Olivia Reingold is one of the leading journalistic voices in the loose assembly of dissident Democrats. After interning at the U.S. House of Representatives, NPR, and WSB, Olivia held production roles at Georgia Public Broadcasting, and later for Politico. Since 2022, she has been a staff writer for Bari Weiss’ The Free Press.
Why did we invite her on?
Next week, the people of New York will decide their new mayor. If any of the predictors are to be trusted, newcomer Zohran Mamdani will assume control of America’s financial epicenter - the wealthiest city on Earth. His rise represents a fundamental shift in the psyche of American politics - populism is the game of today. The old guard of elites has been rejected, and the new dawn is here. But at what cost?
Mamdani is divisive, but his base is mobilised and motivated. As the Democrats flounder, their public image as sunk as it’s ever been, his brand of socialism might prove to be the path the opposition takes.
We wanted to sit down with someone and discuss what this means for America. More specifically, we wanted a Democrat; someone who could lay out where this road might lead. Olivia was the natural choice.
What did we talk about?
“I have gone so deep on this man’s life … Zohran Mamdani is a force of nature. A year ago, most of his constituents hadn’t heard his name, and now he could be the future of the Democratic Party.”
Olivia might be a better expert on Mamdani than any of his supporters. Perhaps better than Mamdani himself. Over the last year, she has studied his manifesto, his past, and every single tweet he’s ever published.
It’s a Herculean task, but political starchildren only come along once or twice in a generation. Zohran Mamdani, it’s clear, is one such case. Even as people who follow American politics closely, we were completely oblivious to him. Suddenly he was everywhere. His ascent has been one of the most unprecedented developments in recent memory. To us, that is; to Olivia, not so much. She saw this coming long before anyone else.
”Andrew Cuomo was tipped to be President one day - he was the favourite. But I knew it was going to be Zohran. All the cool people were carrying ‘Hot Girls For Zohran’ bags, he was getting all the endorsements that Cuomo would typically be getting. A year ago, he was polling at 1%, and now he’s here.”
But who is he? Every major news outlet in America has done an investigative report on the young firebrand, either exalting him as the second coming of ‘Freesus’ or a reptilian anti-semite. So what’s the truth? Where does Mamdani come from?
”He comes from a very privileged family. It’s ironic, because he’s become a ‘champion of the working class’. But his mother is Mira Nair, a successful filmmaker, and his father is a professor at Columbia who specialises in colonisation studies. But his story is that he’s the underdog, and that he makes the impossible happen.”
These factors, Olivia suggests, are more than incidental. They intimately inform his politics and inspire his radical nature.
”He comes from politics from an extremely academic place. He’s said a number of times that Palestine is why he got into politics. He co-founded a chapter of Students For Justice In Palestine - a pretty radical group. On October 7th, it released a statement that was basically a condemnation of Israel. He’s attempted to moderate on this topic, but you go back, and he’s got this radical, academic view.”
This is puzzling. In one of the early mayoral debates, the candidates were asked what their first action as mayor would be if they were elected into office. All but one declared that they would visit Israel, all but Mamdani, who pledged to stay and help the people of New York. The answer drew ire onstage, but outside of the room, that rhetoric was inviting people in. The mayor’s place is his city, and Mamdani stood out as the only candidate who recognised that. In a populist moment, it was a winning move.
But if elsewhere, Mamdani is declaring that Palestine was his radicalising force, is he lying? Was he lying then?
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to TRIGGERnometry to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.