House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Sunday that New York City Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani must prove his vision can be implemented before he endorses him.
Mr. Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, both New York Democrats, have been reluctant to embrace Mr. Mamdani, a democratic socialist who won the primary election in commanding fashion and whose push to address the city’s affordability challenges with free child care, free buses, higher taxes on the wealthy and businesses, and city-run grocery stores have made him a political lightning rod.
“The Assemblyman [Mr. Mamdani] has actually spoken pretty forcefully and strongly about the need to deal with affordability in the city of New York,” Mr. Jeffries said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “Of course, we’ve got to figure out moving forward, how we turn proposals into actual plans so that he is successful if he becomes the next mayor, because we need the city to be sustainable, and certainly the communities that I represent which have been subjected to gentrification and housing displacement, these are all issues to be worked through, and we’ll continue to work through them.”
Mr. Jeffries said he will sit down with Mr. Mamdani “next week” to discuss the campaign.
Mr. Mamdani is running to unseat Mayor Eric Adams. Mr. Adams, a Democrat, is running as an independent after sitting out the party primary due federal bribery and corruption charges against him that the Trump administration has opted not to pursue.
Polls show former Gov. Andrew Cuomo is Mr. Mamdani’s chief rival. Mr. Cuomo also decided to run as an independent after losing to Mr. Mamdani by almost 13 percentage points in the Democratic primary.
Republican Curtis Sliwa is also running.
Mr. Mamdani, 33, has energized the base of the Democratic Party — including young voters. At the same time, he has become a foil for Republicans.
The GOP has cast him as a poster boy for the Democratic Party. They warn that his far-left agenda will doom New York and anywhere else that tries to replicate it.
