Washington Examiner columnist Joe Concha pushed back on New York Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani’s rejection of the “communist” label, saying Mamdani’s policies will “transform” the city away from capitalism.
Mamdani denied President Donald Trump’s accusation that he is a communist, telling The View he is a “democratic socialist.” Concha called that title an “oxymoron,” noting that the term “socialist” rarely aligns with “democratic.”
He argued that Mamadani’s policies amount to communism, citing his proposal to “seize properties” and give these away to the city’s homeless.
“Overall, this is somebody who, obviously, through his policies, whether he wants to defund police and replace them with social workers, or from an economic perspective overall, this is somebody who will transform New York like we have never seen before, and probably in a bad way if you are for capitalism in the financial market of the world, leading one anyway, as far as New York is,” Concha said on Fox & Friends First.
Concha added that Mamdani’s victory is all but assured, noting that “poll after poll” shows him in the lead, even after sitting Mayor Eric Adams ended his independent run on Sunday.
He warned that New York could face a business exodus “like we have never seen before” with companies unwilling to pay higher taxes “to fund all the free stuff” Mamdani is campaigning on.
WHOOPI GOLDBERG ADVISES MAMDANI TO ENSURE ‘EVERYBODY IS PAYING THEIR FAIR SHARE’ IN TAXES
Washington Examiner chief political correspondent Byron York said Sunday that the Republican Party should not “sit by and watch a disaster descend on New York” if Mamdani wins. He criticized the view by some Republicans that a Mamdani win could benefit the GOP in the long term as “a cynical way to look at it.”
Mamdani’s opponents in the race are independent candidate Andrew Cuomo, who lost to Mamdani in the Democratic primary, and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa. Polls showed Sliwa trailing both Mamdani and Cuomo before Adams dropped out, but Sliwa said Sunday that he would not drop out.
