Tunku Varadarajan: Will you ask New Yorkers who voted for you to give Zohran Mamdani a chance?
Curtis Sliwa: Absolutely. He won a majority. He has a mandate. The Masters of the Universe, the billionaires, did everything they could to make sure he wasn't the mayor. It didn't work. He's a great organizer. I'll give you an example: Melinda Katz, the current District Attorney for Queens County, New York. She's the mother of my two youngest sons. She was running for DA in 2019. She had the institutional support. Moderate Jewish mother. Loyal Democrat.
Queens borough president. Perfect résumé. She's running against Tiffany Caban, who wasn't even in elective office at that time. Very radical. You know,
"do away with jails, don't arrest anyone." Tiffany Caban won on election night. But she lost the race on the absentee ballots, but only by about 20 votes. You know who the street organizer was for Tiffany Caban? Zohran Mamdani. So, when they talk about him as a trust fund baby, I say no, no, no, no, no.
You don't like it when people call him a "nepo baby."
He's earned his stripes. He had 100,000 volunteers going door-to-door, and I experienced that in some of the neighborhoods where you would never have seen anybody liberal or progressive go. Howard Beach! In conservative Howard Beach, they're going block to block. They were everywhere. 100,000. I call them Zohranistas. This was the secret to his election, not TikTok. It was good, old-fashioned retail politics. Frankly, Cuomo and not Mamdani was the nepo baby in this race. Born on third base. Felt entitled. Knew the political process, but mailed it in.
He didn't have the stomach to actually go out and do retail politics. And shame on him.
Do you think Mamdani will make a better mayor than Andrew Cuomo might have done?
![How would you describe Mamdani's politics?
He's not a communist. People call him that. That's ridiculous. He is a democratic socialist. David Dinkins [New York mayor from 1990-93] was a democratic socialist. We've had a long history in New York City of socialism.
What's the biggest challenge Mamdani faces as mayor!
I don't think the Zohranistas totally understand the fiscal irresponsibility we just went through with the Adams years and how little money there's left.
There's not enough money to do all the things that Zohran wants to do.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:ssxnmhdtz6le6nxu7jfhglz6/bafkreic7pxra6vmrjmqo4jmw4vdagiluj6xtkovqb3f4ex7fc55m7pzaxu)
How would you describe Mamdani's politics?
He's not a communist. People call him that. That's ridiculous. He is a democratic socialist. David Dinkins [New York mayor from 1990-93] was a democratic socialist. We've had a long history in New York City of socialism.
What's the biggest challenge Mamdani faces as mayor!
I don't think the Zohranistas totally understand the fiscal irresponsibility we just went through with the Adams years and how little money there's left.
There's not enough money to do all the things that Zohran wants to do.
A last question. All through our interview you pronounced Mamdani as "Mandami," transposing the "m" and the "n" in his name. Are you aware of the mispronunciation? Many people, Cuomo included, mangle his name.
In the debate, Zohran brought that to my attention, my mispronunciation. I didn't do it on purpose.
There's no disrespect. I have a hard time with it. It took people about 10 years to pronounce my last name correctly: "Sleewah.'" They pronounced it Silva, Saliva, Slywah. In the streets, we would have given Zohran a nickname, like I did for all the Guardian Angels. "Z Man" would have been perfect for him. That would have been his handle.
Mr. Varadarajan, a Journal contributor, is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and at NYU Law School's Classical Liberal Institute.
this is the most incredible interview i’ve ever read. the aei guy tries so hard to get sliwa to trash mamdani and he simply won’t. he also brings up flaco (rip) unprompted.
www.wsj.com/opinion/free...
