A New York City mayoral election is, definitionally, not anyone outside of the city’s business. That this year’s campaign, which ended in Zohran Mamdani’s victory on Tuesday night, became everybody’s business, and a big stupid national story, speaks to the effectiveness of Mamdani’s campaign and the power of his socialist message, but also to the wild bigotry that was arrayed against him.
Pundits and politicians will spend the next few weeks attempting to sort out the lessons presented by Mamdani’s victory, but here’s one that has always been true: There are no consequences for engaging in gutter racism in this country, so long as it is aimed at a brown-skinned Muslim. One story about this election can be told through the increasing intensity of the racism and Islamophobia that was aimed at Mamdani by those who were emboldened by that lack of consequences. This story began with Mamdani being peppered with ludicrous questions about Hamas and the precise meaning of “intifada,” and it ended with several United States lawmakers talking and posting like Klansmen.
