Cuomo’s pivot to video was merely the latest in a series of failed attempts to discredit Mamdani as somehow inauthentic or insincere. Ever since he jolted the political establishment with his inspirational and—once the votes were counted—overwhelming victory in the city’s mayoral primary last month, there’s been a relentless and often bigoted attempt by Republicans and some Democrats to cast him as somehow abnormal.
Mamdani’s critics would have you believe that he is somehow unusual or out of step with the values and interests of ordinary people. But as someone who has spent more than ten years cataloguing the weird, unsettling, and sometimes inscrutable behaviors of politicians in my job as a late night comedy writer, I can say with near certainty that the opposite is true. The core of Mamdani’s appeal is that he is aggressively, perhaps even radically, normal.
His tendency to caress American flags on stage and in front of cameras is, on its own, the sort of thing you might do if you were accidentally exposed to an unusually high dose of nitrous oxide. To this day it remains a mystery what exactly he means when he says Finland—a “forest nation,” he’s been told—rakes the “floors of the forest.” Or what sentiment he was hoping to convey when he described a hurricane as “one of the wettest we’ve ever seen from the standpoint of water,” a linguistic puzzle that remains unsolved to this day. Or why he thought it was important to let us know that Arnold Palmer has an unusually large penis. (Trump was only relaying this observation secondhand. We’re still awaiting definitive proof.)
Then came Mamdani, with his relentlessly normal way of talking and his laser focus on normal things that matter to normal people. His campaign was a refreshing break from the exhausting strangeness of our current era, one that imagined that sane conversations about public policy were still possible. His seismic win has provided many lessons for Democrats hoping to replicate his success across the country. But one of those lessons should be this: Just be normal.
But Mamdani’s disarming normality is one trait that Democrats could cultivate. One of his first viral videos was about bringing down the price of Halal food trucks. He made a video about losing his race for student body vice president in high school. He told The Bulwark he met his wife on Hinge. Even his brief attempt at a career in music—as a rapper named Mr. Cardamom—is charming and relatable. Millennials who came of age in the early YouTube era know what it’s like to have evidence of our failed creative pursuits online (I’m sure there’s a video somewhere of me doing improv comedy in the basement of a Gristedes circa 2013 that would sink me if I ran for public office).
Andrew Cuomo suffered from similarly toxic levels of Politician Brain, which is why his campaign was so relentlessly abnormal. He barely appeared in public, described the city he wanted to govern as a crime-ridden hellhole out of a steampunk novel, drove to his polling place (which was only a few blocks away) and couldn’t convince anyone that he actually lived here. His Super PACs spent ungodly sums on racist ads. He collected lukewarm endorsements from an impotent and lethargic Democratic establishment. He didn’t have supporters so much as he had underwriters (at least one of whom told The New York Times he didn’t even rank Cuomo first).
And just as important as the way Mamdani talks is what he talks about: buses, childcare, rent. Normal stuff that normal people care about. His appealing brand of democratic socialism—borrowing in part from Milwaukee’s so-called “sewer socialism”—was hyper-fixated on simple, straightforward, broadly popular ideas for making municipal government work better for regular people. He was singularly focused on the cost of living. When he talked about making the slowest buses in the country faster, he made a point of noting that long commutes were robbing New Yorkers not just of their “time,” but also their “sanity.” His campaign was focused relentlessly on making normal life for normal people more… normal.
Hysterical Republicans and their allies in capital now find themselves in the unenviable position of having to make these reasonable ideas sound scary. It’s a tough sell. A CNBC host claimed Mamdani was “taking Wall Streeters and making them walk out on the ice,” like Bane in The Dark Knight Rises. (If Bane had actually focused on hedge fund brokers and corporate CEOs, he might have had more support.)
Democrats will no doubt be tempted to draw the conclusion from Mamdani’s victory that all they have to do to replicate his success is “go viral.” Maybe Andrew Cuomo will eat spicy chicken wings or Chuck Schumer will make a “Get Ready With Me” video. But Mamdani’s deft use of social media is only a small part of the story. The bigger lesson is his unrelenting focus on confronting powerful interests in pursuit of a New York that works for everyone.
Social media gimmicks will continue to fail if they don’t begin with a bold and authentic set of ideas. In Mamdani’s case, a simple, straightforward policy program seeking to fix a broken system and make normal life more normal—and more affordable—for ordinary people. The last ten years of American politics have been a ceaseless barrage of deprivations, vindictiveness, cruelty and exhaustion. Everyone is overwhelmed; American civic life is overwhelming. People need relief. Mamdani promises a new chapter of humane, joyful normalcy. In other words, he’s sitting down at the table of success—and inviting everyone to join him.
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