On Mamdani's win in NYC

All of the signs he was going to win were there

Unless you're totally shut off from the news, you're aware that first-term Assembly-member Zohran Mamdani stunned New York’s political class by winning the Democratic mayoral primary.

His platform — a pro-tenant, pro-public-bank agenda delivered in unmistakably movement language — looked radical next to Cuomo, and other candidates in the race. I wanted to take a deeper look at this through the lens of City Council, Planning Commission and School Board meetings to see if there were early signs that this might happen. While it shocked the political world, it was not so surprising seeing that this could be a possibility based on what was happening in the public discourse.

Who needs polling when you have public meetings? As many of you know, I ran for City Council in my small city a few years back, and - as ill-attended as they are, they are the place where political movements start.

In reality, Mandani’s successful candidacy was years in the making. I looked at 150 school board, planning commission and city council meetings from NYC and analyzed them with the Hamlet team. It was clear that language at city council meetings had shifted from more individualistic to more progressive - and the number of progressive terms at these meetings started to skyrocket leading up to the election.

You can find the full post and analysis here - in my new publication, which focuses on analyzing local city data. I’ll be writing very frequently there, and will cross-post on occasion to this audience.

Does anyone reading this publication have connections in the real estate, data center, or renewable energy worlds? I’d love to talk to you.