The Dictatorship
The hypocrisy of moderate Democrats who are furious over Mamdani’s insurgency
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s successful backing of a trio of left-wing candidates in New York’s House primaries — two of whom ousted establishment Democratic incumbents — has triggered backlash from fuming moderate Democrats. But their criticism reveals the exact wrong takeaway from Tuesday’s political earthquake.
New York Attorney General Letitia James told CNN on Wednesday that some of the Mamdani-backed candidates “do not understand the politics of New York City,” despite the fact that they won their races. She also said other political leaders she’s spoken to are “disappointed” in Mamdani, and likened his movement to right-wing extremism: “All of us are a little frustrated with the Democratic Party. But you don’t blow it up. That’s what MAGA has done.”
The Democratic establishment’s overarching narrative: socialists and their allies don’t belong in the Democratic Party.
James was one of many Democrats sounding the alarm about Mamdani and the Democratic Socialists of America as an existential threat to the party. Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., declared“Many of us believe, as I do, that if you’re a socialist, you’re not a Democrat.” Rep. Greg Meeks, D-N.Y., complained, “Instead of us making sure we put all of our resources to fight Republicans and to fight Donald Trump, we’re using it to fight each other.” Former Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison asked for them to cease and desist: “If you hate the Democratic Party, then please don’t run for our nomination,” he pleaded.
When asked by a reporter if Mamdani was “making enemies” on Capitol Hill, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., seemed to imply that Mamdani should consider groveling before members of Congress. “The mayor and I agree to strongly disagree about some of his endorsements,” Jeffries said. “He’s got work to do in terms of the conversations that he’s going to have with members of Congress moving forward.”
The Democratic establishment’s overarching narrative: Socialists and their allies don’t belong in the Democratic Party and ought to buzz off.
This is a ridiculous position, not to mention a hypocritical one.
First, as Mamdani retorted in an interview with my colleague Chris Hayes, “What is the Democratic Party if not its voters?” The claim that these candidates don’t belong in a party whose registered voters supported them is indefensible. Here’s what the party establishment doesn’t want to admit: While these new candidates objectively do represent the will of its rank-and-file voters, their growing numbers threaten to topple the stability of the creaky, pathologically out-of-touch Democratic Party apparatus and leadership structure. (For example, one of Tuesday’s incumbent losers, Rep. Adriano Espaillat, is chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.)
Second, Democrats have long slammed progressives who have pursued third-party efforts. To this day, Democratic voters will commonly blame former Green Party candidates Ralph Nader and Jill Stein for the elections of President George W. Bush and Trump, respectively, based on the idea that they ran as “spoilers” who siphon off voters who might otherwise vote for Democrats. And yet now when left-wing activists are making inroads into the party instead of playing “spoiler,” they’re being blamed for “blowing up” the party. Democrats need to pick one lane.
Which brings me to my third point, which is that when you put together the establishment Democrats’ two narratives — don’t run third party, but don’t run in our party either — it’s clear the party ultimately wants to disenfranchise voters who are to the left of its leadership’s preferences. Democrats don’t want to win over voters who subscribe to dyed-in-the-wool progressivism, democratic socialism or any other “ism” that expresses left-wing ambition. They want to cajole them into a vote by banking on a soul-sucking “vote for the lesser evil” ballot from them for eternity.
The Democratic Party establishment is now paying the price for this kind of scorn for a vital part of its own coalition. One might think a party that is so unpopular with its own voters might read the socialist insurgency as yet another sign that it should rethink some of its assumptions of voter behavior and desire. One, unfortunately, would be wrong.
Zeeshan Aleem is a writer and editor for MS NOW. He primarily writes about politics and foreign policy.