"One Crazy Lefty"

If "one" is all it takes to ruin your cunning political strategy, I do not think it is so cunning.

The reaction from Democratic leaders this week was mixed, at best. Some regard Mamdani not as a saviour, but an existential threat. Centrists warn of electoral suicide, fearing that a leftward lurch will doom their chances in swing states in November’s US midterm elections. For Third Way, a centrist Democratic thinktank in the tradition of Bill Clinton, the New York results were a disaster.

Matt Bennett, its executive vice-president of public affairs, said: “It’s a bummer, and it’s a problem – not because there’s any danger of losing those districts to Republicans, but because those kinds of candidates and their ideas and rhetoric can be weaponised against Democrats running in tough races. We’ve seen this before, with ‘Defund the police’, and we’re worried about it happening again.”

The concern was echoed by Joe Walsh, a former Republican congressman turned Democrat and Trump critic. He warned: “Democrats have given Republicans a huge fucking gift. Republicans will do what I used to do: one crazy lefty says ‘defund the police’, and then Republicans and conservative media tag the whole party with ‘defund the police’. They’re gonna try to make the whole party out to be crazy, America-hating, democratic socialists and, to a degree, it’ll work.”