When the Base Stays Home, the Fringe Takes Power

I come from a proud Democratic family. My grandmother, Bessie Fried, and great-aunt, Sarah Schlessinger, helped form the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America in Chicago—a defining union for immigrant women who fought for the dignity of labor and the promise of America. That legacy was always held up in my house like Torah on Simchat Torah: sacred, heavy, and joyously paraded around.

So you can imagine the awkward silence at Thanksgiving the year I turned 18 and registered as a Republican.

My father announced it like a family scandal, and to my grandmother—the woman who literally marched for better working conditions—it felt like betrayal. Over time, my views evolved. Today, I’m a registered Democrat. But if I’m honest, I’m fiscally conservative, socially more liberal, and increasingly disillusioned with a political system that rewards noise over nuance. I imagine I’ll become an Independent, not because I’ve stopped caring, but because both parties seem intent on pulling further from the center—and from reality.

Nowhere was that more obvious than this week’s Democratic primary in New York City.

In a city of over 3.2 million registered Democrats, just over a million voted. Two-thirds didn’t bother. Into that vacuum stepped Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist who won roughly 432,000 votes—about 43%—and headlines for his slogan “Globalize the Intifada.” Meanwhile, Andrew Cuomo, forced to resign after credible allegations from 11 women, took second.

What does it say about a party that these were the final two standing?

More troubling than Mamdani’s policies—fantastical economics, sure, but that’s par for the course—is the cultural performance behind his rise. His strongest base wasn’t the working class he claims to represent. It was the overwhelmingly white, college-educated, socioeconomically privileged class—the same demographic that thinks replacing “Latino” with “Latinx” is progress.

Let’s pause there.

I’m Latino. Nobody in the community asked to be called Latinx. It didn’t come from the community. It was hoisted onto us by a well-meaning but completely out-of-touch segment of progressives who believe they understand us better than we understand ourselves. This isn’t solidarity. It’s cosplay.

And that’s what’s happening now. A wave of disenchanted, mostly white progressives—perhaps angsty, perhaps guilty, perhaps just eager to be part of something—are engaging in a kind of political dress-up. They invoke revolutions they didn’t live through, in struggles they don’t belong to, for communities they don’t deeply understand. They speak of the working class, but don’t live among them. They speak of Palestinians, but not to Jews. They say they are “uplifting voices,” but mostly it’s their own.

And this election proves it. The working class didn’t turn out for Mamdani—because they know better. They’ve heard the promises before. Free everything, no cost. More recess, no homework. It’s the same speech the kid gave in fourth grade when he ran for class president. Adults should know better. Apparently, many don’t.

Let’s talk about that slogan—“Globalize the Intifada.” I don’t care how much you dress it up in academic language. I don’t care how many footnotes you attach. That phrase is triggering and dangerous. Not just for Jews, but for anyone who’s lived through violence, whose family has been on the receiving end of “uprisings” that erase nuance and target civilians.

I’m tired of the game where antisemitism has to be decoded like some encrypted message. When Jewish people say something is antisemitic, maybe—just maybe—we should be taken at our word. And if someone insists, “I’m not against Jews, just Zionists,” we need to stop pretending that’s a sophisticated political critique. It’s not. It’s a way to draw a line around acceptable Jewish identity—one where pride, peoplehood, and connection to Israel are stripped out. It’s erasure, not enlightenment.

This isn’t just a Jewish issue. And it’s not just a left or right issue either. Right-wing antisemitism is overt and cruel. Left-wing antisemitism is insidious—cloaked in credentials, often unrecognized by its own adherents. And Jews caught in the middle? Shellshocked. Unsure where to go. Too many are choosing silence or retreat. Some shift right and say, “I told you so.” Others cling harder to the progressive tent, hoping to be spared by being “the good Jew.” Neither is sustainable. Neither is safe.

What we need is engagement.

We need Jews, especially Jewish Democrats, to get back in the game—not just to protect ourselves, but to protect the soul of our politics. That means voting in primaries. It means running for school boards and city council. It means having the hard conversations with our neighbors, our co-workers, our fellow activists. It means being in proximity with those who don’t yet understand—and maybe don’t want to—but who can’t be left alone to define us.

When we disappear from the conversation, the fringe doesn’t just talk louder—it writes the script. When we stay home, someone else decides what it means to be liberal, or Jewish, or American.

My grandmother didn’t form a union because she waited for the ideal candidate. She organized, she showed up, and she spoke out—whether the moment was ready or not.

So no, this election isn’t just about Zohran Mamdani. It’s about whether we believe in politics as performance or politics as responsibility. Whether we define progress by hashtags or by who we bring to the table. Whether we let others tell our story, or tell it ourselves.

And most of all, it’s about whether we still believe in showing up—even when we’re disillusioned. Especially when we’re disillusioned.

Because the second we stop, the cosplay becomes reality. And the people we claim to speak for? They get left behind.