Asking people about New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani and his democratic socialist beliefs is the new Rorschach test ahead of the 2026 congressional elections.
Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy called the 34-year-old assemblyman a "communist" while HBO'S John Oliver praised his forceful Nov. 4 victory speech as "satisfying" after a nasty campaign.
As far as voters like Alexandria Hollis are concerned, however, no label matters if an elected official can understand rising anger over the cost of living.
"I definitely have a couple people that I'm close with that are very against capitalism now, and see it as a system that isn't really working much anymore," the 30-year-old pharmacist, who lives in Scottdale, Pennsylvania, told USA TODAY.
"I don't think it's working, especially in like my my field which is healthcare," she added. "Capitalism is just not working."
Hollis, a registered Democrat, said there remains a large amount of uncertainty about what democratic socialism means. That void can easily be filled with "a lot of misinformation being thrown around" she said.
"There's a lot of fear thrown around with that word," she said.
Mamdani's upset victory over former Gov. Andrew Cuomo has inspired a new generation fueled by dissatisfaction with America's housing crisis and capitalism in general, polling finds.
After he won the Democratic primary for mayor in June, Run for Something, a liberal-leaning group that recruits and supports younger progressive contenders for public office, announced roughly 10,000 people had signed up vying for local or state offices.
Those type of seeds appear to be blooming in the fall, with Kaitie Wilson, a 43-year-old democratic socialist, defeating the Democratic incumbent this week in Seattle's mayoral race.
"Ordinary people are feeling the high cost of everything from rent to childcare to food to gas," Wilson, who gradually became aware of Mamdani this year, told the USA TODAY NETWORK.
"I think that there are a lot of similar forces at work right now," she added.
Mamdani ran on similar agendas that include raising the minimum wage, improving public transit, more progressive tax codes and stronger tenant protections.
But the rise of democratic socialist-aligned candidates is also alarming opponents on the political center and right, who are organizing a rebuttal. That puts Mamdani's beliefs as a centerpiece of the midterm elections, with Republicans arguing that Democrats' association with him will turn off moderates everywhere.
Polls show that socialism is slightly more popular among young voters, who turned out in droves for Mamdani, but that among older voters remain skeptical.
A Gallup poll released in September found among voters age 18-34, socialism had a 49% positive rating versus a 46% negative rating. The survey showed 52% voters age 35-54 and 67% age 55 and over had a negative view of socialism, and just 42% of 35-54 year-olds and 30% of voters 55 and older had a positive view of socialism.
What is democratic socialism?
Generally speaking, democratic socialism is defined as a belief that the economy should be democratically run for the benefit of the public.
The Democratic Socialists of America, of which Mamdani is a member, describes it as a "system where ordinary people have a real voice" in workplaces and neighborhoods.
Other DSA members have included Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and former Reps. Jamal Bowman of New York and Cori Bush of Missouri, who is running to return to Congress next year. All are also members of the Democratic Party. Although he identifies as a democratic socialist, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, is not a member of the DSA.
Mamdani has laid out a wide-ranging policy vision that includes freezing rent on rent-stabilized apartments, eliminating fares on all city buses and universal childcare. He said it would be paid for by increasing income taxes by 2% on New Yorkers making more than $1 million annually plus raising the corporate tax rate to 11.5%.
Peter Dreier, a political science professor at Occidental College, is considered one of the foremost experts on socialism. He said democratic socialists share a "core belief" that society − often meaning the government − should take a more active role in ensuring certain necessities, such as healthcare and housing, are met because they are considered basic human rights.
"Anybody who wants a job, health insurance and a decent roof over their head that doesn't cost half of their income: socialism is meant to achieve that goal," Dreier said.
"Now how to do it, there's been a big debate over the last 150 years about that," he added. "But the idea that everything's free − no, nothing's free. People have to go to work."
Socialist politicians say their appeal is growing due to rising inequality and the cost of necessities like housing, which is hitting younger Americans particularly hard.
Mamdani told USA TODAY his young supporters are looking for "a city where they can do more than just struggle to afford to call it home."
Mamdani's historic victory came with roughly 50% of the overall vote but among those age 18-29 he crushed with 75% in that bracket supporting him in the Nov. 4 election, according to an analysis of exit polling by Tufts University.
Along lines of race, Mamdani performed even better winning 62% of white youth and raking in about 84% among younger Black and Hispanic voters, the exit poll survey showed.
Wilson, the Seattle mayor-elect, also won with roughly 50% of the vote. She said both campaigns reflect a growing shift toward progressivism unfolding across the nation, adding it is fueled in part by a backlash to the policies of the Trump administration and failures of the mainstream Democratic Party to "stop that train wreck" in Washington.
"That's a dynamic that is playing out in New York City and it's also playing out here," Wilson said.
"I've talked to people, not just running for office, but people who are getting more involved in politics for the first time."
Support for capitalism waning ahead of midterms, surveys find
Historically, because of its association with communism, Americans have been skeptical of the socialist label, but that is changing.
The Gallup poll found 54% of U.S. adults overall hold a positive view of capitalism, down from 60% compared to four years ago.
That view is concentrated among Democrats and independents, as opposed to Republicans. About 42% of Democrats look at the free market positively, compared to 50% who said the same in 2021. Roughly 51% of independents give capitalism a thumbs up, versus 59% who agreed with that sentiment four years ago.
Republican views on capitalism were mostly unshaken, the Gallup poll showed, with about 74% holding a positive view. Socialism remains very unpopular on the right: 14% of Republicans have a positive view of socialism, compared to 38% of independents and 66% of Democrats.
GOP operatives acknowledge the tough terrain in 2026 given that the democratic socialist wing of their party is good at firing up the progressive base, but they are betting that Mamdani and others are over-promising with pledges to achieve rent control, free busses and other left-leaning goals.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, has already pumped the brakes on the mayor-elect's ambitious proposal, which require state approval, saying she "cannot set forth a plan right now that takes money out of a system that relies" that money.
The National Republican Congressional Committee, the political arm charged with defending the 219-seat GOP majority in Congress, has already signaled that it wants 2026 to be a referendum on Mamdani's election.
Mike Marinella, an NRCC spokesman, said in an interview that the economy, including inflation and affordability, will be "top of mind for voters" on all sides.
"The Democrat Party has surrendered to radical socialist Zohran Mamdani and the far-left mob who are now running the show. They’ve proudly embraced defunding the police, abolishing ICE, taxing hard-working Americans to death, and replacing common sense with chaos," he said. "Every House Democrat is foolishly complicit in their party’s collapse, and voters will make them pay in 2026."
Republicans believe they can deliver a more commonsense solution that voters will prefer, but Trump supporters told USA TODAY warned that continued economic struggles, especially for younger Americans, could erase any efforts to turn Mamdani and his supporters into the boogeyman as GOP operatives hope.
"I wouldn't say I personally blame capitalism, but I think like any other government infrastructure, it's pretty easy to corrupt and become corrupted," Gray Holland, a 24-year-old sales rep who hails from Birmingham, Alabama, said in an interview.
Holland, a registered Republican, voted for Trump in the last presidential election in large part, because of his promise to decrease the cost of living, but that Trump hasn't delivered on it yet.
"That's what Trump campaigned on and I haven't seen too much of it," Holland said.
Democratic socialism is likely to inspire more left-leaning voters and others his age, he said, who aren't familiar with its past but are fed up with the current state of affairs. But those who believe in "America first" policies who are talking about the working poor, Holland said, could fill in the gap and inspire younger conservatives, such as Sen. Josh Hawley, of Missouri, or Tucker Carlson, a prominent right-wing media figure.
"I'm not a big fan of Trump as much anymore," Holland said.
Republicans accuse Mamdani of communism
Trump and some of his allies, such as Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tennessee, have referred to Mamdani as a communist, a claim Politifact labels false.
Communism is an authoritarian system associated with brutal regimes such as the Soviet Union, North Korea and Cuba. Instead of democracy, communists believe the working class should take control through violent revolution.
"We actually elected a mayor of New York City who happens to be a communist," Trump said on Nov. 12.
Mamdani denied being a communist when asked on NBC's "Meet the Press. He said his ideology is inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the iconic civil rights activist. King often criticized inequality and said "I am much more socialistic in my economic theory than capitalistic."
"There must be a better distribution of wealth for all of God’s children in this country," Mamdani said in the July interview.
Conservatives aren't backing down from using the term, however, and have pounced on a past Mamdani comment that used phrasing associated with communism.
Speaking at a Young Democratic Socialists of America conference in 2021, for instance, he used the phrase "seizing the means of production," which is a concept that means the working class taking control of the economy or nation's resources, during a livestream event when urging attendees to stand by their convictions.
Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said he believes Mamdani is a communist because that phrase quotes Karl Marx, author of the 1848 "Communist Manifesto."
"We cannot normalize Marxism or what it does and has done," Gonzalez told USA TODAY in an interview. "It's responsible for 100 million dead around the world, it's responsible for the Berlin Wall in Eastern Europe during the Cold War. We need to teach these things again because this should scare us."
The NRCC did a national battleground survey across 46 congressional districts that it believes underscores that trepidation and holds the key to retaining the House majority in 2026. It found Mamdani's net approval sits at negative 16% and that socialism has a negative 12% among those 1,000 respondents.
Republican strategists also highlight that Mamdani's name ID sits at 81%, according to the poll, which is almost as House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries at 86%. That means voters can expect the incoming New York City mayor to be the star of the GOP's 2026 midterms campaign.
"The old Democrats, back in my day, disagreed with conservatives on regulation or about the top marginal tax rate, but they did not go around quoting Marx," Gonzalez said.
"They did not want to establish free bus service − something that Mamdani cannot achieve − and they did not want to open state stores, because they didn't work in the Soviet Union and they haven't worked anywhere," he added, referring to Mamdani's plan to open one government-run grocery store in each New York City borough.
"The Democratic Socialists of America is a Marxist entity taking over a very old American party called the Democrat Party."
Contributing: Eduardo Cuevas, USA TODAY and Hannan Adely USA TODAY NETWORK