House Democrats take notes and Bernie Sanders offers advice

Days after Eric Adams won the New York City mayoral primary four years ago, he was invited to Washington by then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi to speak to the House Democratic caucus, touted by the chair of the House Democrats’ campaign arm as a model for campaigns around the country, and welcomed at Joe Biden’s White House.

Zohran Mamdani’s trip to Washington after his own primary victory lasted about four hours. There were no meetings with senior Democratic leaders.

The 33-year-old assemblyman and democratic socialist had breakfast Wednesday with Democratic members of Congress before a private strategy session with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, a key endorser before his stunning primary victory. But party leaders and many swing-district lawmakers kept their distance from Mamdani, worried about his policy ideas and Republican plans to make him a national foil.

Sanders urged his now-protégé to be firm in calling for Democratic leaders to rally behind him but also to more carefully address what he’s said about Israel.

First was a breakfast meeting arranged by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who had also endorsed him before the June 24 primary. The conversation around the platters, according to multiple people in the room, involved roughly 40 House Democrats asking and taking notes about Mamdani’s message of affordability. Mamdani joked at one point that in terms of getting support, he’s gone “from being the hunter to the hunted.”

California Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove, still munching on a spinach pastry, was all smiles as she headed to her car. She said her big takeaway was about “not being distracted by the culture wars Republicans inevitably want to stoke.”

Most New York Democrats skipped the meeting, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who has not endorsed Mamdani but plans to meet with him Friday in Brooklyn. Some members joked privately to CNN that their invitations must have gotten lost. Some blamed scheduling conflicts.

A half-dozen political trackers — one carrying her fluffy brown dog as she held her phone up to take videos — hounded House Democrats on their way out about condoning the phrase “globalize the intifada,” which Mamdani has moved to distance himself from even as he faces allegations that he hasn’t sufficiently condemned antisemitism.

But even as members like California Rep. Mark Takano walked out of seeing Mamdani by already embracing some of his far-left ideas, arguing, “there’s not a lot of difference between a government-run grocery store and some sort of co-op,” Rep. Tom Suozzi, who represents a swing district centered on suburban Long Island, was blunt in an interview with CNN.

“I’m a Democratic capitalist, I’m not a democratic socialist — and I think that Mamdani’s philosophy of raising taxes … would make New York City less attractive than it is right now,” he said.

Asked why she wasn’t standing with Mamdani or offering him up to campaign around the country the way her predecessor did with Adams four years ago, the House Democrats’ campaign chair, Washington Rep. Suzan DelBene, said in a statement that voters in swing districts want “local leaders” talking about lowering costs and pushing back on Republicans.

“Voters in places like Arizona and Iowa aren’t thinking about who the mayor of New York City may be,” DelBene said.

What Sanders told Mamdani

Perhaps Mamdani’s biggest meeting of the day was on the Senate side of Capitol Hill – not with Chuck Schumer, the minority leader and senior senator from Brooklyn, or with Kirsten Gillibrand, the chair of the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm and the state’s junior senator. Neither has met with him. Both have pushed off talk about endorsing him.

Sanders, a Brooklyn native, was eager to welcome Mamdani for their first meeting after several phone calls, including a congratulatory one after his primary win. The closest that they’ve come in person before was at Sanders’ October 2019 rally in Queens marking his comeback after a heart attack, which Mamdani used as an early organizing opportunity for his first assembly campaign.

A person familiar with their conversation, speaking on condition of anonymity, disclosed some of Sanders’ advice to Mamdani.

The eagerness of some wealthy opponents to his candidacy to attack his campaign via super PACs and independent expenditures, Sanders told him, was a topic worth keeping attention on. Call out the oligarchs, the senator said, but also be prepared not to unilaterally disarm via his own PAC.

As for the other Democrats who’ve been holding out, Sanders said, there should be no supplication, even to Jeffries and Schumer. They should be supporting him, Sanders said, since he’s the Democratic nominee. According to the person familiar with his comments, Sanders noted he did the same when he lost the Democratic presidential primaries to Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden.

Sanders, who is Jewish, urged Mamdani to be cautious about how he approaches talking about Israel. Both are critics of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s handling of its war in Gaza.

Ahead of the trip, Mamdani told business leaders in New York that he would discourage the use of the phrase “globalize the intifada.” Mamdani, who has not used the phrase himself, has said he believes the phrase to be a rallying cry for Palestinian human rights and refused to condemn its use when asked during his primary campaign.

According to the person familiar with their conversation, Sanders told Mamdani he had to do a better job explaining that his criticism is not antisemitic and to not let himself seem like he’s minimizing the fear Jews in New York and elsewhere feel from the threat of hate against them.

Afterward, they talked outside for photos showing them with big laughing smiles. Sanders posted them and Mamdani quickly reshared them.

“Bernie may be the great Senator from Vermont,” Mamdani wrote. “But he’s Brooklyn through and through.”

Jeffries and Mamdani will soon meet in NYC

A Jeffries spokesman declined comment on why the House Democratic leader hadn’t extended the same kind of invitation to speak to the whole caucus that Adams received four years ago. The two still don’t know each other much, and Jeffries has been holding off in saying much about him until they meet.

Asked how the candidate felt about not getting an invitation, a spokesperson for Mamdani pointed to comments earlier this week saying that he’s looking forward to their Friday meeting and that they had already connected about working together to tackle what he called the “twin crises” in the city of fighting for affordability and standing up for immigrants’ rights.

Several House Democrats pointed out that it wasn’t as if their embrace four years ago of Adams worked out so well. Adams is now seeking reelection as an independent after dropping out of the Democratic primary. He faced a corruption indictment that the Trump administration dropped in its first months.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the Washington state congresswoman and former chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, had her own private meeting with Mamdani on Wednesday. They talked about help campaigning and some policy issues. What struck Jayapal, she said later, was how the younger staffers in her office and in the hallways responded to seeing him, how many came up to meet him or take a photo.

“Obviously everyone has to go through their own processes, but people have to recognize what an incredible campaign he ran and what an incredible campaigner he is,” she told CNN. “And I hope everyone gets on board quickly.”

Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, the only Republican member of Congress from New York City, was also happy Mamdani was in the capital. She argued Democrats going anywhere near him was a tell about their own fears.

“The radical left and the socialist wing of the Democratic Party is moving everybody to the left, and these folks who are supposedly centrists are afraid of their shadow so they’re just going along for self-preservation,” she said.

CNN’s Manu Raju contributed to this report.

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