Michael Goodwin: The DSA is teaching Mamdani a lesson about leftist loyalties
As noisy elements of Mayor Mamdani’s socialist rabble accuse him of insufficiently hating the police and NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch, and of being a “sell out” and “traitor” to Palestinians, the mayor suddenly finds himself in a very strange position.He is by far the most radical anti-police, anti-Israel and tax-the-rich mayor in Gotham’s history.That he is now a target of the movement he led into City Hall highlights the absurdity of the moment — and the movement.Blinded by his rise, some activists in his camp appear to believe their sudden hold on power is absolute and there is no need to recognize or negotiate with those New Yorkers who hold opposing views.Among Mamdani’s in-house tormentors, Darializa Avila Chevalier stands out.
She won her Democratic primary to unseat long-term congressional incumbent Adriano Espaillat last summer, but was little known in the upper Manhattan and Bronx district until Mamdani endorsed her.Failing to recognize any limits on her power or his, she is turning her nasty attacks on him.In her blinkered view, his main sin is not firing Tisch.Her blow-up followed a recent incident in which ICE agents shot and wounded a wanted illegal immigrant with a criminal record who was trying to escape in his car, with a child in the back seat.“Last night, the NYPD and Commissioner Tisch violated the spirit, if not the letter, of our sanctuary city policies and fueled the Trump Administration’s attempt to demonize our communities,” Chevalier wrote in a rant on social media, where she demanded that Tisch get the boot.City Hall was not amused, and regarded her attack as back-stabbing by a candidate who wanted and needed the mayor’s support to win.
As one aide described it to The Post, even before she wins the general election and takes office, Chevalier’s screed “is a direct undermining of Mamdani.”The history of her ilk is that, after being relegated to the sidelines, they get a taste of the power they lusted for a...