A Dictatorship of Their Own Making

July 17, 2025

By Gabe Khuly

Progressives nabbed a major victory in the Democratic primary for Mayor of New York City with the recent victory of Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani over former Governor Andrew Cuomo. Cuomo was far from an ideal candidate, his resume still marked by the sexual harassment scandals and handling of the COVID-19 pandemic that had previously resulted in his resignation as Governor. However, Mamdani’s victory should scare mainstream Democrats and make them do everything in their power to prevent him from winning in November, either by backing incumbent Mayor Eric Adams, who is running as an independent, or some other candidate. If Mamdani is elected mayor, a likely outcome at this point, it would prove to the rest of the country, to those living outside of the large urban centers where Democrats dominate, that the party really is the out-of-touch extremist force Republicans claim it is. By positioning themselves so far outside the mainstream of American politics, they will alienate centrist voters looking for an alternative to the current administration.

The state of the Democratic Party today is already an unenviable one. Turmoil and chaos have engulfed the party since their loss in November. The drama surrounding the ousting of David Hogg as DNC Vice Chair, for instance, caused a firestorm within the party. Hogg’s plans to fund primary challengers to Democratic incumbents through his Leaders We Deserve PAC drew massive backlash from senior party leaders, ultimately leading to him resigning as Vice Chair. During the controversy, one of the most shocking reports was a leaked phone call between new DNC Chair Ken Martin and Hogg wherein Martin, audibly emotional, tells Hogg that, “the other night I said to myself for the first time, I don’t know if I wanna do this anymore.” While introspection after an electoral loss is expected—even necessary—to reconnect with voters, this is not what has been happening. The level of infighting we have seen from the Democratic Party does not confer confidence in its future, but invites mockery; it is a sign of an organization in disarray.

In that same call with Hogg, Martin goes on to say the ordeal has “essentially destroyed any chance I have to show the leadership that I need to,” which helps to illustrate one of the pillars of what is behind the Democrats’ problems: a lack of real leadership. To be fair to Martin, this isn’t completely his fault, though he is also far from innocent. In a statement, Martin said, “I took this job to fight Republicans, not Democrats. As I said when I was elected, our fight is not within the Democratic Party, our fight is and has to be solely focused on Donald Trump and the disastrous Republican agenda.” However, this statement also underlies a basic problem with the party. More than a crisis of leadership, what we see is a crisis of identity: a party that is unsure of the direction it wants to take, unsure of its message beyond just being “anti-Trump.” As it stands, the Democratic Party is not a cogent political operation; it defines itself ideologically with opposition, rather than anything concrete that presents a real alternative to Trump.

This all brings us to Zohran Mamdani, the 33-year-old Muslim democratic socialist and former rapper. Born in Uganda to Indian parents, Mamdani only became a citizen quite recently, in 2018. His rise in popularity has been largely attributed to a slick social media campaign showcasing his genuinely charming personality that has energized young progressive voters. One pre-election poll that had Cuomo leading overall also showed Mamdani being the first choice of 67% of voters aged 18-34. In the end, Mamdani bested Cuomo after just three rounds of New York’s ranked-choice primary voting, a far cry from the eight rounds it took for Eric Adams to prevail in the Democratic primary four years ago. In a primary that had nine candidates on the debate stage 20 days earlier, only three (Mamdani and Cuomo, as well as City Comptroller Brad Lander) managed more than 10% of the vote in the first round, with Cuomo and Mamdani carrying 36.5% and 43%, respectively (Lander only managed about 11%; every other candidate netted not just less than 10%, but less than 5%). The third and final round was a rout: Mamdani defeated Cuomo 56-44. 

Behind Mamdani’s upset victory is genuine popular sentiment against traditional institutions, which people feel have abandoned them. There is a real appetite for change, and those inclined are going to support politicians who promise something new. On top of his sexual harassment scandals, Cuomo is an old name—in addition to being Governor for a decade, he was also HUD Secretary under Bill Clinton, and his father previously served as Governor. He’s an old-school, establishment Democrat; just about the antithesis of what a young voter dissatisfied with politics as usual would want. Mamdani, by contrast, comes across as his polar opposite; he’s young, relatable, new to the political arena, having only been elected to the State Assembly in 2020, a seeming breath of fresh air to the old, corrupt political system that has failed the average person (and to which Cuomo belongs). In the eyes of voters, Cuomo’s decades of public service amounted to decades of disappointment, while Mamdani’s inexperience meant he had no experience of letting people down. In an increasingly digital age, having a well-produced social media campaign means that you’re meeting people where they’re at. This is especially the case with young voters, a demographic that Mamdani, as a young person himself, already has the upper hand in appealing to. At first glance, this should all be great news to Democratic leadership. Mamdani is a young, effective communicator whose policy proposals clearly resonate with people and capture public sentiment, so what’s the problem? Well, his policies.

Mamdani’s campaign website lists a number of ambitious progressive policies he’d implement as mayor—including a $30 minimum wage, freezing rent for all New Yorkers living in rent-stabilized apartments, and creating a series of city-owned grocery stores to help people struggling to afford food, to name a few of the most notable ones—all paid for by massive increases in taxes to the rich. These policies, which he would have basically no authority to implement unilaterally (either because he needs approval from another body like the City Council or because these measures are set at the state rather than the local level), would be disastrous if actually implemented. There is a plethora of bipartisan research that shows that rent control is largely ineffective and actually makes the problems it seeks to fix worse. His city-owned grocery chain proposal is financially unsustainable in the long run and would become an expensive and ineffective burden to the city's taxpayers. His tax proposals would further drive businesses out of the city, which would exacerbate the already existing problem of people leaving the Big Apple thanks to the high cost of living. When taken in totality, his policies, if enacted, would make New York City drastically more unaffordable and unlivable than it already is for the vast majority of its residents. In a city that has shown a surprising shift rightward over the last 2 cycles, a Mamdani mayoralty would serve to further alienate longtime staunch Democratic voters already behind the surprising overperformances of Lee Zeldin in 2022 and Donald Trump in 2024.

But the effects would go much further than just New York. The City That Never Sleeps is, after all, the financial hub of America and, in turn, the world. New York’s status as the most populous city in the country has long earned it an important position in American culture. As such, the Mayor of New York City has an outsized influence on the rest of the country. In deciding the next mayor, Democrats will show what direction they will take the country if they regain power. Electing someone who calls himself a socialist, no matter how “democratic” he is, would send a message to the rest of the country, to whom Republicans have long been saying that Democrats are socialists, that they are, indeed, just that.

In the Cuban community of Miami-Dade County, Florida, a community I proudly belong to, Trump’s numbers skyrocketed over the last 2 presidential elections because of this messaging: Trump won Miami-Dade County by over 11 points last November, a shocking turnaround for a county he lost by almost 30 points in 2016. In 2020, when so much of the country shifted leftward, Miami-Dade County shifted rightward by over 22 points. While critics may say that this tactic isn’t new, it’s crucial to note that socialism has never openly been a major force in the modern history of the party. The rise of figures like Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, politicians who have huge followings and refer to themselves as socialists, is, to the average American, to whom socialism conjures up images of long lines, food shortages, abject poverty, and cruel dictatorship, a complete and total vindication and affirmation of Republican messaging. This is especially true of Cuban-Americans, who are concentrated in the Miami area.

To a community of people who either fled themselves or whose families fled a communist dictatorship because of those factors, hearing one side cozy up to followers of the same ideology that ruined their lives is an intense motivator. There are still large numbers of people fleeing Cuba for Miami, and each new Cuban refugee that lands on our shores is a living reminder of the failure of communism. While the Cold War is over, the hostility to socialism that it brewed in American culture still largely persists, if somewhat minimized. For Cubans, that hostility never dissipated, and if Cubans shifted as rightward as they did because socialists became a force within the Democratic Party, how might the median voter shift if they become the dominant force? In an environment where the Democratic Party is already wildly unpopular despite Trump, further alienation of centrist voters would render the party politically irrelevant for years.

In the wake of their stunning loss to Trump in November, a political vacuum has opened up in the Democratic Party, and this has resulted in serious and dramatic turmoil within the party over what its future is to look like. In a party without direction defined by opposition to, rather than support for, the extremists are emerging as the strongest bloc. Allowing them to take the reins would shut out the party from the levers of power for the foreseeable future. In doing so, all the Democrats’ talking points about how Trump is a wannabe dictator might just come true, and they’d have nobody to blame for this nightmare come true but themselves.

Gabriel Khuly is a student at Claremont McKenna College dual majoring in Government and Economics and a summer intern at FUSION.