The Lessons of Zohran

How to scale "A City You Can Afford" without losing or being boring

BERLIN — Folks, the Russ Belt is currently traveling central Europe, pondering socialism from a very clean and fast train from Prague to Berlin.

I woke up to precisely one (1) urgent text asking what I made of Zohran Mamdani’s dominant win in the NYC Dem mayoral primary. How does the Belt feel about the 33-year-old (…c’mon man) democratic socialist handily defeating sex pest slash former governor Andrew Cuomo?

If you are a pro-Zohran reader, this post is for you. If you are Zohran-skeptical, this post is also for you. This blog has always been about “how to win elections,” so I’m going to stick to that angle. Also, I’m on vacation so I don’t want to write 10,000 words.

Zohran Surprises The Russ Belt

First, Zohran ran a fantastic campaign. Yes, he had some things go his way—like a wide open race to become voters’ alternative to the scandal-plagued Cuomo. And yes, this was a Dem-only primary in an off-year (meaning a higher-educated electorate) in a solidly blue city.

But frankly NYC is not known for its progressivism (recent mayors are Giuliani, Bloomberg, de Blasio, and Adams—with the most progressive, de Blasio, more of a Warren left-liberal). And as Zohran pointed out in a viral video way back in November (my first intro to him), the city shifted sharply right last year. Yet Zohran not only won, but expanded far beyond his initial strength among college-educated Brooklynite white voters, winning demographics many assumed were out of reach.

Of course, to assume the office, he still needs to beat the Trump-pardoned sitting mayor, Eric Adams, this fall (betting markets give him 3 in 4 odds). And this post won’t explore how he might govern (commentators have pointed out that many of his tax and spending proposals are outside city government authority).

But even in a NYC Dem primary, I’ll admit I did not think a self-identified democratic socialist who’d taken the cultural positions he did (tweets like “queer liberation means defund the police” in 2020) could perform so well in an election where over one million people voted. And Zohran did. Here’s my take on how.

Zohran & The “IPA Theory”

Back in 2022, I introduced the IPA Theory—a super simple framework named not after beer, but for the two traits key for winning campaigns: Be Interesting, and Be Popular.

• What is “Interesting”? Don’t be boring. Have a message that resonates in the culture. It’s now cliche to say we live in an “attention economy,” but if you can’t command it, you’re probably losing. Obama was interesting. Bill Clinton playing the sax was good TV. Bernie as a blunt-talking foil to Hillary Clinton was interesting and memeable. Public attention is a precious finite resource, and that is bad news for stiff, tired, or predictable politicians.

• What is “Popular”? Take positions voters like, especially on the issues they care most about. Again, the key low-engagement voters Dems need to win back tend to be left-of-center on economics and more moderate on cultural issues, or at the very least less interested in hearing about them. If you're a progressive, your best bet is to campaign on your populist issues, as opposed to your “unpopulist” ones.

I argue winning candidates typically fall in the upper-right quadrant of this Interesting-Popular Axis. (The A in IPA stands for Axis, okay?). Zohran’s path to that quadrant was complicated and worth looking at.

A helpful illustration I made re: the IPA theory and Zohran’s primary campaign. If he somehow loses in November, this will look very dumb. But the Russ Belt is not afraid to create bold drawings.

The Interesting Part

This is the part basically everyone agrees on: Zohran is charismatic on camera, speaks like a real person, and churns out attention-grabbing, relatable videos (using a savvy firm also hired by brands like HBO for corporate campaigns). Two fun examples: this one about “Halalflation,” or getting Halal food truck prices down from $10 to $8. Or his Valentine’s Day video to get young leftists to register for the primary. His media all had a soft, humanizing filter and engaging editing, reminding us that his mom is a well-known filmmaker (who directed Monsoon Wedding, and almost the fifth Harry Potter movie).

In terms of media, Zohran went everywhere. He did sports podcasts, morning talk radio, traditional cable TV, and collabs with comedians and influencers, etc. The fact that he was running in the world’s largest media market helped him immensely (local left-wing candidates in smaller markets don’t get the exposure, and with it the chances, he did). But this was all possible because he has “good software,” a.k.a he can talk. As I wrote the day after Trump’s win, “campaigns need to run candidates who can truly ‘go everywhere’ and, as Ezra Klein puts it, have great ‘software’—able to respond immediately to a question in an authentic non-scripted way while scoring political points.”

Some readers might chafe at this, but tactically one comparison is Pete Buttigieg, who went everywhere in 2020 to emerge from unknown mayor of Indiana’s fourth-largest city to presidential contender. (My general Pete take is that he’s appealed to normie and lower-info voters far more than most political nerds acknowledge; he’s also created more viral moments himself than the whole Dem Party this decade.)

Zohran is also young, whereas Cuomo, and most of the Dem Party, is old. If you are an old, senior elected Dem official reading this: Retire! Pass that torch. Also he wears cool suits (even the NYT thinks so).

The Popular Part

Zohran focused relentlessly on the material issues that voters say they care about: cost of living, rent, and transit. His slogan, “A City You Can Afford,” was simple, memorable, and popular. (An old colleague of mine used to always say “simple messages always win.”). In almost Bernie 2016 fashion, it was clear his goal was to avoid engaging on culture war stuff, even as opponents and press tried to bait him into lengthy discussions of his past positions.

Yes, his economic positions were left-wing. Economists are loudly debating whether they can work. Some can (“Halalflation” is indeed fixable, folks!), some many argue can’t, and others are outside the mayor’s jurisdiction anyways. But voters aren’t grading policy white papers. In this case, they chose the candidate who seemed most serious about making their life more livable.

So how did Zohran avoid getting sunk by old “defund the police” tweets, or his widely discussed stances on Gaza and Israel, which drew sharp criticism from pro-Israel groups and national media? Well, he ran a focused, message-disciplined campaign where he acknowledged past positions when asked, but pivoted back to the cost of living, rent, and transit over and over. And that worked for most NYC Dems.

It helped that Cuomo was wildly unpopular, the electorate skewed younger and more educated than most, and that Zohran drove huge turnout in Brooklyn (which, by the way, is already nearly 2X larger than Manhattan). But plenty of candidates have had those advantages and still been blown out by more establishment politicians. Instead, Zohran stayed focused on the economic populism voters care about, pivoting back every time. Would his campaign play out the same way in Iowa? Surely not. This wasn’t Iowa, but there’s a lot to learn.

On the flipside, Cuomo, backed by the Clintons and Bloomberg, still flopped. He ran no real campaign, had nothing Interesting to say, and faced an unenthusiastic electorate thanks to his, shall we say, unpopular record: non-consensual touching, covid mismanagement, etc. Sometimes establishment backing helps win an election (see: Biden 2020), and sometimes it doesn’t (Biden/Harris 2024). But this loss reminds us: voters don’t like it when candidates are forced on them that they don’t want.

Taking “A City You Can Afford” National

Zohran’s slogan may have been born in Queens, but it travels. Voters everywhere are mad about the same stuff: prices, housing, healthcare, and being one slip in the shower from financial collapse.

Nationally, this can translate: in NYC, it’s rent. In Phoenix, it’s a mortgage and AC bills. In Michigan, it’s childcare and groceries. Pair the economic messaging with a little interesting flair (my last post was on Ruben Gallego’s “big ass trucks” line), and you’ve got something that might play with voters.

If the message is clear, material, and delivered by someone even semi-likable, it can work almost anywhere. Non-socialist Dem candidates have also started making affordability their top 2026 message and priority. Whether they’ll make it Interesting enough to resonate with their electorate is TBD.

What This Doesn’t Mean

No, I don’t think Dems should nominate Zohran clones everywhere. Not every race is a NYC primary with a uniquely loathed opponent. But the point isn’t to run Zohran in Wisconsin. The point is to pull out what worked and might scale. “A City You Can Afford” is smart populist politics, and being charismatic and good on camera doesn’t hurt.

Thanks for reading. It apparently pours every few hours in Berlin, so I was able to finish this post upon arrival. Depending on what you think, drop me a “hell yeah” or “F you” to spice up my trip. Cheers.