A Gallup poll released on Monday found that 66% of Democrats view socialism more favorably than capitalism, compared with 38% of Independents and 14% of Republicans.
Citing these surprising results, a reporter asked Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) if he thought this was a messaging issue for Democrats.
Fetterman replied, “I literally was in a former communist nation, and I asked that [question]. I said, ‘Some people in my party, some of the lefties are talking about socialism now. What do you think?’”
Recounting one of his conversations, he said, “He’s like, ‘That’s the worst thing ever. You would never want to live here. I’ve lived through that kind of a thing. You know, you’re going to need a reality check if you ever adopt any of those things. You know, like, you are morons. … It was a nightmare for us, and now we are a free market nation.'”
Asked which country he had visited, the senator said, “It was Croatia. And they’re just like, ‘Thank God, we’ve been freed from that.'”
Fetterman added, “They are just mystified why we’re even having that conversation in our nation.”
We’ve watched with amazement as the radical ideology of the Democratic Party’s far-left fringe slowly took root in the party’s mainstream. While many Americans were shocked by the socialist platform of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in 2016, four years later most of the candidates for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination proudly supported his ideas.
After former President Joe Biden took office, the party’s gradual drift to the left accelerated to the point where the Democratic Party has become almost unrecognizable.
The popularity of Zohran Mamdani, the current frontrunner in New York City’s mayoral race, speaks volumes. For all intents and purposes, while he describes himself as a Democratic socialist, Mamdani is a communist.
The antisemitic, anti-ICE Mamdani’s radical proposals, which include free city buses, free child care, rent freezes, and city-owned grocery stores, would run the city into the ground. He equates capitalism to “theft,” and insists these initiatives would be funded by a 2% wealth tax on the top 1% of taxpayers in the state and an increase in the state’s corporate tax rate from 7.25% to 11.5%.
Sounds great, doesn’t it?
But New Yorkers currently bear one of the heaviest tax burdens in the nation. This has already caused many wealthy individuals and corporations to flee the state. In reality, Mamdani’s proposals are unworkable and would plunge the city into its worst economic crisis since the 1970s.
Following Mamdani’s victory in the June Democratic primary, the editors at The Washington Post provided his supporters with a reality check.
Such a massive minimum wage would depress low-skilled employment. His rent freeze would reduce the housing supply and decrease its quality. Cutting bus fares would leave a transit funding hole that, unless somehow filled, would erode service. Meanwhile, the grocery business operates on thin margins, and his plan for city-run stores would probably lead to fewer options, poor service and shortages, as privately run stores closed rather than try to compete with city-subsidized shops.
Yet all of this is lost on voters captivated by the youthful politician and his rosy vision for the city’s future.
This newfound enthusiasm for socialism, especially among young voters, stems from a mistaken understanding of what it truly is. Few could likely even define the term, seeing only the promise of “free everything.”
Anyone who has lived under the boot of socialism, as the Croatians have, knows how it ends. All four of my grandparents immigrated to the U.S. in the 1910s from Albania. When one of my grandmothers was a young girl in Romania, she watched a government official walk into her family’s kitchen and shoot her father dead.
In May, the Cato Institute’s Michael Chapman reacted to a survey that showed 62% of Americans aged 18–29 held a “favorable view” of socialism and 34% said the same about communism. He wrote:
This is shocking given that communism is responsible for 100 million deaths worldwide and is rooted in socialism, the same philosophy that spawned both Mussolini’s fascism and Hitler’s National Socialism. To favor socialism is to flirt with tyranny.
Earlier this week, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) joined Fox News’ Sean Hannity to discuss the rising popularity of socialism in the U.S. He said that “socialism is for morons” and called it “an equal sharing of misery.”
He then made an excellent point. “Ask yourself this question. When the Berlin Wall fell, who ran to which side?”
The silver lining of a Mamdani victory in November is that Americans would see socialism up close and personal. And they probably won’t be too happy with the results.
Elizabeth writes commentary for Legal Insurrection and The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Please follow Elizabeth on X or LinkedIn.
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