Zohran’s Win Shows DSA Must Build A National Political Machine

Sarah Milner writes that DSA’s Left must run cadre candidates in 2026, or be left behind

Zohran Mamdani’s win in the New York City Mayoral primary is an exhilarating victory for the left.

After a half-decade defined by defeats—from Cori Bush and Jamal Bowman, to the return of Trump, to the ongoing genocide in Gaza—Mamdani’s blowout win is inspiring new ambitions in DSA’s electoral work.

Mamdani’s victory is all the more impressive given the intensity of opposition he faced. His disciplined campaign shows that even when the entire mainstream media is aimed against us, socialist candidates can cut through and deliver our message by sticking relentlessly to issues of affordability, and not giving ground on bad-faith attacks.

Zohran began the campaign as an underdog. In fact, when the campaign launched, many doubted it would be viable, and for many, the plan in the beginning was for an agitational campaign, not a serious contest for the seat. Mamdani was not even included in an October New York Times poll of mayoral candidates and even some of our own DSA electeds were skeptical. 

Such skepticism was not baseless. After all, Andrew Cuomo had all the advantages in terms of money, influence, and name recognition. We were running in seemingly inhospitable conditions: the country has been in the midst of a years-long rightward drift, and in that time, socialist horizons have steadily slipped. 

By seizing the initiative and setting the key issues of the campaign, Zohran forced Cuomo to debate on his terms.

Cuomo tried to take advantage of this skepticism. His billionaire-backed machine sought to define the campaign around the issues of crime and experience. Zohran did more than just go issue-for-issue on Cuomo’s strongest points. Instead he went to the streets, taking social media by storm with his “man on the street” interviews with New Yorkers, empowering city residents to share their stories and their concerns and thereby redefining the terms of the debate around affordable housing, the cost of groceries, and public transportation.

By seizing the initiative and setting the key issues of the campaign, Zohran forced Cuomo to debate on his terms. The most powerful expression of this was Zohran’s advocacy for Palestinian liberation. Cuomo and the establishment media, led by the New York Post, attacked Zohran and DSA over and over again, charging that our opposition to Israel’s genocide was antisemitism. But Zohran — and with him, the growing number of city residents disgusted by the massacre— stood strong and constantly sought to redirect the conversation towards the real issues facing New Yorkers, and to his clear support of Palestinian freedom.

The establishment logic held that the Zohran campaign could be broken by “antisemitic” smearing. Instead, Zohran’s triumph delivered a tremendous blow to Zionism in one of its major strongholds. Mamdani’s win seems to mark a tipping point where now both the majority of progressive voters and the wider public are turning against Israel’s genocide. In fact, Zohran’s victory seems to have driven support for Zohran and his antizionist politics outside his base and outside of New York.

Zohran’s Win Is DSA’s Win 

No less than message discipline, the campaign was a feat of organizing. Zohran’s campaign put together hundreds of events per week in the month leading up to the primary. Thousands of volunteers canvassed, combining long time DSA members and fresh ranks of progressive activists. They were all coordinated through an online sign-up system, personal networks of social connections, and the increasing cultural center of gravity around the campaign.

The effort was the biggest project a DSA chapter has ever undertaken. The campaign demonstrated the strengths of our mass membership organization. We mobilized thousands and catalyzed the mobilization of thousands more: from the candidate and his campaign team, through the chapter leadership, to the middle ranks of highly capable member-organizers, to the wider ranks of new volunteers, and out to the hundreds of thousands of every-day supporters. This was DSA at its best: an embedded social force, a singular vehicle for mass politics and democratic participation in a society inhospitable to either. 

Far from being overwhelmed by the scale of the task, the extent of mobilization and the profound opportunities of victory created an amplifying effect. The years of experience and expertise of comrades in New York equipped them to turn the potential energy of this campaign into ever-greater momentum. Zohran’s campaign built, from the ground up, a new winning coalition. It mobilized people who rarely turn out and in so doing proactively changed the electorate. 

This fight is far from over. With our impressive forces, DSA is heading into a much bigger battle in the general election. With millions of voters, three capitalist candidates, and the combined pressure of the entire American political establishment against him, Zohran will need the full energy of DSA mobilized nationwide to back him up.

Zohran’s campaign built, from the ground up, a new winning coalition. It mobilized people who rarely turn out and proactively changed the electorate.

The logistics of campaigning aside, there are also the real political contradictions that the Zohran campaign faces, and will continue to face. These contradictions grow from the potential of a socialist governing one of the largest capitalist municipal governments in the world, with a police force that is better funded than most of the world’s militaries. The DSA left should be clear-eyed about what this means. Comrades must clearly articulate the extensive dangers Zohran faces. In many ways, his position will feature even greater pressure than that of congress members like AOC. 

However, we also should not treat these limitations as static. Zohran can either retreat and give ground to capitalist pressure, or he can advance his offensive against the New York City elite. Taking the offensive is not only a question of his individual will and his individual choices, but also of whether his base is organized both to hold him to account and to serve as his mass movement. In addition to volunteering with the campaign during the general election, DSA members can keep the momentum up by organizing from below, for example by building mass rallies, launching occupations of city hall, winning endorsements and mobilizations from unions, maintaining regular tabling and canvassing for policy priorities and carrying forward other tactics which keep the capitalists on the defensive.

Man Or Machine

The question of how Zohran will operate in office will become decisive soon. But for many DSA activists right now, the focus has now shifted from what is happening in New York to their own more immediate question: “How can we do that here?”

For some, this question boils down to: “Who is our Zohran?”

For the Democratic Party commentariat, the focus is on Zohran himself — his personality, his charisma, his background. The New York Times has labeled as a rising star and some even call him “a new Obama.” This type of political thinking treats politicians like celebrities and politics like a reality tv show. 

Candidates matter, and it is fair to say that a great campaign is not possible without a great candidate: someone who can inspire volunteers, who can resonate with a wide base, and who can push back on the press and the capitalist politicians at press conferences, in interviews, and on the street. But a closer look at what actually happened in New York shows that DSA activists looking to replicate the Zohran win in their chapters must not replicate the man, but the machine.

Zohran did not appear out of thin air. He arose out of an electoral apparatus that NYC-DSA has been building over the last decade. This work got underway in earnest following Bernie’s 2016 campaign and the revitalization of DSA, and expanded dramatically with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Julia Salazar’s victories in 2018. Since then, NYC-DSA has won a series of municipal, state, and federal races.

Each election has led to the recruitment and training of new volunteers, the development of best practices and systems, the expansion of a cohort of staff with campaign expertise, the development of lists, and even the next generation of candidates themselves.

What made Zohran’s win posible was that, rather than inventing a campaign from scratch, NYC DSA was scaling up an existing method. This would not have been possible if it wasn’t for years of DSA organizing. To “have your own Zohran” you must have your own machine.

Even now, to follow up on his victory and make it count, it is necessary that this machine be mobilized again, waging an inside-outside struggle for core demands which brings thousands of DSA members and working New Yorkers into struggle. The same case will apply everywhere, in every city socialists take power. So how can we build that machine?

Spreading The Machine

If DSA wants to replicate the successes of New York City in chapters across the country, we need to build more political the machines.

First of all, it isn’t automatic that chapters even try to recreate Zohran’s win. Many are inspired, but DSA chapters are often highly disorganized, confusing spaces where even the best inclinations and ideas may struggle to develop into well-executed, systematic efforts. So the first step for party-builders is to actively raise the possibility of recreating Zohran-style campaigns in our chapters. The energy is so great, and the need for direction so urgent, that any workable plan will be a spark which immediately finds kindling.

We should run a slate of candidates in 2026, with at least the 10 biggest chapters putting forward a candidate.

Second, we must put forward a plan to not just run the campaigns but build the machine. We can, with intentionality, accomplish in faster order what previously took years of learning and struggle elsewhere. Chapters can focus directly on the party-building work. Lessons developed, tested, and proven through struggle in other cities, can be shared through trainings, workshops, and case-studies. Election staff and experts from New York can be assisted by the NPC in sharing their knowledge across DSA to help spread the system. DSA chapters can begin this work now, holding regular canvassing, phonebanking and tabling events, identifying lists of potential member-volunteers, talking to other chapters about materials and guides, and developing a list of prospective candidates.

Chapters without a clear endorsement policy should write one, establishing a Socialists-In-Office Committee before they are running candidates, setting out standards, expectations and guidelines before they receive endorsement applications, and training members how to organize and lead canvasses before the campaign starts to go out and knock doors.

Taking the initiative and starting early like this will prepare chapters to take the chances in front of them. 2026 is likely to be a wave election, and with intense dissatisfaction against both parties, many socialists can win. Running these campaigns will be decisive for actually coordinating and mobilizing our membership into mass work.

That’s why we should run a slate of candidates in 2026, with shared branding, messaging, and strategy. The national slate can be used to drive the development of best practices and training throughout the country.

The Left Must Lead, Or Be Left Behind

There is no doubt that there are limitations to the Zohran campaign and to the wider political machine which the moderate wing of DSA are building: their practical policies candidates pursue in office, the messaging and focus of candidates, their vision (or lack thereof) for building DSA into a party, and the way they engage in internal democracy in their chapters. But pointing out all these limitations doesn’t overcome the fact that the moderate caucuses are leading the way in terms of DSA’s electoral work. They are winning authority, building relationships and securing resources which they utilize in the internal struggles within DSA.

Winning the fight for the future of DSA does not mean winning rhetorical debates. The left “wins” when we put forward clear, actionable programs which activate hundreds and thousands of DSA members into struggles which push our politics forward and grow our material strength and political authority. It is not enough to just support and comment on campaigns that other caucuses create and lead. The moderate forces in DSA know this. They have won huge political authority and organizing apparatuses by creating campaigns and leading them start-to-finish.

If the left does not put forward our own candidates, and build up our own political machines, we will be eclipsed and lose ground within DSA. It is not enough to simply join campaigns, no matter how vocally. The left must either lead or we will be forced to follow along at the hem of GW and SMC, issuing complaints like an annoying younger sibling.

The left “wins” when we put forward clear, actionable programs which activate hundreds and thousands of DSA members into struggles which push our politics forward and grow our material strength and political authority within DSA.

If B&R, MUG, Red Star, and R&R each put up a candidate in 2026, this would be a huge step towards building an alternative to the GW/SMC politics. Together, we can take the initiative, proving in practice our ideas and raising even further the horizons for what socialist elected leadership can accomplish. 

Zohran’s victory provides important lessons for DSA, but also poses enormous challenges for it. We are gaining ground in a state absolutely hostile to our socialist politics. These challenges can only be overcome by ambitious, coordinated action. We are living through an exceptional moment, and socialist breakthroughs are possible across the country. It is our responsibility to take that opportunity.