David M. Drucker: Mamdani’s rise is a gift Republicans are already using

Zohran Mamdani isn’t the most famous Democrat in America. But the front-runner to serve as New York’s next mayor is well on his way — and he’ll get there, if Republicans have anything to say about it.

Immediately after the previously little-known state assemblyman from Queens won the Democratic nomination for mayor, stunning his party’s political establishment, Republicans got busy upping Mamdani’s name recognition. In every upcoming contest in every corner of the country, Republicans are attempting to cast Democrats as the party of Mamdani.

President Donald Trump, himself a former New Yorker, led the charge.

“It’s finally happened, the Democrats have crossed the line. Zohran Mamdani, a 100% Communist Lunatic, has just won the Dem Primary, and is on his way to becoming Mayor. We’ve had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

Trump is prone to crude exaggeration and hyperbole. But Mamdani, 33, affiliates with the Democratic Socialists of America and has proposed raising taxes significantly on corporations and the wealthy; freezing rents; opening city-owned grocery stores; using taxpayer dollars to make day care and bus service “free”; and reducing police funding. Mamdani has also refused to repudiate the phrase “globalize the intifada,” a phrase many American Jews interpret as an antisemitic call to violence.

It’s no wonder Republicans are eager to turn every Democrat into a Mamdani, especially rising Democratic centrists and pragmatists who appeal to a broad base of voters; offer the GOP stiff competition; and could potentially cure what ailed the party in 2024. It also happens to be Politics 101, practiced by both parties whenever the opportunity arises.

In other words, for the Republicans, it’s smart strategy.

If swing voters and moderate independents in close races buy the GOP’s message that Mamdani is representative of most Democrats, Republicans stand to benefit. A Mamdani-centric message also has a reasonable chance of pressuring center-left Democrats to field distracting questions about Mamdani and his agenda, rather than their own policies. Regardless of how deftly they parry, there’s a risk of disappointing both their progressive activist base and rank-and-file voters.

Moderate Democrats are not hiding their concern, noting the GOP wasted little time turning Mamdani into a cudgel.

Matt Bennett, chief spokesman for Third Way, a centrist Democratic think tank in Washington, went so far as to warn the party that embracing Mamdani and the Democratic Socialists of America platform is an electoral loser. “It took about 5 minutes for GOPers to start weaponizing them against other Dems,” Bennett said in an X post. “Dems in swing districts/states would be wise to publicly distance themselves from anything DSA-related.”

I imagine the Democrats subjected to the Mamdani treatment will spend a lot of time crying foul and accusing Republicans of egregious spin. But this is a strategy of opportunity that Democrats have also employed — with abandon — over the past decade and are likely to continue using. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you which prominent Republican has played the starring role.

We’ll find out soon enough if it works this time around for Republicans. For that matter, we’ll find out if it is working for Democrats, too — by the time all the votes are tallied on Election Day 2026.

David M. Drucker is Bloomberg columnist covering politics and policy. He is also a senior writer for The Dispatch and the author of “In Trump’s Shadow: The Battle for 2024 and the Future of the GOP.”