The Socialist Republic of NYC

Zohran Mandani, DSA, and a historic victory

New York is electric right now. Zohran Mamdani didn’t just win last night, he won decisively. Ranked choice voting was expected to take several rounds, and many of us thought we wouldn’t find out the victor for up to a week. Instead Andrew Cuomo conceded by 10:30 p.m. and Zohran gave his victory speech just after midnight. The polls didn’t account for thousands and thousands of young people who usually don’t vote, they didn’t account for the incredible momentum of this campaign, they didn’t account for something fundamentally different happening here.

The joy is palpable. The energy in the city, the genuine political hope that has become so rare, the pure happiness among thousands of people after decades of bad to mediocre politicians finally being replaced by one who actually gives and shit and actually wants to change things for the better is amazing. These past several days I haven’t been able to take a single walk without being approached by multiple Zohran canvassers on the street. I haven’t been able to get on social media without seeing multiple posts about early voting, defeating Cuomo, and electing Zohran. And it worked. It paid off. The momentum became a phenomenon unto itself and propelled the Muslim, immigrant, democratic socialist to a historic win.

And this is just the beginning. The general election is probably in the bag after Zohran’s margin of victory, but everyone involved in winning this primary will undoubtedly run through the finish line. But the real battle will come when Zohran becomes mayor. In NYC the mayorship is disproportionately powerful, relative to the city council, but the forces of the billionaire class will array themselves against this administration. Freezing the rent for rent-stabilized tenants, a free bus program, and a city-owned grocery store trial run — these things will all be opposed by the ruling class, who have quite a footprint in New York it turns out. That’s when people power will be needed even more urgently than it was to win this massive electoral victory.

Luckily, the Zohran campaign is fundamentally different from other campaigns when it comes to the power of the masses, the people, the working class. I don’t just mean the tens of thousands of volunteers, although this campaign had that. I don’t just mean the platform centered around the needs of working people, although of course that was a huge part of this win. I mean that Zohran and his campaign grew out of a movement, grew out of an organization, grew out of people fighting for the working class to begin with.

Throughout the campaign New York City DSA was used (ineffectively) by the ruling class, by Cuomo, and by his conservative backers as a bogeyman. The truth is, they should be scared of DSA and they are scared of DSA. Not only has NYC-DSA gotten a dozen elected officials in office at the city and state level before this mayor’s race, they’ve built a base of thousands and thousands of members, many of whom are organizers. Not every member of DSA really becomes an organizer, but in New York the organization has trained thousands of people over a period of years, helped build the skills of effective organizing, and translated all of that into power. Zohran himself came out of this system, as did many of the staffers and the initial powerhouse volunteers who took his campaign from the margins to the finish line, from polling as low as 2% in January to winning decisively on election night. This is what real people power looks like.

This is the difference that most mainstream analysis won’t talk about. It’s easy to focus on the immense power of Zohran’s comms team, who made truly transformative videos that reached millions. It’s easy to focus on Zohran as a uniquely good candidate, and politicians of his caliber certainly don’t come around every day. It's easy to discuss how Cuomo thought he had this in the bag and ran a horrendous campaign. But at the end of the day the status quo, the ruling class, the powers that be were lined up against an insurgent democratic socialist, and it was thousands and thousands of people plugging into a structure and system developed by the DSA that defeated the forces arrayed against this campaign.

Photo by Andras Kovacs on Unsplash

So many politicians are in it for themselves. We see that, and we see the effects. We see how Congress sides with billionaire interests over the interests of the rest of us every day. From Eric Adams to Trump to Cuomo it’s sickening to see how public servants are typically anything but. And Zohran could be a bust, power could change him, the forces of wealth could hobble him while he’s in office. All of that and more is possible. But those of us who have followed this man for years trust his integrity because we’ve seen him behave not as an individual but as part of a movement. Zohran has helped every other New York DSA elected official in their campaigns, he’s gone upstate to the Hudson Valley to help win a socialist an assembly seat up there, he’s gotten arrested protesting, he’s gone on a hunger strike alongside NYC cab drivers when they needed our help. These are immensely commendable actions in and of themselves, but beyond that they speak to Zohran being a part of something bigger than himself. He's part of an organization, he's part of a movement.

And that is the single biggest lesson from this victory. No more politicians who are out there for personal gain, who are untethered to organizations and movements. Not just because politicians with deep ties to organizing can sometimes be held to account, but because through being in the trenches with us people who should and could be real public servants prove themselves, demonstrate their track records, and build relationships with people in their communities. It’s no surprise that a candidate who emerged from this system actually cared about the city, actually had principles, stuck to them, and was able to communicate them compellingly to millions of people.

Most importantly, when candidates come out of working-class organizations, their ascendance can help build that organization. Thousands and thousands of people will join New York’s DSA branch in the coming months and years. The numbers have already been jumping up, and it is in these powerful working-class organizations that people can foster power that will last beyond any one candidate or moment. It is in these collectives that we can create the capacity for real transformation.

Right now, we celebrate. The memes and the videos and the posts and the party will continue through this weekend, at the least. And we deserve it. In a dark time the volunteer army that propelled Zohran to victory has shone a little light. Hell, maybe more than a little. In a country that struggles to believe people power can change anything — because it is so often stifled and squashed whenever it is built — this campaign demonstrated that we can win. We can take power, we can build and we can organize, we can reject the status quo and the corrupt establishment and the people can create the alternative we want to see.

So I hope we do celebrate. Thousands of people across New York have earned it. They created an energy around doing the impossible that was so contagious the impossible came to be. The millions of hours that ordinary people poured into this election moved mountains and toppled a political dynasty. Years and years of organizing won this victory. Years spent building, developing relationships, and creating an organization that could challenge the power structure in the biggest and richest city in America, right under the nose of Wall Street and the ruling class, won this victory.

I don’t think Democrats will take the necessary lessons from this moment. I don’t think the basic economic proposals that try to make life more affordable, that help a candidate connect with young men and immigrants and people across the political spectrum, that create incredible energy and momentum will suddenly be adopted by mainstream Democratic candidates. But they might. And more importantly I think upstarts might adopt them. I think people in DSA chapters and unions and community organizations across the country will learn from this. I think we’ll see other Zohran Mamdanis bloom, I think we’ll see a surge of people plugging into organizing and building the structures that allow us to take back power for the people. I think we’ll see hope, and action, and I think that’s exactly what we need. - JP