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      Nobody likes a sore loser – but Cuomo declines to bow out gracefully

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      At least Andrew Cuomo’s last act in politics came at a fancy venue.While Cuomo held his election night party at the Ziegfeld Ballroom, which describes itself in its own words as a “luxury event venue built on Broadway’s golden era”, it didn’t feel like a golden era on Tuesday, when Cuomo didn’t so much bow out of the race as aggressively posture and snort his way out of it.The night started on an ominous tone, with (Sending Out an) SOS by Rhetta Young blaring from Ziegfeld’s speakers. Was the Cuomo campaign sending out plaintive messages through music? If so, it was a confusing message: the next song was Blame It on the Boogie by the Jacksons.Cuomo had been well behind in the polls, but there was a relatively optimistic vibe at the party, as people enjoyed the free bar and watched huge TV screens. Cuomo’s name was displayed on tables, banners and, intriguingly, on little electronic screens above the men’s urinals.But the mood wouldn’t last. Zohran Mamdani’s victory was announced at 9.35pm, prompting dismay in the ballroom.“I feel very disappointed. I’m just staring at the TV hoping that the numbers will change, just in disbelief,” said Tusha Diaz, from the Bronx. She carried on staring at the TV. If anything, the numbers got worse. With 90% of the votes in on Tuesday night, Mamdani had more than 50% of the vote; Cuomo languished at 41%.“I don’t want to cry in front of people, but I feel heartbroken,” Diaz said. She voted for Cuomo because he was a “great governor” who did a lot for the Bronx, she said. She wasn’t optimistic about Mamdani.“I feel I don’t know what’s gonna happen to New York City. I mean, I have two grandchildren. I don’t know what they’re gonna expect with this guy, you know, with all these radical ideas that he had. Will they be safe?”Anthony T Jones was literally in disbelief as Mamdani was announced as the winner.“I feel wonderful. I think hope is still alive,” he said, as the words “Zohran Mamdani wins race for mayor” rolled across the TV screen.Informed by the Guardian that every major news organization had announced Mamdani as the winner, Jones snapped back to reality quickly, but remained defiant.“I’m not disappointed at all. No, because Cuomo ran a great campaign,” he said. Jones added of Cuomo, who is 67 years old: “He’s still a young man.”Jones and Diaz voiced their concerns about Mamdani with more grace than Cuomo did throughout an inflammatory campaign, but in some quarters the mood became unsavory.“I feel excited to be moving to Long Beach, because there’s no fucking way I’m staying in the city with that piece-of-shit jihadi communist as mayor,” a woman called Felice said, combining Islamophobia with inaccuracy.“I already have a real-estate broker. I already got approval for a loan. I already picked out four places I’m gonna go see on Monday.”Felice, who was drinking wine, added that New Yorkers had voted for Mamdani because “there’s a lot of transplants and young people and foreigners who voted, who bought his bullshit”.Unfortunately there wasn’t time to hear much more from Felice, who said she was a teacher, because a full-throated chant broke out.“Shame on Sliwa! Shame on Sliwa!” dozens of people at the front of the room jeered, apparently blaming Sliwa, a Republican, for Cuomo’s loss. At the bar, one man told his friend it was “embarrassing”.It certainly wasn’t good. By 10.30pm Should I Stay or Should I Go by the Clash was blasting over the speakers. Many people were choosing the latter. Waitstaff were packing down the free bar.With people clearly losing interest, campaign staff sprang into action. They hurried the remaining crowd to the front of the stage. It was time for Cuomo to appear, and give a gracious concession speech.Except it wasn’t.Cuomo immediately tried to cast his loss as a success, telling the crowd: “This campaign was to contest the philosophies that are shaping the Democratic party, the future of this city and the future of this country.” He said that 50% of New Yorkers had not voted for Mamdani’s agenda, and claimed his own campaign, which has seen him accused of racism and Islamophobia, was about “unity”.Cuomo then trotted out some misinterpretations of Mamdani’s political positions, concluding: “We are headed down a dangerous, dangerous road.“We will not make the NYPD the enemy,” Cuomo said. “We will not tolerate any behavior that fans the flames of antisemitism,” he added, returning to a familiar theme from his campaign.After 10 minutes of Cuomo claiming Mamdani was going to drive New York into a post-apocalyptic nightmare, it was hardly surprising that there was a round of lusty boos and loud jeers when the former governor finally mentioned his opponent by name.But Cuomo appeared shocked by the anger. He suddenly adopted an air of contrition that was very much absent from his campaign.“No, that is not right, and that is not us,” he told his supporters.And yet.Cuomo recently chuckled along after a radio host said Mamdani would “cheer” another 9/11-style terrorist attack. In October, Cuomo was widely condemned after posting an AI-generated anti-Mamdani ad that featured a slew of racist stereotypes. Cuomo has labelled Mamdani an “extremist”, and claimed New York “will not survive” him as mayor.Perhaps Cuomo meant it when he said “that is not us”. But as he exits New York politics, surely forever, the evidence is stacked against him. More

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      ‘A historic victory’: our panel reacts to Zohran Mamdani’s triumph | Panel

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      Osita Nwanevu: ‘a historic victory of the American left’Set aside for a moment the interminable back and forth over whether Zohran Mamdani represents the future of the Democratic party. This much is beyond dispute: Mamdani represents the immediate future of New York City, America’s largest town and the financial capital of the world.His win, just as indisputably, is a historic victory for the American left, which has been buoyed in spirit and resolve since Mamdani’s underdog victory in the mayoral primary. In New York, it will have a measure of the governing power its own pessimists and its dogged opponents within the Democratic party alike have doubted it was capable of winning.And the country at large will be watching the city closely ⁠– less out of a belief in the coming apocalypse only Republicans are convinced the city is in for than out of curiosity as to whether Mamdani can actually deliver on the promise of his campaign and manage the city at least as well as an ordinary Democrat could.But the challenges sure to face him as he works to prove himself shouldn’t overshadow the significance of what he’s already done. An organizing effort that will be studied for many years to come, highly disciplined messaging, a moral stand on the genocide in Gaza that has shaken up the Democratic party’s internal politics on confronting Israel, a level of charisma and creativity unseen on the American political scene since at least Barack Obama, a conceptual bridge between the material politics of affordability and a politics of values, speaking to what it means to be a New Yorker and an American ⁠– Mamdani’s run has offered us lessons that ought to be put to work well beyond New York City’s limits.

      Osita Nwanevu is a columnist at Guardian US and the author of The Right of the People: Democracy and the Case for a New American Founding
      Judith Levine: why are Democrats running from Mamdani?The last door on my canvassing turf, a Brooklyn brownstone, looked like a gut renovation: minimalist plantings, spot lighting. The woman welcomed me. Her vote for Mamdani “felt historic”, she said. And her husband? “Are you voting for Zohran?” she shouted into the house. The reply: “Just don’t raise my taxes.”There it was. Israel and Islamophobia moved voters one way or another. But in the end, it was pure class warfare.The city’s richest man donated $8m to defeat Mamdani. The New York Post predicted that Wall Street would move to Dallas if the democratic socialist won. “This election is a choice between capitalism and socialism,” Cuomo declared.Mamdani’s platform, “affordability”, is hardly radical. Indeed, Americans support what he promises: free childcare and raising taxes on millionaires. Gallup recently found that Democrats view socialism more positively than capitalism – 66 to 42%.Still, if not quite socialist, the spirit of city hall will be different: pro-immigrant, pro-tenant, pro-government, anti-billionaire. Last week, three Democratic leaders told the press they wouldn’t let the Republicans use 42 million hungry food stamp beneficiaries to force an end to the shutdown, letting healthcare subsidies lapse to bankroll tax giveaways to the rich. Then Chuck Schumer hurried out, ducking a question about whether he supported Mamdani.“A city where everyone can live with security and dignity.” Mamdani’s message, applied nationally, was the same as the message Democrats were trying to push at their press conference. In New York, it prevailed. Why are Democrats running from this gifted messenger, who embodies the only vital future for a moribund party?

      Judith Levine is Brooklyn-based journalist, essayist and author of five books. Her Substack is Today in Fascism
      Malaika Jabali: ‘flicker of hope amid the gloom’If conservatives wanted to fearmonger about the specter of socialism to keep Mamdani from winning New York City’s mayoral race, it couldn’t have come at a worse time.Donald Trump, billionaire president and self-appointed foil to the new mayor-elect of New York City, has been playing games with the country’s food stamp program as families show up in droves to food bank lines. Authoritarianism, expensive healthcare and unaffordable housing have threatened the average American household, and the country’s elites have cruelly mocked them.New York City residents have felt this acutely. The city’s voters cited cost of living, and housing in particular, as the top concern as they exited the voting booths Tuesday.Mamdani’s popularity will be attributed to his social media savvy and connection with young voters. But the bigger factor is that Mamdani tapped into their economic anxieties in ways the Democratic establishment has failed to while it stubbornly commits to a neoliberal agenda.In the years ahead, Mamdani will not only face antagonism from Trump but the antipathy of his own party, home to Democratic leaders such as Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, none of whom endorsed him in the race. But for one night at least, New Yorkers can celebrate this flicker of hope amid the gloom.

      Malaika Jabali is a columnist at Guardian US
      Bhaskar Sunkara: don’t chalk this up to ‘viral moments’I spent most of tonight thinking about how improbable this once seemed. Mamdani – a democratic socialist – is the next mayor of New York City.Zohran is an incredibly gifted communicator and he built a campaign team that matched that talent. But it would be a mistake to chalk up his victory to charisma or viral moments. It was built on knocking on doors, talking about rent, wages and the everyday costs that define people’s lives. It was a reminder that the left wins when it shows that democratic socialists are laser-focused on meeting human needs, not fighting culture wars.They tried to make the race about Israel. They tried to paint Mamdani as an extremist or a threat. But he refused the bait, staying disciplined and universal in his appeal – talking about housing, transit and affordability with the same clarity to every audience. It was politics rooted in working-class issues, not posture.Does this victory matter beyond New York? Absolutely. The style will differ in deep red districts, but the lesson is the same: build politics around the pocketbook issues workers care about most.

      Bhaskar Sunkara is the president of the Nation, the founding editor of Jacobin, and the author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in An Era of Extreme Inequalities More

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      US elections 2025 live: Americans go to the polls, with elections in New York City, New Jersey, Virginia and California

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      We are restarting our live coverage of US politics.Americans are heading to the polls on Tuesday in a number of elections that will show where support for Donald Trump’s Republicans stands and whether Democrats have cause for hope.Much attention in the US and abroad will be on Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic candidate for mayor, who is facing off against former governor Andrew Cuomo, who is running as an independent after losing the Democratic primary against Mamdani earlier this year, and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa.In California, voters could tear up their congressional maps to turn Republican districts into Democratic ones in an effort to counter gains the GOP is expected to make elsewhere after the party gerrymandered maps in states including Texas and Missouri.Virginia and New Jersey will hold high-stakes gubernatorial and legislative elections that may serve as a proxy for voters’ views on the president.We will bring you the latest news and reactions as election day unfolds.New York City has probably the most high-profile mayor in the country, and in June, Mamdani, a 34-year-old state assemblyman and democratic socialist, won the Democratic primary in an upset over former governor Andrew Cuomo.Though Cuomo remains in the race as an independent, polls show Mamdani with a formidable lead, and if he wins, his brand of left-wing politics will be given a prominent platform.On Monday, the candidates for New York City mayor spent a frantic final day campaigning across the city. Zohran Mamdani, the frontrunner, whose campaign has been centered on affordability, has maintained a commanding lead, with most polls showing him leading by double digits.The 34-year-old Democratic nominee, a state assembly member from Queens, began his Monday walking across the Brooklyn Bridge at sunrise. He was joined by the New York attorney general, Letitia James; the city comptroller, Brad Lander; as well as several city and state lawmakers and throngs of supporters.He finished the walk at city hall, where he told a news conference that “we stand on the verge of ushering in a new day for our city”, and was scheduled to join volunteers before they began a final day of canvassing in Astoria, Queens, later in the day.Andrew Cuomo, the former Democratic governor running as an independent after losing to Mamdani in June’s primary, kicked off the last day of the campaign with an interview on the Spanish-language radio station La Mega before heading to a campaign stop in the Bronx. He reportedly planned to visit all five boroughs on Monday.Running a distant third has been Curtis Sliwa, the Republican candidate and founder of the Guardian Angels, a non-profit organization dedicated to “unarmed crime prevention”. According to social media, Sliwa spent part of Monday morning at Coney Island and was set to host a tele-rally in the evening.We are restarting our live coverage of US politics.Americans are heading to the polls on Tuesday in a number of elections that will show where support for Donald Trump’s Republicans stands and whether Democrats have cause for hope.Much attention in the US and abroad will be on Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic candidate for mayor, who is facing off against former governor Andrew Cuomo, who is running as an independent after losing the Democratic primary against Mamdani earlier this year, and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa.In California, voters could tear up their congressional maps to turn Republican districts into Democratic ones in an effort to counter gains the GOP is expected to make elsewhere after the party gerrymandered maps in states including Texas and Missouri.Virginia and New Jersey will hold high-stakes gubernatorial and legislative elections that may serve as a proxy for voters’ views on the president.We will bring you the latest news and reactions as election day unfolds. More

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      It’s clear why Zohran Mamdani is leading in the New York mayoral race | Margaret Sullivan

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      For someone who exudes positive energy and seldom stops smiling, Zohran Mamdani certainly does provoke a lot of negative reactions.“He’s not who you think he is,” one TV ad glowered over gloomy images of the 34-year-old state assemblymember who is the clear frontrunner for New York City mayor. The ad doesn’t make clear precisely what the supposed disconnect is, but the tagline clearly is meant to give voters pause.“Never ran anything,” former New York state governor Andrew Cuomo charged, as he dissed his opponent on Fox News. “There’s no time for on-the-job training when any given morning, God forbid, you could have a mass murder or a terrorist attack.” Cuomo’s campaign yanked an ad that went further, using racist stereotypes to depict Mamdani supporters.And the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page has been on an anti-Mamdani run for many weeks, churning out opinion pieces like this one from conservative columnist Peggy Noonan: “New York, You’ve Been Warned.” Or this one from Journal editorial board member Joseph Sternberg: “Sorry Republicans, There’s No Silver Lining to a Mamdani Win.”Another Murdoch-controlled newspaper, the New York Post, has not confined its views to the opinion pages but rather shouted them on its tabloid front pages. “SCAMDANI”, read one cover story, with a subheading quoting Mayor Eric Adams calling the state assemblymember a “snake oil salesman”.The pro-Trump billionaire Bill Ackman has warned New Yorkers that Mamdani’s personality is a fraud. “The whole thing is an act,” Ackman posted on X after the mayoral debate last month. “After watching him recreate his fake smile, your skin will start to crawl.” Ackman gave $1m to the anti-Mamdani effort through the Super Pac Defend NYC, while former mayor Mike Bloomberg has contributed more than that to efforts to thwart Mamdani’s rise; Bloomberg gave $1.5m to a pro-Cuomo Super Pac, after spending millions to help Cuomo in June’s primary.But if you ignore the ads, the headlines and the social media posts, another story emerges, as researchers from the Harvard Institute of Politics found when they spoke to young people during the recent early-voting period.“I think my life could really improve if he wins,” enthused one young woman, quoted in an ABC News story about the Harvard focus group. Another respondent compared him in one respect to Donald Trump: “There’s no flip-flopping.”And another approvingly described Mamdani as “badass”.The democratic socialist holds a double-digit lead in the race and right now looks like a shoo-in.It certainly feels that way to this New Yorker. I live on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, an area that split its vote in the Democratic primary between Cuomo and Mamdani, and I also spend a lot of time on a university campus. What I’ve noticed is that Mamdani energizes people and while some of that reaction is skeptical, a lot of the people I encounter – from students to seniors – want to give the newcomer a chance.New York City, after all, is unaffordable for too many, so Mamdani’s relentless focus on the cost of rent and groceries has struck a nerve. Mamdani’s embrace of his Muslim faith, his advocacy for Gaza and his willingness to stand up for immigrants has solidified his appeal.There’s a clarity about it that stands in sharp contrast to most Democratic politicians, noted Astead Herndon, editorial director at Vox who wrote a recent New York Times magazine cover story titled The Improbable, Audacious and (So Far) Unstoppable Rise of Zohran Mamdani.“He works from the premise of his beliefs,” Herndon said on CNN. “A lot of Democrats … have mastered this triangulation dance … where it feels like sometimes, they’re trying to say nothing.” And what’s more, since the primary, his campaign has become more inclusive, as he reaches out to constituencies and powerful figures who have had serious doubts about him. He’s won at least some of them over.Others, of course, will never be won over, but are becoming resigned to the reality of a Mayor Mamdani.Governor Kathy Hochul, whose political instincts are well-honed and practical, endorsed Mamdani in mid-September despite significant policy differences. (At a rally in Queens, chants of “tax the rich” interrupted Hochul’s speech and the Times described the progressive crowd’s response to the centrist governor as “tepid”.)Hochul carried on, though, and got a better reaction when she praised the candidate for refusing to “get down in the gutter” with his many critics, especially those who try to weaponize his faith or ethnicity.Instead, Hochul said: “He rises up with grace and courage and grit.”Hochul is expected to run for re-election next year.She surely has calculated that it wouldn’t be a bad thing to have the Democratic mayor of New York City in her corner. And there is little doubt who that will be.

      Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist covering US media, politics and culture. More

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      Obama calls Mamdani and offers to be ‘sounding board’ if he wins mayoral race

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      Zohran Mamdani, who holds a lead in polling ahead of New York City’s mayoral election on Tuesday, reportedly received a call Saturday from his fellow Democrat Barack Obama – and the former president offered to be a “sounding board” if his advantage turns into victory.Obama also praised the campaign Mamdani had run against his main independent rival, former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, and the Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa.The call was first reported by the New York Times and then confirmed to Reuters by Mamdani’s spokesperson.“Zohran Mamdani appreciated President Obama’s words of support and their conversation on the importance of bringing a new kind of politics to our city,” Mamdani spokesperson Dora Pekec said.Mamdani, a Uganda-born state assembly member, has polled well ahead of Cuomo and Sliwa prior to Tuesday’s general election. A recent Atlas poll estimated Mamdani (40%) had about a six-point edge over Cuomo (34%) and a 16-point advantage over Sliwa (24%).Cuomo, who resigned as governor amid sexual harassment allegations, is running as an independent after losing to Mamdani in the Democratic primary. Sliwa is the founder of the Guardian Angels, a non-profit organization dedicated to unarmed crime prevention.Mamdani, a democratic socialist, shocked political observers on 24 June with a convincing victory in the primary. Since then, his candidacy has won endorsements from party holdouts such as former vice-president Kamala Harris and New York governor Kathy Hochul, and he has received a steady stream of financial backing from small donors.Mamdani’s policies range from hiking taxes on New York City’s wealthiest, raising the corporation tax, freezing stabilized apartment rental rates and increasing publicly subsidized housing. The finance community has expressed concerns that the city’s competitiveness will suffer if Mamdani wins the mayoral election.Meanwhile, his rise is two-sided coins for Democrats on the national stage, who know they need to appeal to young voters but could become more vulnerable to Republican attacks due to Mamdani’s criticism of Israel and his democratic socialism.Mamdani was out late into the night Saturday dropping in on bars and night clubs campaigning, with Sunday marking the last day of early voting, as the New York Times reported. One video reported on by the Times showed him standing behind a DJ booth and saying into a microphone, “Are we ready to beat Andrew Cuomo?” He was met with cheers, the video showed.For his part, Obama on Saturday rallied alongside New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mikie Sherrill, who is competing in a closely contested race against Republican Jack Ciattarelli. He also attended a rally for Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger.

      Reuters contributed to this report More

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      John F Kennedy grandson says Julia Fox’s bloody Jackie Halloween costume ‘disgusting’

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      Political writer and commentator Jack Schlossberg has said it was “disgusting, desperate and dangerous” for actor Julia Fox to wear a Halloween costume evoking the assassination of president John F Kennedy, his grandfather.Fox, however, has defended her controversial decision to wear a replica of the blood-stained, pink suit that former first lady Jackie Kennedy was seen wearing when her husband was shot dead by a sniper while the couple rode in a motorcade in Dallas in 1963. The Uncut Gems star has said she dressed as Jackie Kennedy as “a statement” about the poise and “extraordinary bravery” she showed when subjected to unimaginable “brutality”.Fox wore the ensemble in question to a 30 October Halloween party in New York City. Many online met an image of Fox in the outfit with negative reactions, with TikTok users dismissing the look as “a terrible idea” and “disrespectful”.One particularly notable reaction came from Schlossberg, the son of the Kennedys’ daughter Caroline, who wrote in part on X: “Julia Fox glorifying political violence is disgusting, desperate and dangerous.”View image in fullscreenFox was unbowed by the commentary from Schlossberg and others, with the 35-year-old actor and model saying in an Instagram post that she dressed as Jackie Kennedy “not as a costume but as a statement”.“When her husband was assassinated, she refused to change out of her blood-stained clothes, saying, ‘I want them to see what they’ve done,’” the post read. “The image of the delicate pink suit splattered with blood is one of the most haunting juxtapositions in modern history.“Beauty and horror. Poise and devastation. Her decision not to change clothes, even after being encouraged to, was an act of extraordinary bravery. It was a performance, protest, and mourning all at once. A woman weaponizing image and grace to expose brutality. It’s about trauma, power, and how femininity itself is a form of resistance. Long live Jackie O ♥️”.After JFK’s assassination, Jackie Kennedy indeed refused to take the suit off at Dallas’ Parkland hospital where her husband was pronounced dead and as she flew with his body on Air Force One to Washington DC.“Let them see what they have done,” she is reported to have said before exiting the plane in the US capital.The pink suit then became fashion history’s most iconic piece of first lady clothing despite its dark past. The day of the assassination, the former first lady also wore blue shoes, a pair of bloodied stockings and a blue blouse that were folded and stored without cleaning.The suit is often claimed to be made by Chanel. But it was actually an authorized copy of a Chanel design. It is said that this was a strategy employed by Jackie Kennedy, who died in 1994, to circumvent public disapproval of her taste for European style.All of these items are preserved in a climate-controlled vault at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland, as materials of historical importance. Documents have shown that the Kennedy family wanted to keep the suit from public viewing until 2103.The controversy surrounding Fox’s Halloween garb surfaced as political violence has become one of the most prominent topics of public discussion in the US.It attained that status in part after Donald Trump survived two assassination attempts while successfully running for a second presidency in 2024. Other such cases were the firebombing in April of Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro’s home, the murders in June of Minnesota state house speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and the killing in September of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk. More

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      US food banks rush to stock supplies amid the Snap lapse: ‘We’re going to garner all the resources we can’

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      Waves of hungry Angelenos gathered outside the Community Space food bank’s storefront on a recent afternoon, grabbing dry goods like pastries, bagels, lentils and pasta along with refrigerated salads and frozen bags of brisket.The crowd ebbs and flows all day, said founder Gaines Newborn, but as news spread last week that the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) would cease on Saturday, he braced for the need to dramatically increase.“I’ve gotten more calls than we’ve ever gotten from concerned people saying: ‘My food stamps are getting cut, I need a plan,’” Newborn said. “People are trying to get ahead of food insecurity.”As the federal government shutdown stretches into its second month, the Trump administration announced that Snap, which helps around 42 million people afford food each month, will exhaust its funding at the start of November – something that has never happened before in the program’s half-century history.On Friday, two separate federal judges blocked the government’s attempt to stop paying out the benefits, but the administration could appeal the orders to a higher court. Food banks remain on edge for the possibility of a benefit cut, as they face increased demand driven by federal workers who have gone unpaid during the shutdown, along with people who have struggled to afford rising grocery prices.“The scale of what will happen when 1.8 million New Yorkers don’t get that benefit that they rely on to purchase groceries is sort of hard to wrap my head around, honestly,” said Nicole Hunt, director of public policy and advocacy at Food Bank for NYC, which serves the nation’s most populous city.The organization, which is the largest in New York City, planned to step up its aid during the period when Snap is unavailable, but Hunt said they cannot match the level of assistance the federal program provides.View image in fullscreen“We are going to do what we do, which is to show up with food. We’re going to try to concentrate as much as we can on the neighborhoods that are going to be the hardest hit and garner all the resources that we can, but that’s just not a scale that we’re going to be able to meet, and that’s the reality of how important Snap is and how many people rely on it,” she said.The federal government shut down on the first day of October, after Democrats and Republicans in Congress failed to agree on legislation that would have continued funding. Around 700,000 federal workers were furloughed, with hundreds of thousands more told to continue working for paychecks that will arrive only after funding is restored.The deadlock has continued as Republicans refuse Democratic demands to couple government funding legislation with an extension of tax credits that have lowered costs for Affordable Care Act health plans. While the Senate’s Republican leaders have tried 13 times to pass a bill to reopen the government, Democrats refuse to budge, and there is no sign of a resolution in sight.Snap benefits continued during previous shutdowns – including those that took place in Donald Trump’s first term – and a Department of Agriculture report outlining their plans for the latest funding lapse indicated they would continue during this one, too.But that report was deleted from the department’s website and replaced by a message that attacks Democratic senators and reads: “Bottom line, the well has run dry. At this time, there will be no benefits issued November 01.”David Super, a professor at Georgetown Law, said that between money allocated for Snap and funds for other programs that the law allows it to repurpose, the department could keep Snap dollars flowing, if it wanted to.“Clear congressional intent is that this money is available to pay benefits,” Super said at an event organized by the Brookings Institution. “They’re cutting off benefits to put pressure on Senate Democrats, and they put this offensive and dishonest statement on their website trying to blame anyone but themselves for this entirely voluntary termination of Snap benefits.”The program’s lapse will create need beyond the capability of any food bank to fill.View image in fullscreenOn average, Snap provides 95 million meals per month in New York City. In all of last year, Food Bank for NYC distributed 85 million meals, Zac Hall, the senior vice-president of programs, said.“We’re seeing mothers worried about what they’re going to be able to make for dinner for their kids, grandmothers worried about what they’re going to put on the table for Thanksgiving meals,” Hall said.In the Minneapolis suburb Brooklyn Park, Second Harvest Heartland, the country’s second-largest food bank, is stocking more inventory to be ready for Snap’s end, according to Sarah Moberg, the CEO.“The hunger relief network was not designed to do the work of Snap,” Moberg said. “We are designed to meet someone’s acute hunger need in a moment, and Snap is designed to do that so much more efficiently.”The pain of a cutoff would be particularly acute for the federal workers who are already struggling to get by without their normal salaries.“It’s horrible,” said Christina Dechabert, 52, a Bronx resident who has been working without pay for the Transportation Security Administration at John F Kennedy international airport. “You’re talking about trying to survive with no checks. I’ve had to come to a food bank to get food so our family can survive.”One mother in New York, who did not want to be named, said she was considering taking her two-year-old out of daycare as both she and her husband were federal workers.“We’re in a household with both of us not having paychecks, so that’s the toughest part,” she said. “My son’s under three, so there’s no free daycare, so if this goes on another month or so I might just take him out and have him at home so I don’t have to pay for daycare.”Joshua Cobos, a volunteer at Community Space in Los Angeles, is a Snap recipient himself. He hopes the credit he has earned from his hours at the food bank will see him through the benefit cutoff.“I’m racking up as much as I can around here, and with everything coming up I feel like we’re gonna be busy,” Cobos said.Some cities and states moved to pre-empt the financial hit from the Snap cutoff. Kathy Hochul, the New York governor, on Thursday declared a state of emergency that would free up $65m in state funds for food banks. Tim Walz, the Minnesota governor, is sending $4m in state funding to food shelves to manage the Snap gap, but the need is far greater – $73m comes from federal funds to Minnesota for the program.The Atlanta Community food bank, where the monthly need has grown 70% over the past three-and-a-half years, announced Thursday it would draw $5m from its contingency to stock its pantries in anticipation of a surge of demand from unpaid federal workers and Snap beneficiaries. Andre Dickens, the city’s mayor, also announced a temporary eviction and water shutoff moratorium to support residents affected by the lapse in food aid.Super, the Georgetown Law professor, warned the cutoff for Snap bodes ill for the program’s long-term future in Washington.“This has been something that has not been political or ideological up to this point, and it would be tragic if we cross that line and this does become something that’s just part of partisan warfare,” he said. More

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      Democrats should be taking the fight to Trump – the problem is, he’s got them battling each other | Jonathan Freedland

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      Every year is election year in the US, but the contests of 2025, which reach their climax on Tuesday, will be especially revealing. These “off-year” battles – a smattering of governors’ races, statewide referendums and the election of a new mayor in the country’s biggest city – will tell us much about the national mood 12 months after Americans returned Donald Trump to the White House and one year before midterm contests that could reshape the US political landscape. Above all, though, they will reveal the division, the confusion and sheer discombobulation Trump has induced in the US’s party of opposition.The verdict on Trump’s first 10 months in office will be delivered most clearly in the two states set to choose a new governor: New Jersey and Virginia. By rights, these should be relatively easy wins for the Democrats. Both states voted for Kamala Harris a year ago, and the current polls are grim for Trump. This week, an Economist/YouGov survey registered Trump’s lowest rating of his second term – 39% of Americans approve of him, while 58% disapprove – the lowest number they’d recorded for him bar one poll in his first term. Trump’s handling of the economy gets especially low marks, and a plurality of voters blame the continuing government shutdown, now in its second month, on Trump and his party. If an off-year election offers an opportunity to kick an unpopular incumbent, then Tuesday should be plain sailing for Democrats.And yet, the contest in New Jersey, for one, is looking far from comfortable. Democrats there are mindful that a year ago Trump surged in the state: after losing to Biden by a whopping 16 points in 2020, he trailed Harris by just six. Current polls show the Democratic candidate for governor ahead, but only narrowly: one survey put her just one point ahead of her Republican opponent. The party is funnelling serious money into the contest and deploying its biggest guns: Barack Obama will campaign in New Jersey on Saturday.It may work. But the fact that, after all that voters have seen from Trump these past 10 months – the power grabs; the wild on-again, off-again moves on tariffs; the failure to shrink inflation; the indulgence of corruption; the vanity projects, including the demolition of the East Wing of the White House to make room for a gilded Trump ballroom – a Republican is even competitive in a state such as New Jersey should be troubling Democrats. And, if my conversations in Washington and New York this week are anything to go by, it is.The problem is that, even after a decade in which Trump has dominated US politics, Democrats are still not sure how to confront him, or even, more fundamentally, what they should really be. Take the mayoral contest in New York City, which is exposing the depth of the divide.The frontrunner is Zohran Mamdani, a 34-year-old newcomer who came from nowhere to storm his way to the Democratic nomination. Hugely charismatic and a master of social media, he has energised voters who had long regarded the Democrats as stale and tired: in the Democratic primary earlier this year, turnout was highest among those between ages 25 and 35. His chief opponent is the man he beat in that primary, the former Democratic governor of the state and scion of one of the party’s most storied families: Andrew Cuomo.Their clash captures what Cuomo, now running as an independent, calls the “quiet civil war” among Democrats in almost cartoonishly stark terms. Mamdani is a socialist beloved by the young, but feared by the old – and by those alarmed by his refusal to denounce the slogan “globalise the intifada”, a phrase they believe sanctions attacks on Israel-associated, meaning Jewish, targets in the US and elsewhere. Cuomo is 67, previously endorsed by the party establishment and tainted by the bullying and sexual harassment scandal that drove him out of office in 2021.It is a divide that is both ideological and generational. Plenty of younger Democrats see Mamdani as radical and inspiring, drawn to his message of “affordability” of housing and public transport. They see Cuomo as the embodiment of an exhausted, morally compromised centrism that cannot beat Trump. Meanwhile, many older Democrats see Mamdani as radical and untested, carrying too little experience and too much ideological baggage – the same leftist liabilities that the right ruthlessly exploits and ultimately always leads to Democratic defeat. I got a glimpse of that divide when, at a live event in Manhattan for the Unholy podcast, I asked Hillary Clinton whether, if she had a vote in New York City, she would cast it for Mamdani, who is, let’s not forget, the official Democratic nominee for mayor: “You know what? I don’t vote in this city. I’m not involved in it. I have not been at all even asked to be involved in it, and I have not chosen to be involved in it.”If Mamdani wins, and either of the comparatively moderate Democrats running in New Jersey and Virginia loses, then the party’s progressive wing will take that as confirmation that its approach – the path of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders – represents the party’s best hope. But if all three win, and especially if the gubernatorial candidates improve on Harris’s performance in 2024, then the moderate wing will be buoyed, and the argument inside the Democratic party will rage on. In fact, it’s a fair bet it will rage on whatever happens.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAnd that is because the age of Trump has been utterly confounding for his opponents. How do you play against a player who breaks all the rules of the game? If you stick to the old ways of doing politics, if you obey the traditional proprieties and conventions, you cast yourself as part of the very establishment or deep state or elite that Trump has so profitably railed against for 10 years. But if you don’t, if you disrespect past norms, then you become part of the problem, the danger, Trump represents, weakening the guardrails that keep democracy on track.An example of that dilemma is on display in California. The state’s ambitious governor, Gavin Newsom, has tabled a ballot initiative – a referendum – that would redraw the boundaries of California’s congressional districts to give the party about five more seats in the House of Representatives in time for next year’s midterm elections. It’s retaliation for a Trump-approved gerrymander in Texas that will hand Republicans a similar advantage in that state. Democrats have hailed Newsom’s move as an act of resistance, fighting Trumpian fire with fire. And so it is. But it also burns away one more democratic norm, turning boundary changes into a routinely partisan battleground.Democrats are struggling because there are no good options when fighting a nationalist populist unafraid to wreck democracy. If you stay high while he goes low, you lose – and he is free to wreak further destruction on the democratic system. But if you sink to his level, you risk damaging the very thing you want so desperately to protect. The havoc of Donald Trump is never confined to Trump. It engulfs his opponents too.

      Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

      Guardian newsroom: Year One of Trumpism: Is Britain Emulating the US? On Wednesday 21 January 2026, join Jonathan Freedland, Tania Branigan and Nick Lowles as they reflect on the first year of Donald Trump’s second presidency – and to ask if Britain could be set on the same path. Book tickets here or at guardian.live More