The Mamdani Moment and the Crisis of the “Left”

On June 24, 2025, Zohran Mamdani won the Democratic primary for mayor of New York City. His defeat of the Democratic Party old guard Andrew Cuomo has been hailed as a victory for socialism in America. Social media has been flooded with celebration. DSA apparatchiks are gloating. The only real victory was for the illusion that the system can be reformed.

Mamdani is a gifted politician. He has spoken courageously on Palestine, organized tenants and workers into his voting base, and has roots in the popular sectors. However, he is still a part of the machinery of the Democratic Party: a party of landlords, war profiteers, billionaires, the ruling capitalist class. 

New York City's working class is hit by extreme poverty

Something is very rotten in the heart of the American Dream. In 2025, when the total net worth of the 10 richest Americans is $1.774 trillion, the working class of the largest metropolis in the U.S. faces the consequences of capitalist barbarism.

A new report by a research group at Columbia University and Robin Hood, an anti-poverty group, reveals a brutal reality: One in four New Yorkers lives in extreme poverty. This means that the city's poverty rate is nearly double the national average.

KKE General Secretary Koutsoumbas visited New York

Dimitris Koutsoumbas with ALU President Chris Smalls

Dimitris Koutsoumbas, the General Secretary of the CC of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), was the keynote speaker of a political and cultural event organized by the Party's Friends Club in New York on Saturday 27 April. The event, attended by dozens of members of the Greek Diaspora who live and work in the U.S, was held at the Kefalos Society of America in Astoria.

The opening speech was made by Kostas Lourdas on behalf of the KKE Friends Club in New York, while interventions were also made by KKE candidates for European Parliament, Lefteris Nikolaou Alavanos and Kostas Gouliamos, who accompanied Koutsoumbas in his North American trip. 

 

Enjoying Capitalism? New York City's homeless reach 80,000, highest since Great Depression

New York City, the metropolis of U.S capitalism, hasn't been unaffected by the crisis of the capitalist system. The homeless population in the most populous city in the United States, has surged in recent years to 80,000 people, according to The Bowery Mission, a 150-year-old agency serving the hungry and homeless, citing federal data.

"Homelessness in New York City has reached the highest levels since the Great Depression of the 1930s," Fox News on Wednesday quoted the Coalition for the Homeless as saying.

Shameful billboard against Victory Day in New York's Times Square

The shameful billboard in New York City.

A shameful multimedia billboard appeared in Times Square, New York City, on Monday 9 May, calling the victory of the Soviet Red Army over the Nazis a "day of shame"! 

The billboard, paid by the campaign "Unite with Ukraine", was referring to Russia and the ongoing imperialist war in Ukraine. 

"MAY 9, RUSSIAN VICTORY SHAME DAY" was the message written in the billboard, provoking numerous negative comments in social media. 

Greek-American resistance fighter Kostas Lekkas dies

Comrade Lekkas in his 100th birthday.

Kostas Lekkas, also known as Constantine "Gus" Lekas, a fighter of the Greek Resistance during World War II and a long-time member of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), died in New York aged 102.

Comrade Lekkas was born on 7 July 1919 in Elizabeth, New Jersey. At the age of one, alongside his mother and siblings, he moved to Greece, settling at a village in Peloponnese. His father stayed in New York in order to work for a period of time but he was later killed in a car accident.

Lenin's bronze statue to be erected in Manhattan, New York City mayor confirms

A 16 feet tall bronze statue of Vladimir Lenin will be erected in Manhattan's Union Square, NYC mayor Bill de Blasio confirmed in a press release today.

The effigy was made in 1934 in Leningrad and was acquired in 1992 by a Ukrainian American businessman following an auction in Berlin.

"The city of New York is proud and pleased to honor the legendary leader of the 1917 October Revolution and founder of the first workers' state in the world, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin", reads a statement by the mayor's office, adding that "despite the fierce reaction by anti-communist and right-wing organizations and groups, the statue will be unveiled in a ceremony on May 1, 2021". 

Celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution in New York City

On November 7, 2017 Marxists in New York City will come together to commemorate a revolutionary centenary.  One hundred years to the day since the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution,  US activists and scholars will assemble to celebrate  a socialist revolution which, more than any other, defined the 20th century and still impacts our century, the 21st.

The Bolshevik Revolution stunned a despairing world weary of the mass slaughter in the trenches of the First World War. It sent shock waves through all people’s movements around the world, not least in our country.

The Great Lie of the "American Dream": Capitalism perpetuates poverty in the USA

According to a New York Daily News report, earlier this month, the number of homeless people living on New York City's streets surged by nearly 40% this year, according to the results of an annual count. "There were 3,892 homeless people on the street, the Homeless Outreach Population Estimate done in February found — up 39% since last year, when the number was 2,794, according to results released Wednesday" the report writes. 

New York City is of course an example which highlights the great problem of homelessness that affects the United States of America. According to the official data published by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) more than half a million people - a quarter of them being children- were homeless during 2015.