Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) pressed the Democratic Party to champion the socialist policies espoused by New York Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, who recently clinched a victory in the Big Apple’s Democratic mayoral primary. 

Mamdani has been accused of holding an antisemitic worldview and favoring policies Republicans believe are widely out of touch with the majority of the country. Powerful establishment Democrats, such as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), kept the socialist at arm’s length as he challenged former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, viewed as an old guard centrist, for the mayoral nomination. 

Recommended Stories

• House GOP duo endorses Mike Rogers for Michigan Senate as colleague weighs bid
• Mamdani gives Republicans opening to tether Democrats to socialism
• Democrats to learn if they can afford socialist New York City mayor

In an op-ed for the Guardian on Wednesday, Sanders rebutted the idea that Mamdani is too radical for the country, contending that the candidate understands “antisemitism is a disgusting and dangerous ideology, but that it is not antisemitic to be critical of the inhumane policies” of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. Mamdani’s policies, which include raising taxes on the rich, providing free public buses and child care, freezing rent in subsidized units, and creating government-run grocery stores, are “what working people want,” Sanders continued, as he urged establishment figures to “learn the lesson that the Zohran Mamdani campaign taught us on Tuesday.” 

“Have the courage to address the real economic and moral issues that face the majority of our people, take on the greed and power of the oligarchy and fight for an agenda that can improve life for working families,” wrote the senator, who caucuses with Democrats and endorsed Mamdani ahead of the primary win Tuesday. 

“Mamdani has been criticized for his ‘radical’ and ‘unrealistic’ economic policies. These ideas, and more, are not radical. They may not be what billionaires, wealthy campaign contributors, and real estate speculators want, but they are what working people want. And maybe, just maybe, it’s time to listen to them,” he continued. 

Sanders lamented that mainstream party leaders would likely not “learn the lesson,” writing that “too many of them would rather be the captains on a sinking Titanic, rather than change course.” But he said Mamdani’s win, which came without the support of many powerful Democratic figures against establishment candidate Cuomo, proved that it “doesn’t matter” what current leadership thinks. 

“The establishment threw everything they had against Mamdani — millions in Super Pac money, endorsements from ‘important people,’ a hostile media — and they still lost,” the Vermont senator concluded. 

Sanders’s spirited defense of Mamdani comes as the assemblyman is under intense scrutiny for his positions on a host of issues. 

In 2020, Mamdani wrote that his support for the “defund the police” movement was a “feminist issue,” saying that “especially trans women are disproportionately impacted by police violence & the violence of incarceration.” The same year, he argued that “queer liberation means defund the police.”

Some Republicans, including President Donald Trump, have characterized Mamdani as a communist “lunatic,” with the New York Young Republican Club responding to his recent victory by calling on the federal government to strip the candidate of his citizenship and deport him by invoking the Communist Control Act. Some communist groups have disavowed the mayoral candidate, arguing he is trying to “deceive” working-class voters. 

Mamdani has also raised eyebrows on a flurry of other issues, including his anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement rhetoric and voting during his time as an assemblyman in 2021 against banning revenge porn. Although Sanders defended him against claims of antisemitism, the mayoral candidate continues to come under scrutiny for defending the controversial phrase “globalize the intifada,” which calls for violence against Jews, and defending the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement, which protests the Jewish state. 

Many Republicans are hoping that Mamdani becomes the new face of the Democratic Party, believing that his socialist views will be broadly unpopular with voters nationally despite his surge of support in the country’s largest city by population. 

“LETS F***ING GOOOOO,” conservative podcaster Tim Pool wrote after the results were in, with strategists telling the Washington Examiner it’s clear the GOP appreciates “a boogeyman.” 

HOW ZOHRAN MAMDANI TOOK DOWN ANDREW CUOMO IN NYC MAYORAL PRIMARY

Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) said he shared “serious concerns” about Mamdani following his primary, while Rep. Laura Gillen (D-NY) called the assemblyman “too extreme to lead New York City.” 

“His entire campaign has been built on unachievable promises and higher taxes, which is the last thing New York needs,” Gillen wrote, adding concerns about Mamdani’s past support for the “defund the police” movement and accusing him of “a deeply disturbing pattern of unacceptable antisemitic comments which stoke hate at a time when antisemitism is skyrocketing.”