David Paterson was the governor of New York from 2008 to 2010, when he was succeeded by Andrew Cuomo as the Democrats’ one-party rule of the state continued drearily on. Yet although he is another New York Democrat, Paterson is not thrilled with Zohran Mamdani, his fellow Democrat who stands on the brink of becoming the next mayor of New York City.
Yet when he criticized Mamdani, Paterson found to his dismay that not only was he inundated with angry phone calls from the young Communist’s supporters, but his family was targeted as well. And so once again we see the new feature the left is intent on introducing into American politics: intimidation.
Paterson said Sunday that after he said that either Andrew Cuomo or Eric Adams should drop out of the mayoral race so as to try to block Mamdani from winning, the reaction from those who see Mamdani as the Democrats’ new hope was swift and severe: “I got a whole lot of nasty, negative phone calls — really vitriolic — from Mamdani supporters,” Paterson recounted. The enraged Marxists “called my home. They called my wife. It was really kind of difficult for those 48 hours after the press conference.”
Paterson refuses to bow to intimidation, and restated his position: “If Andrew Cuomo and Eric Adams both stay in the mayor’s race, it will be [an] open door for Zohran Mamdani to win the election in November for mayor. My proposal was that there be a way to make a decision [on] which of these two candidates should run against Mamdani.”
All three of these candidates are Democrats, although Cuomo and Adams are running as independents, as Mamdani is the official Democrat nominee. There is a Republican in the race, Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa, but he doesn’t stand a chance: New York City is a one-party entity, to the degree that even if Adolf Hitler himself were running on the Democrat ticket and the Archangel Michael on the Republican, New Yorkers would still dutifully reject the GOP candidate and pull the lever for the man with a D behind his name.
Three Democrats in the race, however, will just split the Democrat vote and likely hand the city to the candidate who is the official party nominee, and that’s Mamdani. Evidence of how deep the rot goes in the Democrat Party is the fact that Paterson’s problem with this Communist is not so much a matter of principle as simply that he is a young upstart who has not fully sketched out the details of how exactly he plans to destroy New York City.
“The reason I have such a problem with Mr. Mamdani,” Paterson explained, “is because, in the beginning, he was a young candidate. Had new ideas, Very charismatic. Can make a crowd really cheer for him.” All that was great, but there was a catch, and it wasn’t Karl Marx. Paterson explained: “But he has never evidenced a plan for changing pretty much anything in the city.”
To his credit, Paterson also took issue with Mamdani’s cavalier response to the George Floyd riots: “He said things like, ‘Well, it’s too bad it had to happen, but it had to happen,'” Paterson recalled. “Why did it have to happen? This is not the way we make change in this country — by rioting.”
Related: Mamdani’s College Writings Surface, and Yeah, They’re Just What You’d Expect
That’s true, and the inundation of menacing phone calls that Paterson received from Mamdani’s supporters was a manifestation of the same impulse, one that is relatively new in American politics. Rioting, an avalanche of phone calls, demonstrations at the private homes of those whom they oppose and hate (and vandalism of those homes) — all this is designed to frighten the left’s foes into submission.
The unspoken but unmistakable message is that patriots (and, indeed, even fellow leftists who get out of line, such as Paterson in his opposition to Mamdani) must be made as uncomfortable and afraid as possible, so that the faint-hearted among them will drop their opposition and fall into line. This is how the left has always operated, and why every time the far left comes to power anywhere in the world, it initiates a reign of terror. The public must be made to see that they have to toe the line, or face terrible consequences.
If Zohran Mamdani is elected mayor of New York, this way of operating will receive a tremendous validation, and we will see much, much more of it. Violence and intimidation are the life’s blood of the left. They know they can’t truly convince people on a rational level, so scaring them to death will work nicely instead.
David Paterson is right — an unusual thing for a Democrat. Zohran Mamdani would be a disaster as mayor of New York, but to find out all the reasons why, you'll need to become PJ Media VIP member. Get access to all our incisive analysis, free from intimidation from the left. Use code FIGHT for 60% off.
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