Schumer And Jeffries Keep Dodging Mamdani. Democrats Shouldn't.
Op-Ed: Schumer And Jeffries Keep Dodging Zohran Mamdani. Democrats Shouldn’t.
At this point, in terms of electoral relevance, it no longer matters whether or not Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, both of New York City, and together, hold positions that make them the current de facto leaders of the Democratic Party, endorse Zohran Mamdani in the city’s looming mayoral election.
The voters spoke for themselves already in July when they handed Mamdani a decisive victory in the Democratic primary, besting former NY governor and alleged creep, Andrew Cuomo, by a 12-point margin.
Yet even if their endorsement would not move the needle any further, it’s pitiable that New York City-based Democrats are dragging their feet to endorse the candidate their constituents have chosen publicly.
Not only failing to endorse, but Jeffries recently declined to appear in public together after holding a second “constructive” meeting with Mamdani at a Brooklyn church.
Even more contemptible is the paltry number of donkeys in elected office to call them out for it.
Unsurprisingly, among those few is Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, an NYC resident herself, who endorsed Mamdani in the primary earlier this year.
When asked by reporters if she was frustrated with Schumer and Jeffries, AOC responded with: “We have a Democratic nominee. Are we a party that rallies around our nominee or not?”
She then took a minute to remind her congressional colleagues how primaries work.
“We use our primaries to settle our differences, and once we have a nominee, we rally behind a nominee,” AOC explained – citing her eventual support of Joe Biden for president in the 2020 presidential election.
“I am very concerned about the example that is being set by anybody in our party,” she continued, going on to add, “If an individual doesn’t want to support the party’s nom now, it complicates their ability to ask voters to support any nom later, whether that is mayoral, presidential, what have you, and I think for the good of the party, we must put our differences aside and support our nominee.”
When told that her response sounds like she is indeed frustrated with Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, she politely shooed the reality away, arguing that “it’s not about personalities.”
That’s nice of her to say otherwise, but, nah, this all is about the flawed personalities of two out-of-touch politicians that, unfortunately, are leading the Democratic Party to their worst polling numbers in several years.
Last I heard, per the Wall Street Journal, their favorability stood at only 33 percent.
I was elated to hear Charlamagne take social media parlance to syndicated radio when he branded Hakeem Jeffries as “AIPAC Shakur.”
“I don’t hate him, I just don’t think he stands for anything,” Charlamagne explained to Claudia Jordan during an interview on “The Breakfast Club.”
I have never been that impressed with Hakeem Jeffries and have resented those who extended him far more grace than his political positions ever deserved, simply because he liked to quote The Notorious B.I.G. from time to time in interviews and on the House floor.
And the way he has danced around endorsing Mamdani in interview after interview has been pathetic to witness.
Let some in the Democratic Party tell it, Jeffries and Schumer are dodging Mamdani for the good of the Democratic Party in next year’s midterm elections.
“They are probably weighing the potential blowback from swing districts nationally from the perceptions of progressive politics,” Basil Smikle, a Columbia University professor, policy advisor, and political strategist, explained to the New York Daily News.
As it’s been since Bill Clinton’s country self became president and governed like Ronald Reagan with a twang, by and large mainstream Democrats have pretended that tending to the concerns of working-class Americans and po’ folks is the stuff of socialist lunacy.
In the case of Mamdani, it’s selective outrage regarding his choice of verbiage in condemning a genocide, and in terms of policy, his support for initiatives such as free buses and city-run grocery stores in areas with food deserts.
I have watched a millionaire anchor on cable news and a pundit on the “for you” section of whatever social media app where words dominate lament about this, but publicly run grocery stores already exist in America, and everyone is fine.
Meanwhile, I’m squirming at the grocery store prices in these monopolized markets, giving glory to God that I can even still afford meat (while also silently praying this government hasn’t completely let safety go to hell).
As for Gaza, if the experts can call it a genocide, so can the Democratic leadership (without backpeddling) – especially when an overwhelming majority of Americans are fed up with the Israeli government’s war.
Yet here we are, all because Hakeem loves that AIPAC money and goofy Chuck Schumer, who, by the way, is currently trying to recruit someone who is 78 years old to run for Senate.
And because of that, we continue to have Democratic moderates like New York Congressman Tom Suozzi going on TV to say nonsense like, “Zohran Mamdani and every other Democratic Socialist should create their own party because I don’t want that in my party.”
The last thing anyone needs is more election advice from another boring white man with no vision other than their own careerist pursuits on cable news.
People like him, along with Jeffries and Schumer, fear the GOP making a boogyman of Zohran in electoral ads, but cowering to racism and ignorance will not help them win the midterms.
What would help them is following Zohran’s lead by finding affable candidates who seem to actually understand what Democratic voters want.
And if they want to counterprogram the Republican fearmongering, just tell the truth about them and the racist, elderly bigot that used to be best friends with a pedophile that’s fleecing the country while the rest of his family suffers under his lunacy.
And please, I am begging the people of New York, somebody primary both of them.
Michael Arceneaux is a New York Times bestselling author whose most recent book, I Finally Bought Some Jordans, was published last March.
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Op-Ed: Schumer And Jeffries Keep Dodging Zohran Mamdani. Democrats Shouldn’t. was originally published on newsone.com
