The Zohran Mamdani campaign represents one of the largest and most shocking victories for socialism in America in decades. Following an unlikely grassroots political strategy, Zohran Mamdani soundly defeated the Cuomo political dynasty while openly declaring himself a socialist in America’s largest city. This has registered a seismic impact on American politics, especially given last year’s total defeat of the liberal Kamala Harris by Trump, and strongly contradicts the prevailing narrative that the nation is shifting to the right. New York City now has a socialist mayor; leftists everywhere must now begin to ask how they can replicate these victories for socialism elsewhere. IMHO member and long-time activist Andrès Magon-Marmol was on the ground canvassing for the Mamdani campaign and agreed to sit for an interview. The following is the transcript of that interview, edited for clarity.

Casement: I’ll start by asking you to just introduce yourself. Tell us who you are.

Magon-Marmol: Oh, God, that’s a big open-ended one. I’m Andres Magon-Marmol, originally from the state of Texas. The borderlands. I now live in New York City. I came out here initially to go to Columbia University as an undergrad. And I didn’t finish there, I ended up finishing at a state school. I’ve been a member of IMHO for a few years.

Casement: I suppose I’ll open with a comment. I cannot recall really seeing anybody interviewing Mamdani campaign ground workers or canvassers, though that could just be my impression, viewing the campaign at a distance. Have you seen interviews with your fellow workers on the ground campaign?

Magon-Marmol: I have not. I’ve seen snippets when Mamdani was with them. You know, where they were doing, like, the celebrity thing, and he would show up at a canvassing, or at a public event. And then they would catch a little exchange with him, but not really interviews with people on the ground. I’ve canvassed for Mamdani, I did pole watching, I’ve been to at least one big event that… do you know Manhattan at all?

Casement: Roughly.

Magon-Marmol: It was Uptown, Washington Heights. There’s a venue called the United Palace. And that’s where I went to see him. It’s on 175th Street off of Broadway. So, it’s way, way uptown. And it’s a largely Dominican neighborhood. I live on 155th, 156th.  So, it’s my neighborhood. And I canvassed, I did door knocking, about 3 hours each stint. I’ve been doing canvassing in my neighborhood, basically, for Mamdani. I’ve been closer to the ground game – not the inner circle of Mamdani’s campaign.

Casement: That’s perfectly good, because the questions I’ve written up in advance are about your experiences canvassing in your neighborhood. We’ll touch on Mamdani, but won’t necessarily exclusively speak about Mamdani. So, I’ll start with those, and I think maybe the most broad and general one: what is your impression of Mamdani’s support base, and what do you think drew people to him?

Magon-Marmol: I’ll tell you one very important actor in this is DSA. I’m just gonna put it out on the table. They’ve been the ones who put the calls out. They’re the ones who organize the events. Post campaign victory, I’ve gone to one DSA-organized event also up in the Heights. They do it by neighborhoods in the borough. So, there’s a Bronx DSA, and it’s got a couple of groups, and then there’s. Brooklyn [which] seems to be a stronghold for Mamdani. That’s his stronghold. I think that the foot soldiers are actually the young. To your question, one of the questions that I asked at this DSA gathering is, are you mostly white? Because that’s what I was seeing. And as you know, Washington Heights is a mix. It’s largely Dominican. And it’s changed. Like, every place in New York has been changing. But to their credit, DSA has pulled lots of people. I think the count was between 90 and 100,000 volunteers knocking for this guy, you know, and they got me to go.

Casement: So, your experience here seems to suggest that door knocking was more important than, say, social media as framed by the national media. Was it social media or door knocking, you think, that was really the most important?

Magon-Marmol: I think the social media… this is my uneducated guess, was how they got volunteers. And then they launched those volunteers into canvassing. I really respect that. I give them credit because I’ve been involved in a lot of canvassing and door-knocking, and they did a very commendable job. I mean, they… and again, it was very youthful. Not entirely. There were a lot of other gray hairs like me, socialist gray hairs who were in the mix. But it did seem like it was a Millennial Gen Z kind of project, and it was great. They pulled it off, man.

Casement: It seems to me that to reach that demographic, they used social media as a way to propel people into the streets, as opposed to social media as just an end. So, the next question I have for you is mostly related to your experience. The Mamdani campaign was hugely successful with its communications with the diverse population in New York City. I’ve seen reports that the campaign was running in five languages at some points. And I suppose my question here is, what experience did you have with regard to that aspect of the campaign? What people did you reach? And what issues are most important to communities speaking languages other than English, in particular, the Latino community?

Magon-Marmol: Have you seen Mamdani’s website, where he has this platform?

Casement: I have not.

Magon-Marmol: It’s in several languages. I’ve seen it in English, and I’ve seen it in Spanish, and I think it’s in others. Yeah, they did a great job with that, too. If I were home, I would show you posters in Spanish, English, and Arabic, and probably they were in other languages as well. Again, reaching out to people. I’ll tell you what response [we met with]. I’ll give you one example; this is rare in Manhattan. This is very rare. A guy opens the door, he sees our campaign literature, and he starts yelling, I’m a MAGA Republican, you’re bringing communism to New York City, and get out of my building. And so, we left, but he followed us, saying I’m calling security on you. And he did get security to come after us. Now, he was a man of color. He could have been South Asian. I don’t know what his real background was, but he says I’m an American, and my relatives fought in the wars. And I lost it, and I said, listen, my father and my uncles are all buried in the same military cemetery. I’m as American as you, you idiot. And then security came up, and they politely escorted us out.

Casement: I see.

Magon-Marmol: There’s another reaction that I heard from Latinos. This was in Spanish, they would say, oh, that Muslim, he’s going to cut our throat. He’s gonna have our throats cut.

Casement: Say more about that. What is the origin of that sentiment?

Magon-Marmol: Well, the other side really did a smear campaign on Mamdani’s identity as a Muslim. They really played it up.

Casement: Keep the commie out, yes, from the New York Post. Classic. Let’s stay on this experience with the hostile guy calling security in the building. How did socialism come off in your discussions with people? What did people say? Did people draw distinctions between different types of socialism? What were your discussions about socialism like?

Magon-Marmol: Again, I’m coming back to the question of age. Yesterday, I talked to an older woman who’s a Democrat. And I asked her, what do you think about the vote? She just says, well, I respect the process. It was clear she didn’t want Mamdani. She voted for Cuomo. The old-timers mistrust the younger politicians. I think that the younger people aren’t tainted. They didn’t live through the Stalinist versions of communism. For the younger crew, they’re open to this idea of equality, of economic democracy.

Casement: How did you reach out to those people who were skeptical, who needed to be convinced? What has been a winning issue for people who need to be convinced?

Magon-Marmol: I mean, I’m telling them, did you ever hear of Fiorella LaGuardia? And of course, they’re New Yorkers, they say, sure, of course I know who LaGuardia was. I would say, do you know that he was socialist-friendly? And then they kind of stop. Then I would say, do you know that he wasn’t exactly close to the Communist Party, but he protected it, and he protected [Communist Party councilman] Vito Marcantonio, and he relied on their votes. Another thing I said [to those concerned about Mamdani’s age] is, do you know how old George Washington was when the revolution broke out? He was 33. How can you let that play such a big factor in your prejudice here. You’re deciding to go against this guy who’s trying out something new.

Casement: So, what you’re doing when you’re speaking to someone older is you rely on the history of socialist politics in New York. You gesture back. Remember LaGuardia. Remember Marcantonio. Remember the legacy of socialist politicians in New York that has been in your experience, as someone who’s older, positive, right? And on the other hand, you point towards the youth of the revolutionary founders of America, right? The American Revolution was conducted by young people. Mamdani is not the first.

Casement: I’d like to move towards what you recall about how the campaign did its messaging. I’m interested in how socialists in the campaign worked to address the concerns of working immigrants, especially the urban populations. How did the Mamdani campaign address migrant working-class concerns? I’m really curious about how the campaign addressed the top concerns of the working class. Obviously, the economic issues are very important.

Magon-Marmol: If there’s a catch-all word here for his campaign, it’s affordability. That’s for working-class people. Mamdani likes to quote how we had this conversation with a woman, she said I used to love New York, now it’s just a place where I live and struggle to survive. The three main parts of Mandani’s platform that I heard were freezing the rent, free childcare, and free buses. And you talk about immigrants; I don’t know what came out of that meeting today with Trump, but you know, the administration will likely target New York like it’s targeted LA, like it’s targeted Chicago. And I think Mamdani has made a pledge to defend immigrants, because immigrants are the ones who make up the city.

Casement: And is the atmosphere for immigrants in New York one of fear and anxiety at being the target of the Trump policy of abduction and brutalization, and disappearance?

Magon-Marmol: Not yet.

Casement: Then is the community more oriented towards anger? Determination, let’s change things, let’s protect ourselves, things like that?

Magon-Marmol: I’ll tell you, and this is only anecdotal, but like I told you, I live in Hamilton Heights. It’s just south of Washington Heights. It’s West Harlem. About a week ago, ICE picked up someone 3 blocks from where I live. I was at work, I didn’t see it, I saw it on a video, but I know exactly what corner that took place, okay? Now, that’s in a neighborhood that’s not Midtown, not downtown. It’s still in Manhattan, but not in the center. I think what ICE has been doing in New York is making, like, these little forays. They did a sweep on Canal Street and took, I think, 4 people. But they haven’t, to my knowledge, gone into a neighborhood full blast, you know?

Casement: Given that narrative about ICE, my next natural question would be how the Mamdani campaign dealt with those reactionaries that are present in the city. I think the reactionaries were obviously pretty short on leadership, right? I mean, the two options for the right were a disgraced sexual predator, that is to say, Cuomo, and the cartoonish Sliwa. Right? But the NYPD police union, that’s not a small obstacle. So, how did you address the NYPD? Zionist propaganda? Wall Street traders? The whole gamut of reactionaries, why did that pressure not work on the Mamdani campaign?

Magon-Marmol: I don’t think people tried to convert them. I think they threw their energies into getting people who were sitting on the edge, get them over to our site. And then also, you know, oftentimes in these elections, people don’t go vote. So, we were like a pain in everybody’s butt. Get yourself out to vote. People were complaining that they had gotten door-knocked 5 or 6 times. We had an app where you go into a building, and it would tell you whether that place had had a door-knocking before or not, and what the response had been. It was an aggressive campaign in that regard.

Casement: So, you didn’t focus on what reactionary forces were doing. Instead, you focused your energy on the people that you could reach.

Magon-Marmol: And to have them come out to vote, yes.

Casement: One question I have had, and it connects with every other question here, is the question of Palestine. To what extent, in your experience, was Palestine a factor? Versus what you said earlier, that the Mamdani campaign on the ground for working people was all about affordability, economic class issues. But was Palestine at all a factor?

Magon-Marmol: Of course, there was, but I don’t know if I can speak very well to that one. My discussions or my involvement with that have been very, very peripheral. Some people say the genocide shouldn’t be politicized, and the mayor shouldn’t talk about it, but a lot of people understand that it’s on the table, you know, what’s happening in Palestine is on the table, and this mayor is right to speak out on it.

Casement: It’s definitely present for people, you would say.

Magon-Marmol: Yes. Yeah.

Casement: Two more questions, and then I’ll let you go. First, what limitations do you see with the Mamdani campaign and what it promises for New Yorkers? In how socialism was projected in the organization. What critiques would you register towards the Mamdani campaign’s policies?

Magon-Marmol: You know, New Yorkers are very show me the money type people.  The question people have now is how are you gonna pay for all of this? I’m acting like a person on the street here. So, I think that the campaign might do better to break down how the funding will happen for these programs that are aimed at helping working-class people. Because there are doubts [among the working class]. The president of Chile, Gabriel Boric, comes to mind. He came in very much like Mamdani, you know, very idealistic. And then the walls came up, and then all the obstacles got thrown in his path. This highlights that there’s always the possibility of defeat. But you know what? A fight is good. Better than rolling over and dying.

Casement: So, your complaints would be aimed at perhaps a framing too much around idealism or idealistic politics, rather than the material basis of the fight that’s going to happen.

Magon-Marmol: I think maybe the way I’d say it is that the administration needs to break it down to people more clearly, and how this can be done practically. And then that way, it’ll be on the street, and it won’t be just in the editorials of the dailies, or in the New York Times, or whatever. It’s been done before, and elsewhere.

Casement: Relatedly, then, my final question: how do you respond to parts of the left that would call this sort of a sham, right? They would say something like, well, bourgeois electoral politics won’t change anything. You mentioned the inveterate pessimism of what you characterize as old school leftists.

Magon-Marmol: For example, I have friends who are ultra-left.

Casement: So, how would you respond to that? How did you keep your optimism up?

Magon-Marmol: I never imagined that New York City would have the chance of a socialist mayor being able to present programs that would help working-class people in this way. Who would have thought of that 5 years ago? You know, now look where we are. And that goes to answer what you were saying. The socialists who are against Mamdani, I’m sorry, but they’re being purists. You know, like, what the hell have you delivered? And that’s what it’s all about, right? If you’re gonna fight, fighting is good, even over a dime, right? Even over a little bit of progress for the working people. This campaign got people out in the street door-knocking. It was blood, sweat, and tears by the volunteers, you know? That’s good! How can you, as a socialist, laugh at that or frown at that? That’s what we want, isn’t it? There’s got to be a fight. And the younger people are ready for it.