This week the youthful and charismatic Democrat politician Zohran Mamdani was elected mayor of New York city.

Mamdani’s victory was, in one sense, nothing to write home about – his main opponents were the aging and tarnished former Democrat Governor Andrew Cuomo, who has been plagued by sexual harassment claims for years, and the inept and uninspiring Republican Curtis Silwa. In an election characterized by a record voter turnout – over two million New Yorkers voted – Mamdami won with 51% of the vote. Cuomo received 42% and Silwa 7%.

What makes Mamdani’s victory significant is that he is a self-styled “democratic socialist” who was elected mayor without being endorsed by the Democratic Party leadership – most of whom, including Chuck Schumer, minority Senate leader from New York, refused to endorse him at all.

Mamdani is an intelligent, 34-year-old Muslim of Indian heritage who was born in Uganda. His father is a prominent black studies academic and his mother is an acclaimed filmmaker.

Mamdani, a former celebrity rapper, social worker and state assemblyman, ran on a left-wing populist program that focused almost exclusively on alleviating cost-of-living pressures for ordinary New Yorkers – especially young New Yorkers. He promised to deliver rent freezes, free public transport, free childcare, city-owned grocery stores and universal health care. He also promised to build 200,000 affordable new houses with union labor.

Whether Mamdani can actually implement this program is by no means clear – New York city is $5 billion in debt, and the New York state government and governor can severely limit what a New York mayor can do.

Mamdami is a strong critic of America’s support for the Netanyahu and Zelensky regimes, and has stated explicitly that he would fund his reforms by increasing taxes on New-York-based large corporations and the ultra-rich that control them.

Mamdani’s program is a pragmatic social democratic one – that contrasts starkly with the MAGA populist agenda, which is based on magical thinking, demonizing America’s supposed internal enemies and leaving America’s economic structure and widening inequalities of wealth completely intact.

Mamdani maintained throughout his campaign that “unlike Trump I can deliver for the working class.” This is correct – because if his economic program were to be implemented it would really benefit those groups that he represents. In any rational view, cost-of-living pressures on ordinary Americans can only be relieved by redistributing wealth downwards from the haves to the have-nots.

Some left-wing commentators – as does Mamdani himself – have seen Mamdani’s rapid political ascendency as the harbinger of a radical........

© RT.com