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Sept. 2, 2025 — It’s not just questions about the extent to which he remains aligned with Democratic Socialists of America policy (national or local) that Assembly Member Zohran Mamdani, the prohibitive favorite to be elected Mayor of New York City in November, won’t answer or have his campaign answer. On August 19, Remapping Debate, via email to Dora Pekec, Mamdani campaign spokesperson, sent a series of 13 questions relating to: (a) the scope of municipally sponsored projects Mamdani would support; (b) healthcare (c) healthcare; (d) housing; (e) education; (f) management; (g) role of the federal government; and h) Israel/Palestine issues as relevant in the context of New York City governance. We asked for a response by August 29.
Despite following up via email with both Pekec and with Ali Najmi, the campaign’s election lawyer, we got no response.
Other media outlets have gotten non-responsive replies like the “New Yorkers know exactly who Zohran is and what he stands for,” given to The New York Times, or the “if Zohran has not publicly endorsed or spoken on a position during the campaign, it is not a part of his mayoral platform,” given to his chief media antagonist, the New York Post.
These are dodges that it shouldn’t be difficult for reporters to identify.
It’s understandable that Mamdani partisans might want the press to keep hands-off so that Mamdani can coast to victory. And some of the “it’s socialism: run for your lives” rhetoric that has been generated is over the top. But it isn’t (or shouldn’t be) the job of reporters to protect a candidate or campaign. As I pointed out in one of the questions I posed (and it’s hard to imagine anything more basic than this), “There are many issues on which a candidate doesn’t campaign, but are nevertheless issues about which he or she has to make decisions once in office.”
Except for articles focusing on the efficacy of campaign strategy (or to the extent a victorious candidate later claims a mandate on an issue he or she had disclaimed running on), it doesn’t matter whether an issue is part of the candidate’s platform. “Non-platform” issues come to the Mayor’s attention every single day. “What will the candidate do once in office about X, Y, or Z?” is not an unreasonable inquiry. What does the candidate’s view on the issue tell voters about how he reasons about things? About what his governing philosophy is? When it comes to an issue where the candidate has previously taken a position and changed that position, has he articulated an explanation for a change that is persuasive?
Remapping Debate has an old-fashioned view: if you’re running, you need to be prepared to be probed and scrutinized. That view has informed our coverage of all the candidates: see, for example, this one on Cuomo; this one on Adams, and this extended interview with Walden.
The overwhelming likelihood is that Zohran Mamdani will be elected in November to be New York City’s next mayor. It is basic journalism to want to fill out the picture of what that will be like to the greatest extent possible, regardless of whether doing so contravenes the Mamdani campaign’s attempt to keep attention focused on his signature issues.
What follows are the 13 numbered questions I posed (some with subparts), including the subheadings used in the email. Other material preceding and following numbered questions [presented within square brackets] represents explanatory content written for this article.
I hope these illustrations encourage more media outlets — at least those who have a track-record of hard-hitting reporting in other campaigns and in respect to other candidates — to question the Assembly Member and his campaign more broadly and to not be deterred by diversionary tactics.
Going further on municipally sponsored projects
[Plenty has been written about Mamdani’s (now-slimmed-down) proposal for municipal grocery stores. I was more interested in seeing how he evaluated the potential role of municipal government more broadly.]
1. To my knowledge, press coverage of some of your core proposals has focused to a great extent on their giving too much of a role to municipal government (a la the grocery-store proposal). I wanted to focus on the opposite direction: are there other pilots that could potentially be more important if NYC government had the will to pursue them? One example: there are perennial shortages of prescription drugs and medical supplies (even saline, sometimes). It’s a classic example of market failure. What do you think of a pilot program that leveraged NYC’s leading roles in healthcare and biotech to create a public or quasi-public entity that would reliably produce — at high quality and low cost — medications and supplies that the pharmaceutical industry has either abandoned or has proven unable to deliver consistently (or at non-astronomical prices)?
[I picked this issue because, even though it gets relatively little attention in national media and none in local media, it is one that has had, and promises to continue to have, critical consequences. It is a problem where it is nearly impossible to argue with a straight face that there hasn’t been market failure. Indeed, it’s been a problem of longstanding (Remapping Debate wrote about it in the national context a dozen years ago). As adverted to in the question, New York City has a leading role in healthcare and biotech. Does Mamdani have as positive a sense of what local government can accomplish as he has been assumed to have? If he deems tackling this problem to be too ambitious, why? What are the criteria for such a determination? How does one decide to focus on a pilot, private grocery-store program, and not deal with this?]
Healthcare
[More and more New Yorkers face difficulty accessing, receiving, and paying for quality care. Here I wanted to focus on two specific issues.]
2. Sticking with healthcare, you’ve stated in your platform that “New York’s public hospital system serves over one million unique patients a year and is the crown jewel of our public health infrastructure—but it faces significant funding gaps, leading to underinvestment, understaffing and overburdened caregivers. Meanwhile, we keep closing our critical community hospitals. Zohran will work with our healthcare unions and city and state partners to increase funding for H+H and end hospital closures.” What’s the projected cost?
[Mamdani’s platform has three paragraphs totaling 227 words on healthcare. Part of that is quoted in the question above. I was tempted to ask why he couldn’t bring himself to say directly that patient care is compromised, but instead took what seemed to be a reasonable diagnosis of at least a set of the problems faced by NYC Health + Hospitals and asked the most basic question: how much will it cost to fix it?
3. CMS data show that median length of ER stays — even in what are considered NYC’s premier hospitals — are long (see attachment). New York-Presbyterian and Mount Sinai are just over four hours; NYU is 3 hours and 21 minutes. Do these numbers concern you? Do you think this is an example, to paraphrase Bernie Sanders, of the business model being understaffing? What, if anything, do you propose to do about this?
[The problem recited in the question will be familiar to any New Yorker who has had to visit an emergency room either for himself or with a friend or family member. Maybe not the specific numbers, but certainly the waiting and — not mentioned in the question — the invariable staff puzzlement that somene would be inquiring or complaining about the wait (or the answer that we’re busy “tonight”). So it is an issue that has gone unaddressed for a very long time, and one that seems like it would be right up Mamdani’s alley: that is, an industry that isn’t facing an occasional or aberrational surge in volume such that it is impossible to plan for it, but rather an industry that has decided that structural understaffing is the prudent way to operate. One could imagine a variety of responses (including “I haven’t had a chance to study that”), but the question oughtn’t be ignored.]
Housing
[New York City has long had twin housing crises: one of affordability; the other of segregation. At least the affordability part is at the center of the Mamdani campaign.]
4. Do you agree with the proposition that all our neighborhoods should belong to all of us, regardless of protected-class status and regardless of where in the city we’re coming from or of where in the city we wish to move?
[For decades in New York, those on the right who defended the status quo of residential segregation in predominantly White neighborhoods were, paradoxically, joined by many of those who claimed to be of the left who defended the status quo of residential segregation in predominantly Black or Hispanic neighborhoods. This kind of identarianism had and has the distinction of being opposed both to basic principles of civil rights and basic principles of socialism. (In recent years, there has been some movement away from this on the left.) Question 4 gets to the heart of whether the candidate sees New York as a series of racial turf zones (the romanticized version tends to describe racial or ethnic “enclaves” that “historically” have been a home base for a partricular group), or whether everywhere in the city is a place to which everyone should have an equal opportunity to compete for housing.]
5. As you have surely noticed, there are luxury condos that are constructed every year in high-cost (“high opportunity”) neighborhoods without any requirement that even a single unit be used as an affordable rental. These are projects where the initial capital investment by the developer is quickly recouped by market-rate sales and where there is ample room for cross-subsidy. Do you support introducing a requirement for new condo construction in high-income neighborhoods that a portion of the condo units be transferred to an HDFC or other not-for-profit to be used in perpetuity for affordable rentals, perhaps structurally similar to this year’s Affordable Housing Retention Act?
[As the recently enacted, state-level Affordable Housing Retention Act demonstrates, there is nothing impossible about combining affordable rental units with market-rate condos (Remapping Debate wrote about that legislation, which focused on a subset of existing buildings, here.) Yet a potential source of affordable rentals (coming with significant built-in cross-subsidy) has been ignored. Instead, luxury condo after luxury condo is built with zero percent affordable units. Does Mamdani think this is a problem? Does he see a regulatory or other solution?]
Education
[K-12 education covers a set of issues of great importance, yet it has received limited attention during the campaign. Mamdani’s platform on education is strikingly thin — 171 words in all. Surely, there is more that he wants to have happen in this domain than is discussed.]
6. Imagine that there are 10 steps you can take in conjunction with your DOE Chancellor to improve education for NYC’s children. Where from 1 to 10 would you rank the importance of creating a system “in which parents, students, educators and administrators work together to create the school environments in which students and families will best thrive—strengthening co-governance through the PEP, SLTs, DLTs, and CECs in particular.”
[One thing that Mamdani does discuss is local control. Local control had a sorry history before mayoral control was introduced, but I wanted to focus here on what he thought the relative importance of local control was in the context of all the key things he would need to do to reduce the number of students who either don’t graduate or who graduate unready for work, college, or citizenship. Did he mention local control because he thought it was most important? Are there other steps he believes are more important but that he hasn’t specified?]
7. Do you believe it is reasonably feasible for a fourth-grade teacher to serve the needs of all the children in her classroom where the reading level of the students ranges from second-grade to sixth-grade? If so, how does that get accomplished for each of the students?
[There’s nothing “socialist” about a K-12 system that is locked into a notion that students of wildly varying readiness can all be successfully taught together in one room. (New York City is just emerging from more than a generation of the faux left idea of rejecting systematic instruction in reading skills like phonics.) The question is designed to probe how Mamdani thinks of the problem of genuing achieving what other administrations have called “excellence and equity.”]
Management
[New York City employs the equivalent of more than 300,000 full-time workers. Even if you set aside the Police Department and Department of Education entirely, that still leaves the equivalent of well over 100,000 other full-time workers. Those are a lot of employees to manage.]
8. There’s nothing inconsistent with being Mayor and retaining one’s pro-labor sympathies, but a key part of the job is holding hundreds of thousands of city workers to account. Do you agree? Outside of the uniformed services, are there work practices that you think require close scrutiny? If so, please name two. Does NYC need to do a better job of identifying underperforming workers; trying to help them improve, if possible; but then terminating them if they don’t improve?
[It’s not a surprising political instinct to “celebrate” workers, especially those whose unions are or may be supporting you. But the reality, of course, is that there are deeply inefficient work practices that have been allowed to stay in place, as well as workers — be they cops, teachers, nurses, parks employees, clerks, Administration for Children’s Services personnel, or others — who perform at what should be deemed either a deeply subpar level or at an unsatisfactory level. I asked this question to see the extent to which Mamdani is prepared to recognize that reality and to assess the extent to which he has thought about charting a path to deal with those problems.]
Role of the federal government
[The second term of Donald Trump as President has turned virtually everything upside down. There seems to be an almost daily breaking of constitutional and other norms, with Republican Senators and Representatives either silent in the face of power grabs (including Trump’s arrogating to himself what has long been Congressional power), or actively supportive (as in blessing initially unilateral budget cuts). While there are some dissenting voices on the right, there is widespread agreement — Mamdani most certainly included — that Trump and his policies will have significantly negative impacts on New York City.]
9. I’m imagining that you agree with the analysis that there are many problems where only the federal government has the capacity to attack problems with the full measure of appropriate robustness. Is that right? Currently, the feds have actively and radically moved away from that responsibility. One response, which you’ve given, is that states and cities need to step up. But isn’t another part of the analysis accepting (and educating the public about) the sobering reality that a deeply retrograde federal government does limit the realm of what is possible? Have your plans adjusted to that reality and, if so, how?
[While there’s a flavor of what it calls itself the left in New York City that can be summarized as believing “local good, central bad,” it has long been accepted in most left and Democratic circles that, as set out in the first sentence of Question 9, “there are many problems where only the federal government has the capacity to attack problems with the full measure of appropriate robustness.” It’s also the case (not mentioned explicitly in the question) that a key part of socialist thought is the recognition that what may be practically achievable at any particular moment is governed by the circumstances and power relations that exist at that moment. Does Mamdani agree with or appreciate that? There is clearly much backfilling that New York State and New York City will have to do to protect existing programs: does that have any impact on what new programs can be initiated? On what existing programs may need to be cut? By definition, the loss of federal funding means New York City shouldering a greater part of the load: does that mean that new taxes won’t be able to go as far, that those taxes will need to be raised more than initially thought, or is there a different way entirely to think about New York City’s dilemma?]
10. Constitutionally, the supremacy of the federal government is probably nowhere more clear than in the area of immigration policy (both as a matter of the Supremacy Clause and as a matter of explicitly designated authority). On the other hand, there are clearly many things that the Trump Administration is doing that are illegal (e.g., invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, poor conditions at 26 Federal Plaza); or (at least) disturbingly authoritarian (e.g., the intended intimidation effect and announcement of unaccountability of deploying masked ICE agents); or unwise (e.g., going after longstanding residents). As I understand your view, it is to oppose everything that the Trump administration does in this area. Are there federal actions as to which your analysis of constitutional and statutory authority tells you are not able to be fought successfully? Is it not a better strategy to combine critiques of the abuses of the administration with a statement of how you believe immigration enforcement should proceed?
[If Social Security had been, until recently, the third-rail of national politics, support of any immigration enforcement has been the third-rail of much of progressive politics in New York City. This question deals with the facts that: (a) the federal government has vast authority over immigration: and that (b) the executive branch has vast power to enforce existing immigration laws. As the illustrations in the question suggest, there are many areas where the Trump administration can be challenged (legally and in the court of public opinion) with a reasonable chance of success. But, the question wonders, doesn’t objecting to every enforcement action without specifying an alternative policy (regardless of the finality of legal process that has run its course or the short length of time a person has been in the U.S., for example) simply reprises a posture vulnerable to the “open borders” line of attack that was so successful for Trump in 2024?]
I/P as applied to NYC context
[The questions that follow were not designed to dig into Mamdani’s overall views on Israel and Palestine. The questions have to do with issues that might reasonably arise in Mamdani’s role as Mayor of the City of New York.]
11. It’s January 2026, you’re the Mayor, and protesters have shut down Grand Central “for Palestine” (as has been attempted at least twice before), blocking access to trains, What do you do? What do you say both to the protesters and to New Yorkers as a whole?
[This is one where answering could very well reassure those New Yorkers who are concerned about Mamdani’s views about I/P in general … if the answer combined a commitment to a response from the Police Department and criticism of the particular action. A more equivocal response, however, could stoke more fears.]
12. What is your comment, if any, on the apparent defacement of the Carl Schurz Memorial (screenshot attached) in connection with an August 15th Within Our Lifetime demonstration?
[Here, again, this would seem an easy one for most politicians, and perhaps it is to Mamdani, too (“Whatever your views, we can’t accept defacing of monuments.”) But we don’t know without Mamdani or his campaign actually answering the question.]
13. There are many issues on which a candidate doesn’t campaign, but are nevertheless issues about which he or she has to make decisions once in office. To what extent will you attempt to implement BDS on a local level and why?
[Mamdani has said that, as Mayor, he would arrest Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if Netanyahu came to New York (“in line with international law”), an action not authorized by U.S. or New York City law. To what extent would he take other actions based on his view of what is in line with international law? The BDS movement that Mamdani supports has many elements, including, for example, its “anti-normalization” campaign and other efforts to isolate Israel as well as those deemed complicit with Israel. Which elements, if any, would he put in place as Mayor?]