A spectre is haunting The Bronx —
the spectre of communism.
According to U.S. President Donald Trump, Zohran Mamdani will be the “Communist Mayor of New York City.”
Who's Man's Is This?
Zohran says he’s not a communist. According to the Revolutionary Communists of America and The Communist Party of USA, he's right. Mamdani has not called for a communist system without bosses or workers (no social classes), exploitation, private (or profitable) property, or a state (no centralized government).
Mamdani is actually a democratic socialist. The Democratic Socialists of America believe that capitalism is “designed by the owning class to exploit the rest of us for their own profit,” and want to replace it with “a system where ordinary people have a real voice in our workplaces, neighborhoods, and society…to collectively own the key economic drivers that dominate our lives…as a transition to a freer, more just life.”
While Mamdani thinks billionaires shouldn't exist, he has not called for their abolition or deletion as a capitalist class. That didn’t stop billionaires from spending millions of dollars against Mamdani. In fact, Zohran wants to work with the rich to achieve five main reforms of his affordability agenda:
- Free child care
- Rent freeze
- Cheaper groceries
- Free city buses
- $30/hour minimum wage
- Rent freeze
- Cheaper groceries
- Free city buses
- $30/hour minimum wage
Whether Mamdani will achieve these reforms, or if he’s truly socialist, is debatable. Some call him a reformist who won’t change a system that’s good for the rich and bad for the poor. They point to his running for the Democratic Party, which represents capitalists, as proof that he's not a socialist, but instead a social democrat. Others doubt if Mamdani’s reforms will happen since they rely on capitalists to pay for them through higher taxes on the rich.
Hate Me Now: Capitalists vs. Socialism
What we do know is that Mamdani’s reforms aim to help a working class suffering from rising living costs and a growing wealth gap between workers and bosses. That’s why the rich and their conservative goons hate Mamdani.
Trump preached in his 2020 State of the Union address that “Socialism destroys nations.” He later spoke at the “America Vs. Socialism” themed Conservative Political Action Conference. Four years later, Trump pushed this hate to win more votes in The Bronx (27%) than he did in 2020 (16%).
This shift to the right helped a Republican Party candidate win a City Council District in the Bronx in 2023 for the first time in over 40 years; the 13th district covers the East Bronx from Throgs Neck to Pelham Bay where Cuomo beat Mamdani. Bronx Conservative Party Vice Chairman Gonzalo Duran, who ran for Public Advocate of NYC this year, warned about a “rising tide of socialism.”
If socialism is so scary, why do so many people want it? Since 2010, polls on socialism by Pew Research, YouGov, and Gallup show:
- Support for socialism has gone up
- Support for capitalism has gone down
- More young people want socialism
- More Democrat voters want socialism
- Support for capitalism has gone down
- More young people want socialism
- More Democrat voters want socialism
U.S. Americans define socialism differently and often misunderstand it as social democracy, which maintains capitalism to fund social programs like healthcare, education, and housing. Socialism provides these benefits under worker control of the economy. Recent polls show that around 40% of U.S. Americans want socialism, while support for capitalism has gone down to 54%. Support for socialism is way higher among youth and Democrat voters: 66%.
Dem Not Ready: Democratic Party vs. Socialism
If so many Democrat voters want socialism, why did 86 of 213 Democrats (40%) in the House of Representatives condemn the “horrors of socialism” the day Mamdani met Trump? One Democrat who condemned socialism was Ritchie Torres, U.S. congressmember for NY’s 15th district in the South Bronx, one of the poorest or most exploited congressional districts in the country. Next door, the East Bronx 14th is represented by self-described democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who won its Congress seat in 2018.
This shows the Democratic Party’s internal struggle between a neoliberal right wing representing corporate interests (Ritchie Torres, Andrew Cuomo), and a social democrat left wing promising progressive reforms (AOC, Mamdani). There are people in the Bronx taking advantage of this contradiction and Mamdani's win, such as Andre Easton, who is currently running for Congress in the South Bronx's 15th congressional district as an independent socialist for the Party for Socialism and Liberation.
Boogie Down Zohran: How the Bronx Voted
So why does the Bronx want Mamdani now after voting for Cuomo in the June Democrat primary election? Zohran may have been rewarded by party loyalty when Cuomo switched from Democrat to independent and the Bronx Democratic Party endorsed Mamdani. Zohran and his canvassers also visited the Bronx a lot, which helped promote his affordability agenda and convince 52% of Bronx voters to choose him versus Cuomo’s 40%. This was despite only 28% of registered Bronx voters casting a ballot and only 11% of all NYC voters coming from the Bronx, the city's lowest turnout.
While Cuomo won northwest and eastern sections of the Bronx in neighborhoods like Riverdale, Throgs Neck, City Island, and Pelham Bay where a minority of wealthy White voters live, Mamdani won the South Bronx and parts of North Bronx (Westchester Square, Norwood, Mott Haven, Eastchester, etc.) where more working-class people of color are. Mamdani also won young voters under the age of 45 (over 70%).
This helps to understand why Mamdani won The Bronx. His promises to make NYC more affordable speaks to the needs of Bronx tenants, workers, and families who live with the city’s lowest median income in the most exploited New York state county. Bronx tenants are the most rent-burdened, or pay the most rent compared to their income, and are most likely to be evicted, than in other boroughs. Bronx residents are also the most underpaid and underemployed in NYC.
This may explain why so many fewer Bronx voters go to the polls. They might wonder what the point is if their lives haven't gotten better no matter who they vote for. It says a lot about the Democratic Party's failures for the working-class, which has held power in the Bronx for decades.
Will Zohran's reforms be enough for the Bronx? He promises to prioritize it in City Hall, as he calls it a big part of who he is as a graduate of Bronx High School of Science. But will Mamdani be allowed to achieve his agenda in the capital city of capitalism? How will he clash with corporate Democrats, capitalists in New York, and Donald Trump? Is Mamdani’s win a step forward towards socialism, or a step back to save capitalism from itself? Time will tell. The MC, the master of ceremony, the main character in this struggle, is not Mamdani, but everyday workers in The Bronx and beyond.