Political Shades of Gray: Why Liberal Centrism (still) Dictates Electoral Success

In light of Democrats’ electoral victories this past Tuesday came an anticipated mountain of post-elections political analysis. No doubt continuing for the next few weeks, the analysis is not concentrated to the contest between the Conservative and Liberal philosophies, rather, more so between the Progressive and Moderate Democrats who emerged as victors. The most notable of the former being Zohran Mamdani’s NYC mayoral win. What followed was the predicted debate: does Mamdani’s victory personify the Democrats’ new coming of age in today’s political landscape? To plausibly settle on an objective answer, there are a few variables that need to be looked at closely, divorced from one’s own ideological hang-ups.

First, there’s the in-depth break up of the household-income votes that contributed to Mamdani’s victory. The mayor-elect’s campaign was premised on the advocacy for the working-class and affordability. With this theme being the foundation of his campaign, his victory is unexpectedly mellowed by the fact Mamdani failed to acquire even 50% of voters who earned less than $50,000 annually. As any New Yorker would confirm, that salary is utter poverty when shacked up in the Big Apple. Mamdani also performed underwhelmingly for those earning from $50k-$99.9k, inching above half at 55% of the voter bloc. This paints an awkward picture of how New York’s lower and lower-middle class workers voted for the candidate whose campaign championed the “working class.” Ultimately the self-proclaimed Democrat Socialist, whose upbringing starkly contrasts the livelihoods of those he claimed to empathize with, won with just 50.4% of the vote. This result is a drastic reduction to his mayoral predecessors, De Blasio and Adams, who each obtained over 65% in their contests. However, an objective assessment would be remiss if we don’t account for Cuomo’s participation as an Independent following his defeat to Mamdani in the June Democrat primary.

Cuomo’s participation undoubtedly consumed a good piece out of Mamdani’s potential voter bloc. Although Cuomo’s own ambitions hindered the heights of Mamdani’s success, one thing is certain: any candidate of the Left would’ve emerged victorious as NYC’s mayor-elect. This is where many Mamdani enthusiasts, based in NYC and elsewhere, overestimate the reach and applicability of his victory. On the political spectrum of how Conservative or Liberal an electoral landscape may fall, with 0 representing the most Conservative and 10 being the most Liberal, NYC can resoundingly be pinned as a solid 8/8.5. The pitfall we’re witnessing many Mamdani supporters who work in media and political commentary fall into is misapplying Mamdani’s electoral viability to the broader American landscape. A more astute observer of NYC’s mayoral results would instead turn their gaze to moderate Democrats Abigail Spanberger and Mikie Sherrill’s victories in the Virginia and New Jersey governor races.

Despite the Old Dominion’s GOP running a weak candidate in current Lt. Governor Winsome Earle-Sears, with a near 15-point runaway victory, it’s plausible to predict Spanberger’s success would’ve remained unaltered. Spanberger saw an increase in Democrat voting in virtually every Virginia county, including traditionally Republican ones. The ultimate results revealed Spanberger soared past Earle-Sears by a whopping 15 points. When weighing her victory margin against Mamdanis’ in NYC, there lies a stark difference in each of the victors’ margins in relation to their respective political landscapes. As mentioned before, Mamdani secured his victory by a 9-point margin in a hyper-liberal metropolis, while his moderate Democrat counterpart achieved a 15-point lead in a blueish-purple Southern jurisdiction. Not only that, but the Old Dominion has a slimmer ratio of Democrat-over-Republican victories in their governor races than the Big Apple’s mayoral contests. This is where the voters in each of the respective political landscapes matter in how they compare to the broader, national appetite of voters. With NYC being a solid 8 on the political spectrum, it paints a clear picture of the metropolis’ average voter being further afield from the mean national voter. Compare this to voters in Virginia, a landscape that falls in the 6-7 range, demonstrating how Spanberger’s political philosophy resonates much more with the average national voter’s appetite.

But this reality wasn’t first put on display during Spanberger’s and Sherrill’s Tuesday blowout. Political Centrism, more specifically Liberal Centrism, has long proven to be the preference of the average national voter’s appetite. To further demonstrate this, it helps to examine the two biggest presidential electoral powerhouses since the 90’s: Clinton and Obama. With his 1992 victory, Clinton dominated the presidential race by obtaining 370 electoral votes, an impressive excess of 100 of the required threshold. If that wasn’t impressive enough, he would later raise this accolade in 96’ by securing 379 electoral votes. Clinton’s lofty isolation in the exclusive 320+ electoral club would come to end when Obama obtained 365 electoral votes in his 08’ campaign, and again with 335 in 2012. In the past 35 years, no presidential candidate apart from these two Classical Liberal candidates have accomplished such feats. While occasionally misclassified as a “Progressive” in his 08’ campaign, Obama himself has never identified as such. Past misclassifications were a result of far-left voters perception of Obama’s campaign slogan centered on “Hope.” However, this campaign slogan spoke not to the cultural-flashbait issues Progressives require candidates to espouse in order to meet the title’s criteria, but the adverse economic conditions wrought by Bush’s administration and its failed policies.

Spanberger and Sherrill’s victories display the enduring trust of the average national voter. These candidates ran on common-sense, non-ideologically driven platforms that proved to deeply resonate in jurisdictions whose voters reflect the national appetite. In contrast to NYC, Mamdani’s victory, while not negligible, was more the result of moderate and high-moderate earning Millennial professionals. Not the blue-collar working class whose margins of getting by in the Big Apple are far slimmer than their younger counterparts employed in tech, law, and consulting. However, this awkward contrast of voters who supported his campaign and the intended audience Mamdani’s campaign attempted to capture isn’t without a lesson or two. As more assessments come out regarding the analysis of Mamdani’s voters, a greater consensus is gradually being painted about just who that central crowd is. It’s not the lower spectrum of earners in NYC, nor swaths of the city’s working class. Rather, low six-figure income earners with advanced degrees who are disgruntled they aren’t at the stage of prosperity they hope to have arrived at, and thus, have protested against Capitalism by blindly voting for the candidate they saw as the antithesis of the system they quietly still strive to further advance in.

None of this is to say these types of voters don’t have genuine complaints, nor is it to say $100,000 is what is use to be. It most certainly isn’t, especially in places like NYC. I understand the complaints of Mamdani’s main voter base because I myself am within that base. However, the immense irony between the people Mamdani’s campaign purported to support and the voters his campaign ultimately captured reveals a hard pill to swallow: champagne socialists whose policies allegedly address the issues they themselves never experienced will always attract a voter base different from the ones they alleged to support. In this case, Mamdani’s campaign found more success in voters who outweighed its intended audience in income, education, and privilege. This was largely due to low six-figure 20-40 year olds feelings of resentment towards Capitalism, not a sincere belief and inspiration born of Mamdani’s policies. Regardless, one thing that is certain is that as the New Year inches ever closer, 2026 will be a year of great intrigue in the city that never sleeps.