? Can he actually make any part of New York City more affordable? People who aren't already rich, who aren't already Wall street fat cats, who aren't already at the highest ends of their profession, whether it's advertising, marketing, fashion and all the other industries based there in New York City, that's going to be difficult. There's absolutely no doubt that is not going to be an easy task. But I do think that we are entering a period now because of artificial intelligence giving superpower to our big tech companies, social media, the algorithms design to make people angry all the time, to exacerbate tensions. In some ways, it makes it a little easier for new parties to emerge within old parties. Certainly Donald Trump demonstrated that in 2016. None of the party poobas liked Donald Trump. It seems like so long ago. It seems like 100 years ago now, but National Review magazine devoted an entire issue where they had dozens and dozens and dozens of conservative writers, thinkers, intellectuals, all make the case why Donald Trump would be the worst thing that ever happened to the Republican Party. They've all pretty much changed their tune now. Trump changed the party to his own mold. Completely different party positions on things like tariffs and socializing companies like Intel. Could the same thing happen to the Democratic Party? Traditionally, the idea has been no, it's impossible because Democrats are a party of coalition, not of ideology. And they need moderates and they even need right of center people in order to get electoral majorities. I still think that's true, but in certain locations, like in New York City, it will be different. Let's take a look at some of the other countries around the world and how this has happened. Again, our own mindset in the United States is okay, you're only going to have a choice between a Republican and a Democrat. And some may be a little more liberal and some may be a little more conservative, but it's basically the same old thing that was true until about 10 years ago. It's not true anymore in the Republican Party. And it appears as though it's about to be a little different in the Democratic Party too. Especially if someone like AOC runs for president and gets the nomination. It's going to be a radical, radical change. But we live in a time where political parties and political cultures around the world, with a lot of democracies that we have stuff in common with, are seeing similar changes now. It's been more on the right. Let's not kid ourselves. Let's take a look around the country. Nigel Farage, who was considered a joke for decades in Europe, couldn't even get elected to a seat in parliament for decades. Now people are thinking this guy could become prime minister. And he is very much sort of a Trump white character, down to having his own meme coin and down to making money on a cameo. And he's a member of parliament and a talk show host and he's involved in 100 other projects. Very similar to Donald Trump and loves being flamboyant on social media. So he's someone who is very similar. He has something called the Reform Party that some polls show it could actually take over parliament in the next election. In the Netherlands, you have Wilder's PBV topping the vote, entering a governing coalition. In Italy, Brothers of Italy leapt from a fringe movement to lead the government. In France, you have the National Rally made rapid gains reshaping party competition. Portugal, Chegga surged quickly. In Austria, the FPO ascended quite quickly. Germany, the AfD expanded influence through regional breakthroughs. In Sweden, the Sweden Democrats, not the same as the Democrats in the United States, have gained leverage backing the government. So what we're seeing around the world is in democracies more and more what used to be called fringe ideas, fringe parties are gaining real power and the United States, maybe they're even taking things over. Or could it's already happened to one party in the US could it happen in the other party? I don't know. But if Mamdani wins the mayoral race, he's going to be by some accounts the most high profile elected Democrat in the country. And he will be seen as the leader, the spokesperson for the Democratic Party. Let's not forget anyone who becomes the mayor of New York City is at some level a major national player. And they do run for president from time to time. They haven't done very well. John Lindsay's campaign for President back in 72 didn't go very well and certainly Bill de Blasio's campaign for president was an instant joke. But you've got that platform, you've got the money, you're in the center of the media universe, at least for US Politics in New York. So it is a huge, huge platform. Can Mandani, even if he governs well and has high approval rate in New York City as mayor, can he get past the stigma of using the socialist word? Democratic Socialist? That's what I haven't figured out because I still happen to believe that in the United States, if you are to believe polling data that that word is the kiss of death for huge swaths of the American elite, it's maybe an inch better than labeling yourself a pedophile. And that's not a good brand either. So that's what is still to be determined. Now he can always rebrand himself and say, hey, forget what I said in the past. I'm a Democrat. And if you think, well, politicians can't get away with that, can they? Ho, ho. Let's not forget Donald Trump has been a member of the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, Independent Party. He's changed party affiliation five times. Didn't seem to hurt him when he ran for the Republican nomination. So consent.
