New York City’s 2025 Democratic mayoral primary experienced a major upset when, on Tuesday night, June 24, progressive New York State Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani — a self-described “democratic socialist” endorsed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vermont) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) — defeated former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and other candidates.
Now the official Democratic nominee, Mamdani enters the general election, where the current mayor, Eric Adams, is seeking reelection as an independent.
During an appearance on Democracy Now posted on June 26, liberal economic Robert Reich discussed Mamdani’s victory as well as the economic policies of President Donald Trump.
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Reich emphasized that Mamdani aggressively ran on a message of economic populism, telling host Amy Goodman, “Shockwaves is a good way of putting it, Amy. The Democratic Party really needs to learn this lesson…. The lesson is very simple: There is a huge anti-establishment wave in America that is the strongest wave in American politics. And a lot of it has to do with the fact that the bottom 60 to 80 percent of Americans have not seen a real wage increase in 45 years…. The people at the top are doing wonderfully well.”
During the interview, Reich noted that Trump, in 2024, ran on a message of economic populism.
“Trump fooled the majority of Americans, or at least the plurality, into thinking that he would be their savior,” Reich told Goodman.
But Mamdani, Reich argues, is the real deal — unlike Trump.
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“This is the one thing that I agree with Donald Trump about: The economy is rigged — but it’s rigged against working-class people,” Reich told Goodman. “And I think Mamdani understood that. He understood that people have got to want a change, but also, they want affordability. They want an economy that is working for them. And they want new faces. They want younger people. They want a new generation of Democratic leaders.
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Watch the full video below or at this link.
