During the course of his election campaign, Mayor Zohran Mamdani raised the concerns of many when he shared his so-called “democratic socialist” agenda for New York City. And that concern was not limited to this-or-that item on his wish list. He seemed intent on an ideological policy sweep to displace the time-honored – if imperfect – practical approaches to problem-solving. What we’re getting from the new mayor only confirms those fears. Consider three examples.
Most recently is the new pilot program he announced to dispatch unarmed social workers, rather than police officers, as first responders to domestic violence calls. According to the Mayor, this is “de-escalation” of hostilities with police and in sync with the “defund police” narrative that a police presence is inherently toxic.
So rather than “individuals with guns,” calls would be answered by civilian professionals and advocates trained in trauma care and de-escalation. But to anyone who has a passing familiarity with domestic violence incidents, these responses would be – as criminal law experts have said – “suicide missions.”
They note that domestic disputes are notoriously the most volatile, unpredictable, and dangerous situations law enforcement encounters. They involve high emotions, enclosed spaces, and frequently, weapons. Sending a social worker with a clipboard into such situations to mediate is just pure negligence. It endangers the social worker, who is untrained for combat, and it abandons the victim who needs immediate physical protection, not a counseling referral.
Alarmingly, this is not a law enforcement standalone for this Mayor. Rather, it reportedly is a part of his plan to lead a public health approach to safety.
And then there were the freezing deaths of those 11 homeless people on N.Y.C. streets in the early days of the current cold snap – that number has now risen to 18. Despite the plunging temperatures, Mayor Mamdani stood firm on his refusal to dismantle the tent cities the homeless slapped together that have proliferated on our sidewalks and force them into city shelters to save their lives. He maintained, in true progressive mode, that sweeping the encampments “criminalizes poverty” and violates the “autonomy of the homeless.”
But in the real world, allowing a mentally ill person to sleep in a tent in sub-zero weather is not respecting their rights; it is abetting their deaths.
Further, the Mayor’s detachment from reality extends to the City’s finances. Despite facing a staggering $12 billion budget deficit, Mamdani insists on going through with new spending, such as providing free bus transportation and expanded housing and child care vouchers. Indeed, rather than pulling back, he has gone to Albany demanding a raft of new taxes on high earners and increased state aid to fund all of it.
But, if anything, these supposed remedies will come at the expense of closing the current budget gap, which will not simply go away. Moreover, the need for additional taxes and state aid to fund the new spending will be recurring in upcoming budget cycles just to maintain the status quo.
In addition, his plan seems oblivious to today’s reality that the tax base is not an infinite resource. In fact, capital is now plainly mobile and if he taxes the rich into fleeing to Florida, the result will be a collapse in revenue that would destroy the very social services he aims to expand.
Nor are these isolated incidents. They are plainly of a piece with major Mamdani ideological appointments. Thus, he appointed Kamar Samuels as school chancellor, although he opposes merit-based admissions and chasing “equity” by removing the standards that allow bright, low-income kids to excel.
And he appointed Cea Weaver as his “tenant czar,” despite her open disparagement of homeownership – she has said it is a tool of white supremacy – signaling to members of the middle class and wannabes that their aspirations are the enemy of his administration.
It’s time our mayor ditched the ideology thing, and got down to dealing with the real problems we face with real solutions.