Few topics evoke socialist and communist narratives faster than government officials forcibly confiscating the property of private citizens.
Although there are already concerns about eminent domain and civil asset forfeiture, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani amplified them when he rolled out his socialist plan for dealing with so-called “negligent” landlords in the Big Apple.
According to News.com.au:
New York’s socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani put bad landlords on notice, pledging to help “transfer ownership” of chronically neglected buildings to tenants as part of his sprawling, new housing plan.
ADVERTISEMENTThe 34-year-old social media sensation became New York City’s first Muslim and first South Asian mayor after a landslide victory last year, on a platform of making the city more liveable and affordable.
Just like Australia, a cost of living and a housing crisis have emerged as potent political issues in the Big Apple.
Apartment rentals in Manhattan topped US$5000 ($7000) a month for the first time in April as vacancy rates tumbled to six-year lows, according to US real estate firm Corcoran.
Now, Mr Mamdani has taken drastic action on fixing the city’s astronomical housing costs under a plan called “Block by Block”.
“When necessary we will take aggressive legal action to remove negligent owners and property managers,” he said.
Mamdani’s plan received widespread criticism on social media:
"Bad landlords" will include anyone whose property the communists wish to confiscate. pic.twitter.com/bo4tBsNOsd
— Interesting Times (@FreeTheBee22) May 26, 2026
Miami realtors watching Mamdani's plan to "transfer ownership" from landlords pic.twitter.com/N6f0F6BA1P
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) May 26, 2026
1. Private entity buys building
2. Government restricts the amount you can increase rent, making upgrades and maintenance unaffordable
3. Gov calls you a deadbeat and takes your building
4.Profit!— Le Poilu (@Class0305) May 26, 2026
The New York Post’s Miranda Divine offered her historical take on why the program is doomed to failure:
Wherever in history his Marxist prescriptions have been applied, misery and tyranny follow — from Stalin to Mao to Pol Pot, 100 million deaths were caused by communist regimes in the 20th century alone.
This is a lesson the 34-year-old nepo baby appears to have missed — or doesn’t care to heed because the revolution is never about improving the lot of the downtrodden. It’s about seizing power.
Mamdani, having won office on the Democratic Socialists of America ticket, told us what he thought of America in his inaugural address: “We will replace the frigidity of rugged individualism with the warmth of collectivism,” he said.
By collectivism, he means the state must seize the means of production — the factories, land, businesses, property and capital that generate wealth.
This requires total economic control, which is impossible without total social control.
The result is always one-party rule, secret police, censorship and tyranny.
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