A few days ago, CNN news anchor Abby Phillip interviewed the Democratic candidate in the New York City mayoral race, Zohran Mamdani. He did what he always does, staying focused on his core message of making the city more affordable for ordinary New Yorkers with initiatives like free childcare, rent freezes for already rent-stabilized apartments, and eliminating bus fares. Mamdani has emerged as one of the best messengers for a democratic socialist agenda, combining a consistently compelling and charismatic delivery with relentless message discipline. As always, it was a pleasure to watch him in action.
Phillip’s side of the conversation, by contrast, revealed the limited political imaginations of the custodians of respectability at CNN. She seemed to be arguing that any moves toward substantial redistribution of wealth from the rich to everyone else should be off-limits.
At one point, Phillip raised the topic of Tesla’s proposed pay package to Elon Musk, which is poised to make him a trillionaire. Presumably fishing for a sound bite where Mamdani would come off as a fire-breathing radical, she asked him, “Do you think trillionaires should exist?”
He’s already on record proudly saying that billionaires should not exist. As a matter of logic and arithmetic, he clearly believes that we shouldn’t have trillionaires either. In his answer to Phillip, though, he took the opportunity to broaden the topic and emphasize the other half of the equation. New York is full of working-class people “who keep the city running,” he said, but who, in many cases, now have to commute to work in the city from homes across state lines. What kind of society combines that with such rampant accumulation of wealth that we’re now talking about trillionaires?
Mamdani emphasized that these aren’t two separate, coincidental phenomena. Highlighting recent cuts to Medicaid and SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits, which have…
Auteur: Ben Burgis
