The Clock Ticks on Zohran Mamdani

Zohran Mamdani’s election as mayor represents the culmination of New York City’s leftward shift that began in 2018, Manhattan Institute President Reihan Salam observes, with progressives passing bills about climate change, bail reform, and tenant protections.

Mamdani’s rise “was led by downwardly mobile elites—children of the professional class struggling to make ends meet and entranced by the promises of frozen rent and fare-free buses,” Salam writes. They believed “that some New Yorkers have been handed the short straw, that soak-the-rich policies can correct these imbalances, and that New York’s private sector was resilient enough to sustain a further ratcheting up of punitive taxation and regulation.”

But what the Mamdani coalition has failed to recognize is that New York’s slide toward socialism has already come with consequences—namely, the erosion of its economic base. “Can we expect Mamdani to make a U-Turn toward spending discipline and public-sector efficiency, a nod to the ‘sewer socialists’ of a century ago? That’s hard to imagine,” Salam writes, “both for ideological reasons and because he is plainly unwilling to buck progressive allies on the city council.”

Read his analysis.

In less than two months, Zohran Mamdani will take office as New York City’s 110th mayor, which means the promises he made on the campaign trail will finally be tested. But what can he actually do?

Mamdani will oversee hundreds of thousands of employees, but he can still be checked by state and federal authorities, or by competitors like the city council. “His real powers are administrative and managerial: hiring, firing, and directing the bureaucracy that keeps the city running and directs trash pickup, police, firefighting, roads, and other services,” Daniel Golliher explains.

Mamdani’s ability to expand beyond those duties will depend on whom he adds to his team and how he navigates political and legal forces beyond City Hall.

Read more about the mayor’s powers here.

City Journal investigative reporter Adam Lehodey spent Election Day talking with voters across the Bronx, Harlem, the Upper West Side, and the Financial District. He found New Yorkers enthusiastic for Mamdani’s youth and energy, and others who expressed skepticism about his signature affordability proposals: fare-free buses, universal childcare, and rent freezes, among others.

The mayor-elect would be well advised to listen to this latter group. “If Mamdani wants to create a city that works for all, he can’t forget their voices,” writes Lehodey. Flashy campaign promises may win elections, but they don’t solve problems.

Read his reporting here.

Charles Fain Lehman, Rafael Mangual, John Ketcham, and Pirate Wires’s Mike Solana analyze the results of New York City’s mayoral election.

“Why exactly would you expect free buses to be safer? Free buses means all comers are able to get on, no questions asked. So a cynic might think that criminals looking for easy pickings, and paranoid schizophrenics and jihadis looking to commit mass murder, would welcome free buses.”

Photo credit: ANGELA WEISS / Contributor / AFP via Getty Images