Summary
- Candidate Zohran Mamdani has proposed radical left-wing pledges such as a rent freeze, raising the minimum wage to $30, and operating free public buses.
- Mamdani has also put forth policies to tax the wealthy, including increasing income and corporate taxes for high earners, raising concerns on Wall Street and among financial circles.
- President Trump warned of the possibility to cut off federal funding to New York City if Mamdani is elected mayor.
Making headlines for radical left-wing pledges
Zohran Mamdani (33, photo), a member of the New York State Assembly who has been effectively confirmed as the Democratic candidate for New York City mayor, responded to President Donald Trump’s accusations of communism and mounting concerns on Wall Street by stating he is not a communist, but apprehension over his radical leftist platform persists.
On the 29th (local time), candidate Mamdani appeared on NBC's 'Meet the Press' and said, "President Trump wants to distract from who I am fighting for. I am not a communist and I am fighting for the very workers President Trump promised to support during the presidential campaign."
President Trump criticized Assemblyman Mamdani upon his selection as the Democratic mayoral candidate for New York City, saying, "He is a communist. I think he is very bad for New York. He's an extreme left-wing fanatic."
Candidate Mamdani explained the background of his signature pledge to relieve the cost-of-living burden for ordinary citizens by stating, "New York is the richest city in the wealthiest country, yet one out of four New Yorkers lives in poverty, and the rest seem to exist in a state of anxiety."
Mamdani, an Indian-American Muslim, has put forward commitments such as ▲a freeze on apartment rents ▲raising the minimum wage to $30 ▲operating free public buses ▲running public grocery stores. He also called for raising the income tax by 2% points for high earners with an annual income over $1,000,000 (about ₩1,357,000,000), and increasing the corporate tax to 11.5% (currently 7.25%), putting forth a platform for taxing the wealthy.
The British Financial Times (FT) reported on this, saying, "The mood on Wall Street is now ‘anyone but Mamdani’."
On the same day, President Trump warned in a Fox News interview that "even if Mamdani becomes (mayor of New York City), I will still be president, and if he doesn’t act right, New York City won’t get a single dime."
Jang Ji-min, contributing reporter for Hankyung.com newsinfo@hankyung.com
Son Min
sonmin@bloomingbit.ioHello I’m Son Min, a journalist at BloomingBit
