We’ve been wondering how it is that political newcomer Zohran Mamdani was able to raise and spend $12.7 million on his mayoral campaign. One major contributing factor was the city’s lavish system of public matching funds, a long-time cause of left-wing groups.

Mamdani collected $8 in taxpayer money for every $1 he raised in small donations.

Another factor is ranked-choice voting (RCV), which voters approved in 2019 after a slick campaign financed by figures such as Jonathan Soros, son of billionaire George Soros. Mark Penn, who was Bill Clinton’s pollster, laments that “the left has engineered voting rules in New York City” using RCV to have “left-leaning voters get a second vote, but not applying it in the general election, making it hard for moderates to coalesce around an alternative.

Mamdani financed his campaign with taxpayer dollars and we predict this will be a new crusade for the progressives around the country.