Will the electorate “learn” if Mamdani is elected?
It seems inevitable that Mamdani will win in New York City and become its new mayor. However, he’s done so poorly in the debates – against even a lackluster and much-despised Andrew Cuomo – that the polls have supposedly tightened:
The race for New York City mayor has tightened considerably — with ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo cutting front-runner Zohran Mamdani’s lead in half from a month ago, according to a new poll.
Mamdani, the Democratic nominee, now leads Cuomo, running as an independent, just 44% to 34% among the likely Big Apple voters, the Suffolk University survey found.
Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa is in third place with 11% support.
But Mamdani had a 20-point lead over Cuomo in Suffolk University’s prior poll conducted in September.
Mamdani’s hefty lead still remains, despite the shift.
Where did those new votes for Cuomo come from? Apparently, Hispanic voters and Independents:
Cuomo is now running roughly even among Hispanics after trailing Mamdani by 30 points in that demographic in the September poll. …
He leads among independents by 10 points, a dramatic flip from a month ago, when he trailed Mamdani by 18 points among non-party-affiliated voters.
Seven percent of voters are still undecided and the four other candidates whose names are on the ballot garner 2% support combined.
Note that “undecided” 7%. That could put the whole thing in play – perhaps.
Sliwa still gets around 10.6%, but will that many people stick with him when they’re actually in the voting booths, realizing that a vote for Sliwa is effectively a vote for Mamdani? In a little more than a week, I guess we’ll find out.
As I’ve written before, I care what happens in New York, and I deeply hope Mamdani won’t win. Others here disagree with me to a certain extent – for example, “physicsguy”:
I know its sounds bad, but I think its good if Fateh and Mamdani both win. The country needs hard, stark examples of what the current incarnation of the Democratic party brings. I’m afraid the residents of Minneapolis and NYC will never learn, but maybe the rest of the country will as those cities fall into the abyss.
Well, quite a bit of the rest of the country is already red, and knows this. And the rest may be in the “will never learn” category. What Thomas Sowell calls the vision of the anointed is strong in many places and among many demographics. Even with the current 3-way race in NY, Mamdani shouldn’t be getting more than a few percentage points, and de Blasio’s tenure as mayor should have been lesson enough to teach everyone.
The truth is that the US is still split approximately 50/50, despite Trump’s strong victory in 2024. The Democrats have a chance of gaining the House in 2026. The clueless nonentity Kamala Harris came way too close to winning in 2024, despite Biden’s disastrous presidency. Trump’s victory over her should have been far more decisive, but too many Democrat voters would vote for anyone rather than a Republican.
If Mamdani wins in New York, it probably won’t be because a majority of New Yorkers voted for him, and yet the whole city will suffer. I’m not willing to sacrifice the city to create an object lesson that way too many people elsewhere may not be taking to heart (not that I have a say in the matter, but I certainly have an opinion). After all, it’s not as though we lack prior evidence of the failure of the sort of policies Mamdani proposes. And yet so many voters don’t care, or are unaware.
Once the left gets hold of the power structure of a city, it often gets very dug in. The damage that can be done is incalculable. One of the things that happens – and to a certain extent has already happened in New York – is that the more conservative residents flee, and the place becomes even more skewed to the left.
And don’t forget – a mind is a difficult thing to change.
And, as commenter “AesopFan” writes:
Places where the ratcheting [to the left] has been reversed have had some sort of intervention element, where the electorate experienced a shift in voting preferences due to the action of the contesting parties. We can do that because of our political system, so long as it isn’t being monkeyed with too much.
Part of the ratcheting includes monkeying with the electoral system.
Once a particular city gets ratcheted the wrong way* past a certain point, it is not recoverable.
NOTE: Remember this, when New York faced bankruptcy?
Huey Long was screaming to “Soak the Rich” almost 100 years ago. This is nothing new, and no amount of starvation and destruction ever seems to get through to the masses that eating your seed corn always leads to famine.
Nayib Bukele:
https://x.com/nayibbukele/status/1982846456194302074
Will the electorate “learn”? Likely not.
“As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly.”
– Proverbs 26:11
Which is why my hopes for Mamdani are to lose Biblically huge somehow.
For instance
https://www.salon.com/2013/03/06/hugo_chavezs_economic_miracle/
Vs reality
https://x.com/60Minutes/status/1982596109173182598
Hat tip Insty
If I had to make a guess as to what will happen, I’d say that NYC and Minneapolis will both sink into a cesspool of massive corruption and financial mismanagement. Unfortunately I think Trump still has a sentimental connection to his hometown, so he’ll probably bail at least NYC out.
… a cesspool of massive corruption and financial mismanagement.
Hmm…sounds like a city I know.
Dear Sgt. Joe:
I am a Trumpian from way back, but should he do anything like “bail out” NYC, I shall disavow my support. (I’ll still support him, but I will strongly disapprove. I may even send him a strongly worded letter relating my disappointment, just like all good republicans do when democrats get caught stealing us blind.)
Mamdani will “ensure our immigrant New Yorkers are protected by strengthening our sanctuary city apparatus: getting ICE out of all City facilities and ending any cooperation…” https://www.zohranfornyc.com/platform
‘Sanctuary’ is a direct interference with Federal law. Charge him accordingly. Legal consequence must be personal.
I turn to Mencken on this topic:
“Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”
Will the electorate “learn”?
It’s not a binary question. It’s the rate of change — how many are peeling off.
What we learned in 2024 is that many more people in almost all demographics are peeling off from the Democrats than visa-versa.
So, even if Mamdani wins, that doesn’t mean voters won’t be learning.
Bessent has already said no bailout for New York City.
But it would be nice to see all the billionaires bail out of the city. Then how will he get the money for all of the free stuff?
An electorate determined to get people like Fateh and Mamdani into office will do so, and soon, and there is nothing the rest of us can do about it except see to it we live in polities with different electorates.
They are not the disease, they are the symptom. The Left has been thinking if they can just keep Trump out of office or get him out then everything will be better. We are in danger of doing the same with people like Mamdani and our algorithmic bubbles are not helping us avoid it.
Niketas:
You write, “An electorate determined to get people like Fateh and Mamdani into office will do so, and soon.” However, Mamdani does not have the votes of the majority of New Yorkers, and he may indeed get into office anyway. As for Fateh, polls show him behind Frey, although I haven’t seen any recent polls. However, because of some of the candidates uniting to tell their supporters to avoid making Frey their second choice in ranked-choice voting in Minneapolis, the fear is that Fateh may get the job despite not having a majority of voters. So, each may get elected DESPITE an electorate the majority of whom don’t want them.
You also write:
However, I haven’t seen anyone here indicating that he or she thinks “everything will be better” if Mamdani stays out of office. I see people saying that keeping Mamdani out of office will at least slow – not prevent – New York’s decline, including its descent into more crime.
Hitler’s ascension to power wasn’t an electoral mandate either but an unfortunate cascade of opportunism, elite misjudgment, and constitutional weakness.
I don’t see Mamdani as an inevitable force. Sometimes the planets are lined up wrong.
He is part of the Dem’s Last Stand in the face of Trump. I’m sure that’s a factor.
@neo: However, Mamdani does not have the votes of the majority of New Yorkers, and he may indeed get into office anyway… each may get elected DESPITE an electorate the majority of whom don’t want them.
So what? We all know how the system works, and it’s the one with the most votes who wins, an absolute majority is not required. And of course we know the Electoral College did this with Trump in 2016 and Bush in 2000 and we have chapter and verse on tap as to why those were legitimately elected despite having a majority voting against them, so of course I don’t have to repeat arguments you yourself have seen any number of times in defense of elections whose outcomes you supported.
I see people saying that keeping Mamdani out of office will at least slow – not prevent – New York’s decline, including its descent into more crime.
To what purpose will be this “slowing”? A delay is good if it enables time for something else to happen that will stop it. What is that thing? What cavalry is coming to rescue New York City from itself?
@Niketas Choniates: What cavalry is coming to rescue New York City from itself?
Meanwhile back on Planet Earth humans can’t predict everything but often have to take their best shot and hope for the best.
@neo:However, Mamdani does not have the votes of the majority of New Yorkers, and he may indeed get into office anyway… each may get elected DESPITE an electorate the majority of whom don’t want them.
And of course this would be just as true for Cuomo if by some miracle he wins. He would be elected DESPITE an electorate the majority of whom don’t want him. I’m sure we’re not expecting him to get an absolute majority. The most recent polls are just as likely to be indicating that Mamdani has majority support as of right now, as they are to indicate that Cuomo might be almost even: the margin of error works both ways.
@ huxley > “Hitler’s ascension to power wasn’t an electoral mandate either but an unfortunate cascade of opportunism, elite misjudgment, and constitutional weakness.”
A well-phrased and succinct summary of how the Nazis took over Germany (leaving out a few details like armed gang warfare, it still captures the essence of the disastrous mistakes made by more than one actor in the drama).
Right now we are running with two out of three, and if our conservative justices don’t stay firm we will lose the advantages of our Constitution, which lacks the weakness of Germany’s as it does not overtly allow the Executive to take over all functions of government.
However, our constitutional order has been manipulated in the past (Wilson, Roosevelt 1 but especially 2, even Obama and Biden) to let the President abscond with far more power than the office is entitled to.
I actually don’t object to the lawsuits challenging Trump’s actions, as many of those questions of prerogatives-in-action need to be decisively settled (until overturned by the next court). That the Supremes under FDR buckled to his threats was a scandal. I don’t remember how many actually agreed with him, but I’m sure some did, just like our three leftists will happily shred the Constitution to obstruct Trump.
@ Sgt Joe Friday > “Unfortunately I think Trump still has a sentimental connection to his hometown, so he’ll probably bail at least NYC out.”
Maybe he would have in his first term.
Now that his “hometown” has kicked him in the teeth, and other parts of the anatomy, over and over again, I doubt his sympathy will extend to a bail out of the politicians causing the disaster.
Maybe a reconstruction effort IF the city comes crawling to him after throwing the bums out.
He’s actually very generous, and even forgiving.
But you don’t get back in his favor without working for it.
@ Geoffrey > “Charge him [Mamdani] accordingly. Legal consequence must be personal.”
After all, both sides agree that “no one is above the law,” don’t they?
@huxley:Meanwhile back on Planet Earth humans can’t predict everything but often have to take their best shot and hope for the best.
Not sure what makes you think I would disagree.
New Yorkers do have a candidate to vote for that would actually have a chance of reversing things instead of delaying them, but they are mostly refusing to consider him. I don’t think Cuomo plausibly represents a “best shot”, reasonable people can disagree, but obviously the Democratic Party machine is not behind him or they never would have ousted him from being Governor. He peed in some powerful people’s Cheerios apparently. If elected he’d meet Mamdani’s supporters half or three quarters of the way, or he’d be done before he began…
@ sdferr – from your link: ” to Bukele something is to fix a problem that liberals say is too complicated by simply ignoring their long-winded excuses and just doing the obvious”
Sounds a lot like Trumping someone.
Or Milei-ing, but that’s not as euphonious (maybe fileting?)
They make a unified trio with the same objectives: cut off the gangrenous branches of the government (with a chainsaw!), and uproot the criminals.
Reminds me of the other great trio of Reagan, Thatcher, and Pope John Paul II.
There’s even a book!
https://www.amazon.com/President-Pope-Prime-Minister-Changed/dp/159698550X
Come to think of it, their story arc as concurrent conservative leaders would make a great movie. But it would have to be made by someone willing to leave out the steamy sex scenes.
@ Neo in her earlier post > “Milei wasn’t running; he’s not up for re-election until 2027. This was a midterm election in which polls said his party wasn’t doing well. But it seems the polls were wrong.
Fancy that.”
Any yet, look how much time is being spent debating whether Cuomo is falling behind, or Mamdani loosing ground, or if the margin of error puts them neck-and-neck.
But we have no idea how reliable “the polls” are.
Looking at a meta-study of multiple polls sometime gives results that turn out to be more accurate than any single poll, but the only poll that counts is the one taken on election day.
And we still can’t be too sure of that one.
PS Yes, I do know that the polls are really the only way to gauge support for candidates, so that there is some thing to talk about other than just belaboring their noxious policy platforms; although I did like the “kinetic poll” of the Trump rally vs Biden basement metrics in 2020.
And yet, Trump “lost” —
So.
Which candidate owns the better fraud machine in NYC?
If only New York had ranked choice (a.k.a. instant runoff) voting.
I heard an interview with Dinesh D’Souza today. He said that Mamdani didn’t just come out of nowhere, but has been groomed for public office by the Red-Green (communist-Muslim) Alliance. Reminds me of Obama.
= = = =
Winsome Earl Sears has been asking me to help her in her race for the Virginia governorship, so I’m planning to send her a bit more money, even though the latest poll has her down seven points. She is quite conservative, and her opponent Spangenberger is a typical Demoncrat. It would be nice to hold the VA governor’s seat.
Learn?
I doubt it. Marxism has proved you can get a population to H8 itself
Read speculation the 9/11 Mosque will finally get approved if Mamdani is elected.
We will see
Everyone here underestimates what these people will do to gain and maintain power.
If it’s any comfort, the farthest Left are accusing Mamdani of selling out to cops and “Zionists”, of using the DSA to get to where he is and now throwing them away to get bigger.
As I said a few days ago, Mamdani is lying to SOMEBODY about who he is and what he means to do, because he promises different things to different people at different times. Those supporting him are convinced someone else is the sucker.
I presume there’s a cohort of potential voters who can’t see past “free stuff”. Perhaps they’ve been so desperate that what comes next isn’t relevant to the Now.
But living in NYC presumes a certain level of nutrition and health care to this point, plus residence. Perhaps some of that is “free stuff” in terms of benefits or regulated activities like rent control.
So one would presume the long(er) view could at least be entertained for a few moments.
Going back as far as college in the Sixties, pointing out practical obstacles or negative outcomes for some proposed pre-lapsarian idyll made you some kind of big meanie. If they could think of it, it must be perfect. You’d think….
But I guess not.
Huxley,
“Hitler’s ascension to power wasn’t an electoral mandate either”
Yes it was.
The Germans voted Socialist – they knew exactly what they were doing. When 3/4th’s of a country votes Socialist – That’s a Mandate for : “I don’t want liberty or freedom, I want slavery for me and my country.”
Germans 1932 election – 1st Three Parties
National Socialists (Nazis) – 37.3%
International Socialists (Communists) – 21.6%
Socialists – 14.3%
German 1933 election – 74.5% for the (3) Socialist parties just different percentages and that was after Hitler took power. The Nazis got even more votes.
Interviewer: What’s your prediction for the fight?
Clubber Lang: My prediction?
Interviewer: Yes, your prediction.
[Clubber looks into camera]
Clubber Lang: Pain!
Pain has always been the greatest educator for the obstinate. Some people can only learn the hard way.
“One of the things that happens – and to a certain extent has already happened in New York – is that the more conservative residents flee, and the place becomes even more skewed to the left.”
That is already happening in CA, IL and NY.
Studies indicate that the Right is 4X more likely to leave a failing Left State vs The Left which is actually happy to stay in a Left Wing State. Maybe not $billionaires but average Leftists like living in Leftist states overwhelmingly like it there.
I have them in my family. These Leftists have no intention on leaving and one was a victim of the Pacific Palisades fire. No amount of cajoling, persuasion or facts change their minds at all.
Look at those cities – all demokrat controlled for decades – that are crime ridden, economic basket case, disastrous sh**tholes.
The voters there keep re-electing pro-crime, anti-police , anti-economic growth politicians.
The electorate in those places simply do not learn and what’s really mind boggling, they have no desire to learn.
No need to mention the voters of California or Illinois or Minneapolis.
And there is no reason to think that NYC voters will leave ; they will not.
NYC voters lived thru the mayoral rule of David Dinkins and later on, DeBlasio.
After Dinkins, one would think the voters there would wise up.
Well, you would be wrong.
Some NYC folks will move out of NYC if Mandami gets elected; perhaps .02 % of the population. A drop in the bucket.
And if NYC loses revenue if many big taxpayers get out of Dodge, no big deal. NYC will just go deeper into debt and raise taxes on the remaining rich and businesses.
As far as a bail out; NYC will just wait for a democrat administration in Washington, DC to bail them out or get bailed out by NY State.. This is a slam dunk
I am convinced that about half of all voters are emotion voters; reality, facts, cause and effect, mean nothing to them. They vote based upon how the candidate makes them feel.
That’s it.
The demise of the USA, if ever that day will come, will be the result of voters, willingly and voluntarily, voting for a national suicide.
Paraphrasing what Abe LIncoln may have said; “this nation will never be destroyed from the outside.”
I want to think people will learn their lesson if economic ruin comes to Mpls. or NYC, but confirmation bias will get in the way.
Even if crime explodes and the city becomes unlivable, people will stick with their tribe. They might move out, but they’ll never be able to admit voting for a socialist caused the disaster they’re fleeing from.
John Tyler:
Actually, NYC was different. It has elected Republicans in the fairly recent past. And Adams, the current mayor, was actually elected as the more “law and order” candidate.
And people did indeed flee NYC during De Blasio’s mayoralty – see this.
California has the highest gasoline prices in the country, by $2 a gallon, in a car centric state. Electricity is very expensive. Housing is really expensive in the big blue cities. Poverty is high. Homelessness is everywhere. Yet, Democrats continue to win elections. They hold all elected higher offices. They hold 43 out of 52 House seats. They have a super-majority in both the state assembly and senate. It’s true that more people voted for Republicans in the last election but not much has changed.
I’m not sure what rock bottom looks like to Democrats but it looks like rock bottom to me.
How the hell has Mandummy “been manipulated by” Zionists other than making vague weaselly suggestions that he might not actually want to murder every Jew on the planet?
Re the Nazis and electoral mandate I think a lot of people arguing Hitler wasn’t democratically elected tend to downplay the magnitude of his electoral achievements in what was a parliamentary system. He never got a majority of the vote but he could get a commanding proportion and had the single largest share going in. And while I have plenty bad to say about Hindenburg and his cabal (moreso than most who generally go “Hindenburg was old and senile and manipulated”) and will freely admit there was horse trading and back room deal, but some flavor of that was necessary to clinch Hitler’s rise as Chancellor, some flavor of that underwrote a lot of other government formations (even if this one was excessively slimy and probably involved more open discussions of criminal intent).
And while I am pretty sure John Galt has mixed up the order of the communists and the Social Democrats and underestimates the democratic achievements of the latter, it would still be worrying as hell (especially given the socialist and authoritarian tendencies in the SPD). Indeed the truth was in a lot of ways even worse, since the DNVP that was the bastion of the absolute monarchists won about 5.9-6% of the vote and the Centre Party that had previously been a bulwark of the Republic and catholic democracy (coming in at 12.4% of the vote) had been taken over by Ludwig Kaas and others openly arguing for a dictatorship that would protect the church.
I’d estimate that the parties unreservedly willing to defend constitutional, democratic republicanism clocked in less than 10 million votes, or about 25%, put together, with the SPD being the largest (and even that has some worrying things – often overlooked – like discussion by Otto Wels of fusing the role of Chancellor and President like Hitler ultimately would).
In short while Hitler had not won a clear majority, he had won a plurality, and parties outright opposed to the republic had won a clear majority, leaving aside question marks.
Turtler:
But democratic republicanism was quite new in Germany when Hitler came to power – only 14 years old. And it was sparked by WWI and a revolution with the knowledge that Germany was defeated (Wilhelm abdicated 2 days before the Armistice). The years of the Wiemar Republic were very hard for Germany, and if that was the only democratic republic the Germans had ever experienced, I’m surprised there was ANY support for that form of government.
As far as Hitler’s parliamentary plurality goes, the Nazis got few votes until after the devastation of the Depression.
I realize of course that you’re aware of all this. But I think it mostly explains why there wouldn’t have been much support for a democratic republic there.
I think it was Amity Schlaes who pointed out that FDR’s brain trust, the dollar-a-year men, couldn’t decide who they admired more: Hitler (National Socialism), Stalin (International Socialism) or Mussolini (Fascism). They wanted FDR to be America’s “strong man.”
The Dem Demonization Strategy has been successful—too many New Yorkers feel that any Rep is evil, so they can only vote for a non-Republican. That’s DDS, the underlying cause of Bush or Trump or Kirk Derangement Syndrome.
The alternative to Democrats, like Mamdani, is R Republican, and if the NY voters accept a terrible Dem over a (R), they deserve to have problems.
More rich folk leave, more poor Dem voters become crime victims, instead of growing a bit like by 1%, it goes down by 10%. Sad, but no crisis.
Any “bailout” should be to help companies relocate outside of NYC.
If enough folk do leave, housing will become more affordable even without new building, tho demand will also be much less.
It’s too bad. All the west coast cities, the other east coast cities, Chicago, Pittsburgh and Atlanta are already there.