$100 Million to fight deportations — and Mamdani isn’t done yet

Zohran Mamdani surprises every day. For the worse, of course. As if it wasn't enough to propose raising the minimum wage to $30 an hour or having state-run stores, this weekend, the Democratic New York mayoral candidate has proposed an additional $100 million to legally defend undocumented immigrants who face deportation. Perhaps the most astounding thing about the whole Mamdani case is that the candidate continues to hold a 15-point lead in the polls, even with his proposals completely out of whack.

On MSNBC's The Weekend, Mamdani claimed that 400,000 New York residents are at risk of deportation right now, and that fewer than 200 of them had access to free lawyers last year. Therefore, the leftist's proposal is for Americans to fund those who skipped the law to enter the country. It is important to note that the city's 2026 budget included $54.5 million for publicly funded challenges to deportation orders in court, and that this is a larger budget than any other major city in the country allocates to the issue. Mamdani, however, wants more.

Mamdani has proposed freezing the rent fee on rent-stabilized apartments, which make up about 40 percent of all rent-stabilized apartments in the city. He has also proposed making bus transportation free, the creation of government-operated supermarkets, raising corporate taxes, and raising the minimum wage to $30 an hour by 2030. The Democratic candidate's proposals are among the most extreme the city has seen in recent times, yet he continues to rise in the polls.

The most recent New York Times/Siena University poll showed Mamdani leading with 46% support among likely voters in the race. He was followed by former Governor Andrew Cuomo with 24%, Republican Curtis Sliwa in third place with 15%, and incumbent Mayor Eric Adams, who had not yet dropped out of the race at the time, with just 9%. About 6 % of respondents said they were undecided. The poll also asked, in a hypothetical scenario between only two candidates, for whom they would vote, and Mamdani managed a small lead over Andrew Cuomo, trailing with 48% to the former governor's 44%.

This weekend, the current mayor of New York, Eric Adams, announced that he is withdrawing from the race. However, Adams, depending on the poll, only had between seven and nine points, and some polls have predicted that, by withdrawing, his voters would not all go to support Cuomo but would split between the former governor and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa.

The New York mayoral race has become a national issue. First, because Mamdani is gaining the attention of millions of people who wonder if the New Yorker will become the future of the entire party, and second, because President Donald Trump devotes a social media post to him almost every week.

This Monday, the president said the following: "Zohran Mamdani, who is running for mayor, will prove to be one of the best things to ever happen to our great Republican Party. He is going to have problems with Washington like no mayor in the history of our once great City. Remember, he needs the money from me, as president, in order to fulfill all of his FAKE Communist promises. He won’t be getting any of it, so what’s the point of voting for him?"

True, America is not New York, and Mamdani's proposals seem too extreme to gain popularity nationally, so that he will become a leader beyond his hometown. But these days, things are not very predictable in the Democratic Party. According to some reports, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, another of the party's most radical voices, is poised to challenge Senator Chuck Schumer and become the leader of the Senate. The young Democrat is one of the top budget holders in the House of Representatives, and her popularity is already making her appear in polls for a possible presidency. So there is a good chance that Mamdani will not only win the mayoralty, but with the help of other extremes, become the strong voice of the Democratic Party.