Democrats Keep Losing. Mamdani’s Reimagined American Dream Can Change That.
NYC mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani speaking at a Resist Fascism Rally in Bryant Park on October 27th, 2024. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
From Bill Clinton to Barack Obama, Democratic politicians have long preached what political philosopher Michael Sandel calls the “rhetoric of rising”—the belief that those who work hard and play by the rules can succeed if they truly want to. “We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anyone else because she is an American,” Obama proudly stated in his 2013 inaugural address, offering an unwavering pledge to those who work hard enough. The nonpartisan appeal of this American Dream has made it an effective and signature political tool for decades, especially in Democratic circles. While recognizing that Obama’s words may have reflected his own trajectory, the rhetoric of rising serves to maintain politically safe messaging and acknowledge existing inequality, while circumventing the underlying disparities rooted in America’s economic system: how hard is “hard enough”?
Today, men born into the poorest fifth of households have only about an 8 percent chance of rising to the wealthiest fifth in adulthood. Neighborhoods in the U.S. with greater upward mobility tend to already have lower poverty rates, higher-quality schools, more stable family dynamics, and stronger social networks. Yet, the reality of intergenerational socioeconomic mobility rarely factors into how most Americans think about who gets ahead and why. Nearly 69 percent of Americans still believe that people are rewarded primarily for “intelligence and skills.”
The illusion of meritocracy, which values individual achievement above all else, has shaped the doctrine of the Democratic Party for decades. Rather than addressing systematic barriers like under-resourced schools or economic disparities, the Party’s meritocratic approach prioritizes expanding individual opportunities—promising that the solution to poverty is helping people climb the ladder rather than questioning why the ladder is difficult to climb in the first place. The American Dream is far less attainable now than it was in the past. Despite working longer hours and achieving higher levels of education, working families face an economy where wages remain insufficient for individuals and families to make ends meet, even after the fastest low-wage growth in decades. The widening gap between the promises of meritocracy and economic reality has alienated the voters the Democratic Party claims to represent, reflected in the party losing nearly 30 percent of working-class voters between 2008 and 2024 alone. However, a new wave of progressive Democrats has begun disrupting this outdated playbook to win back the American working class.
Zohran Mamdani’s triumph in his 12-point victory over Andrew Cuomo in New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary was built on a coalition of working-class immigrants and young professionals—a divergent approach from the party’s traditional strategy. The self-described Democratic Socialists’ overwhelming margins in working-class immigrant neighborhoods—28 points in Chinatown, 52 in Astoria, and 42 in Sunnyside—were emblematic of this different approach. Rather than relying on an individualistic narrative, Mamdani rejected the party’s decades-long reliance on meritocratic promises, embracing collective dignity as a potential new blueprint for progressive candidates. His proposed policies, which include a four-year citywide rent freeze and universal childcare, aim to guarantee basic decency for everyone—regardless of their socioeconomic status. These ideas were not strategized by elite political consultants; they came directly from speaking to New Yorkers to address immediate needs.
The appeal of Mamdani’s proposals was reflected in the unprecedented, volunteer-driven effort behind his campaign. Nearly 50,000 volunteers knocked on doors across the city for 8 months, overpowering opponent Andrew Cuomo’s $25 million campaign fueled by corporate interests. In his grassroots victory, Mamdani effectively raised the question of who New York actually serves—shifting the debate from how individuals could succeed in the city’s economy to who the system was designed to reward in the first place. Mamdani’s vision reflects that today’s most salient political divide is not between “winners and losers” in competition. The real division is between underserved communities fighting to preserve their dignity and the system seeking to extract their value.
Mamdani’s bold rejection of economic individualism extends beyond New York. Minnesota State Senator Omar Fateh’s victory in 2020 over longtime incumbent Jeff Hayden followed a similar playbook, mobilizing his working-class community around universal healthcare and housing justice rather than promises of upward mobility. These victories represent the forefront of a growing movement within the Democratic Party of candidates abandoning the party’s meritocratic doctrine.
The success of Mamdani and Fateh signals a broader shift in voter expectations. The rhetoric of rising is increasingly obsolete as the current economic reality sharply diverges from any notion of widespread economic mobility. When politicians tell struggling Americans that success comes from getting a college degree, they implicitly blame those workers for their shortfalls and economic circumstances. This framework becomes even more dangerous as economic realities shift. A degree no longer guarantees economic stability to the extent that it once did; college graduates face the highest unemployment rate in more than a decade, often struggling to land entry-level roles. Yet, this outdated meritocratic ideology persists. Those deemed as “unsuccessful” internalize economic hardship as personal failure rather than recognizing systemic barriers. As Sandel argues, this can lead to humiliation instead of mobilization, resulting in resentment toward the very politicians who promised them otherwise. This paradox helps us understand why the reimagined approach of candidates like Mamdani and Fateh resonates, now more than ever, where the Democratic Party has fallen short. Rather than asking exhausted voters to try harder in a rigged game, these candidates challenge the rules of the game itself.
The Democratic Party has responded to Mamdani’s victory with predicted apprehension and resistance. They warn that his proposals would require higher taxes that drive people and businesses out of New York, arguing that Mamdani’s agenda ignores basic economic realities that would turn the city into a cautionary tale of progressive overreach. However, these critics, fixated on tax rates, fail to grasp what Mamdani has tapped into—a fundamental shift in American attitude on who deserves economic security. Voters have embraced the premise that basic needs should not have to be earned through individual competition. Mamdani is not asking New Yorkers to abandon hard work or responsibility; he is proposing that such dignity should be a starting point, not a reward.
After 2024’s losses, Democrats cannot afford to keep preaching this broken promise at risk of defeat. The choice is not whether to change, but whether Democrats will do so before even more working-class voters realize this party has nothing left to offer them.
Elif Sahin (GS ‘27) is a staff writer at CPR studying political science-statistics. She can be reached at ees2219@columbia.edu.