Fil-Ams Launch Grassroots Drive for NY Mayoral Bet Mamdani
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New York District 36 Assemblymember Zohran Kwame Mamdani (left) standing with Chris Post running the New York Marathon
Mamdani is like the popular kid in school who has every reason to be arrogant but never became a Republican because of a preternatural sensitivity for the kids who had it hard. As the son of Mira Nair, an Oscar-nominated filmmaker, and Mahmood Mamdani, a Columbia Professor, his progressive roots placed him on the other end of the playground. He is taking his empathy to a larger stage. In an interview by Forbes on June 26th, Mamdani explained his politics.
“The definition for me of why I call myself a Democratic Socialist is in the words of Dr. King decades ago. He said, ‘Call it democracy, or call it Democratic Socialism, there must be a better distribution of wealth for all of God's children in this country.’
Kat with Patrick and Don canvassing in Woodside, Queens.
“That's why I'm focused on dignity and taking on income inequality. For too long, politicians have pretended that we're spectators to the crisis of affordability. We’re actually actors, and we have the choice to exacerbate it, like Mayor Adams has done, or to respond to it and resolve it, like I'm planning to do.”
Two Non-Spectators
As the sparks behind Filipinos for Zohran, Bahia and Cleofe have been helping bring fellow Fil-Ams into the Mamdani campaign.
Bahia is a rising senior in Urban Studies at Columbia University. He is a U.S. citizen and New York voter who was born to Filipino American workers living in the U.S. territory of the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands and stayed there until age 10 before moving to the Philippines. At age 14, he moved to New York, where he stayed with relatives. He has planted roots in Woodside in the Borough of Queens.
“Woodside, Queens is a working-class community and is specifically known as Little Manila,” says Bahia. “There is an abundance of Filipinos in my community. It’s the home of the first Jollibee on the East Coast. I’ve worked there, too. Filipinos have an entire small business corridor. We have a lot of Filipinos at my Catholic Church. My barber is Filipino. My boss is Filipino. The friends I play basketball with are Filipino.”
Cleofe hails originally from Jersey, lives in Queens, and works for a global firm in New York City. She belongs to the Working Families Party, which supports Mamdani. Of the various progressive organizations she assists, Cleofe singles out Malaya New York.
Kat with Zohran and an attendee at the same St. Patrick's Day for All parade in Sunnyside, Queens
“We have several different Filipino groups. Malaya has always been social but in these times, it is also political because everybody is being hit. I like the idea that we’re part of a broad human rights organization that comes together to see how we can utilize our skills to better our lives and others in our community.”
Filipinos for Zohran isn’t a funded arm of the Zohran Mamdani campaign, but an affinity group that channeled the buzz that followed Mamdani’s primary victory into a community with a similar background that is united by a common interest.
“I noticed posts proclaiming, ‘I am a Filipino for Zohrani.’ It’s not just you, but we feel it, too,” recalls Cleofe. “A lot of Filipinos have a relatability to Zohran. So, let’s vocalize it together.”
The group includes Filipinos as far away as Texas who have become enchanted by Mamdani’s brand of politics and his dedication to bringing down the cost of living in the most expensive city in the U.S.
“Our community is getting more politically active, whether it would be in domestic or international affairs,” says Bahia. He cites the success of Los Angeles City Controller Kenneth Mejia and Los Angeles 14th District Councilmember Ysabel Jurado. “A lot of people are getting into the electoral scene, but also into the advocacy scene, especially after what happened after the pandemic. Our nurses’ unions are heavily populated.
“I’ve also seen my peers on the East and West Coasts getting more engaged. We care more. Our attitude is I’m going to do something about it this time around.”
Are His Promises Realistic or Rhetoric?
John is attending a Zohran rally
Mamdani faces mounting skepticism about his campaign promises of a rental freeze, grocery stores operated by the City, transportation, universal childcare, and to raise the minimum hourly wage to $30 by 2030. Nothing of it appears feasible within a stretched City budget.
Quoting his Forbes interview again, Mamdani states, “Let's go through it. Freezing the rent; that's not something that requires any fiscal output from the City. It's something that's determined by the rent guidelines board, composed of nine members, the mayor picks each of those members. They determine each year whether rents rise or whether they stay the same. The previous mayoral administration froze the rent three times, so this has clear historical precedent.”
He denies a pre-Gorbachev Soviet-style food rationing program for City-run grocers. He says, “I proposed a pilot program of one store in each borough. These are five stores in total. The total cost of this is $60 million. This is less than half the cost of what the City has already set to spend on a subsidy program for corporate supermarkets that has no guarantee of cheaper prices or collective bargaining agreements.”
What he’s looking at is how to solve “the very clear twin crises of affordability when you go to the grocery store and food deserts, which disproportionately impact black and brown New Yorkers across the five boroughs, where I've heard directly from New Yorkers who say, why is it that I can find six fast food restaurants in a five-block radius, but I can't find a place to buy groceries?
“When it comes to making buses free and universal childcare, these are things that cost around $700 million, and let's say about five or $6 billion dollars (respectively). Significant amounts of money. But they have to be understood in the context of a $113 billion municipal budget, a $252 billion state budget. We put forward a plan to pay for these and more. By increasing the top corporate tax rate of New York to match that of New Jersey, that raises $5 billion. And we increase income taxes on the top 1 percent of New Yorkers who make a million dollars or more a year by 2 percent. After both of these things come to fruition, you're still paying less than you did before Trump.”
Where the Rubber Meets the Road
Free bus rides appeal to Cleofe. “Everybody relies on public transportation. I think it’s great in terms of public safety. As we know, there are many people who work different shifts. I had a neighbor who was saying that his daughter really benefited from the previous free fares because she worked a later shift, so it relieved his fear of her having to take out money to pay for transit. I once worked for a staffing agency where a lot of people would decline roles, not because they don’t want to work, but just because transit is very costly.”
Fellow Queens residents Kat Cleofe, 38, and John Bahia, 24, are two of a growing number of volunteers in the grassroots organization, Filipinos for Zohran.
When he boarded the Mamdani locomotive, Bahia wasn’t motivated by a particular program but the candidate’s overall plan. “Don’t get me wrong… I agree with his freeze on stabilized rents and his City-run grocery stores even though I won’t directly benefit from them. Free buses and universal childcare would radically improve quality of life for working parents, frontline workers, caregivers, many of whom are Filipino.”
In sum, he says, “What drew me to Zohran was his bold economic agenda for New Yorkers. There’s a lot we’re going through in terms of increasing costs, not just in New York but throughout the United States. We need new solutions. We’re tired of status-quo solutions being pushed on us and still nothing happens.”
An informal gathering of around 50 persons has been involved in canvassing campaigns and phone banks sponsored by Filipinos for Zohran. The group will ramp up as Labor Day (September 1st) approaches. To see what’s happening and to join the effort, follow them on Instagram @filipinosforzohran.
Anthony Maddela is a Positively Filipino Staff Correspondent based in Los Angeles.
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