Thread by @michelletandler on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "A few months ago, I dug into Cea Weaver's Twitter history because she was Mamdani's housing advisor. I had a hunch she might get a position on his team. Well, she did, and she deleted her X account, accordingly. However, I took some screenshots. Let's dig in."
Cea Weaver @ceaweaver: "There is no such thing as a "good" gentrifier, only people who are actively working on projects to dismantle white supremacy and capitalism and people who aren't."
For context, this woman was just selected by Mayor Mamdani to be the Director of the newly revitalized Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants. According to NYC.gov - "The revitalized Office to Protect Tenants will serve as a central coordinating body to defend tenants’ rights, stand up to landlords, and ensure city agencies act swiftly on behalf of renters facing unsafe or illegal conditions." Source: nyc.gov/mayors-office/…
Okay - so what are her beliefs?
1. "Public housing for everyone."
2. "Rent control and public housing for everyone"
3. "Massive government interventions to solve gentrification"
What else? She believes: "rent control is a perfect solution to everything" and rent control is "a more effective way to shrink the value of real estate than reducing rezoning applications" Just in case you missed that - Yes, she wants to SHRINK THE VALUE OF REAL ESTATE
Next up - views on white people: "this country built wealth for white people through genocide, slavery, stolen land & labor" "white supremacy built the north and the south" "Private property is a weapon of white supremacy" "Gentrification is... part of a centuries long process of white supremacy" "The 'rules' are designed for white people" "new/white residents are gonna benefit as the whole city is planned around their interests." "endorse a no more white men in office platform" "improverish the *white* middle class "homeownership is racist"
Warning - this one is creepy: "I wish I believed in god so I could believe that all men who take credit for women's work and all white men who take credit for the work of women of color would one day burn"
Apparently, she even wants white people to stop reproducing, and be banned from planes... "came across a mob of 11 year old white boy children... i dunno why we keep procreating." "Delta shd kick all white people in Xmas outfits off planes"
In addition to disliking (hating?) white people - she is a passionate Socialist...! "we can and should raise expectations that we all live in green, beautiful, public housing" "not convinced that stopping development... builds our movement or advances socialism like rent control does"
Cea Weaver and her boss, Mayor Mamdani, apparently see eye to eye on many things... Apparently, they both want to "move away from a situation where most people access housing by purchasing it and towards a situation where the state guarantees high-quality housing to all."
Questions top of mind:
1) Does she work effectively with white people, despite her views about them?
2) Does she see homeownership as having any validity in building wealth?
3) Does she really hope we all live in gov housing?
4) Thoughts on the constitution?"
Michelle Tandler on X - ""It offers an opportunity to take those existing programs and sort of supercharge them, so that we can... you know, take over a lot of distressed housing." "... there’s all sorts of things that organized tenants can do to drive down that market price, especially if, you know, we have strong rent controls.""
Michelle Tandler on X - ""We can say, hey, um — you know — you are not maintaining this building, and we are the City of New York. We have an interest in making sure that housing is well maintained, and — and we’re gonna take this building away from you.” - Cea Weaver"
Meme - "Here's a guy who teaches at Harvard saying the idea that home ownership is white supremacy is 'uncontroversial'. They absolutely think these things. They never said they didn't. Maybe some of them regret saying the quiet part out loud but they're not being portrayed unfairly."
Erik Baker @erikmbaker: "The uncontroversial conclusion of generations of historical and social-scientific research is that this has indeed been its historical function in the United States"
Brian Cronin: "Is home-ownership an instrument of white supremacy?"
Meme - Smiling Cea Weaver: "I'm gonna seize all their houses"
Crying Cea Weaver: "oh they find out"
NYC mayoral aide Cea Weaver who says whites owning houses is racist bursts into TEARS when asked about her mother's $1.4m Craftsman home - "Weaver appeared to be walking towards a nearby subway station, but then turned back and ran inside her home, which has a 'Free Palestine' poster taped to one of its windows... Weaver previously tweeted that 'homeownership is a weapon of white supremacy' and that 'homeownership is racist' in social media posts that also urged people to 'impoverish the white middle class.' In another Twitter missive from 2018, Weaver wrote: 'There is no such thing as "good gentrifier," only people who are actively working on projects to dismantle white supremacy and capitalism and people who aren't.' Weaver further called on people to 'seize private property' and called for the election of communist lawmakers. The privileged former Bryn Mawr College student's stunning hypocrisy was uncovered by the Daily Mail on Wednesday when we revealed her mother owned a gorgeous Craftsman home in Nashville worth $1.4 million. The Tennessee city is America's fastest-gentrifying. But Weaver gave no indication to her family wealth - and has now refused to say whether she will ask her mother to give up her private property... In a press conference on Tuesday, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said he stood by Weaver, but his team is understood to have been caught by surprise by her anti-white tweets... When contacted by the Daily Mail via phone on Tuesday, Weaver said: 'I can't talk to you now, but can talk to you later,' and hung up before a reporter could ask any questions"
David Austin Walsh on X - "Here’s the last thing I’ll say about Cea Weaver: The rhetorical shift among liberals and leftists against white people in general and white men in particular was politically stupid and led to bad political and cultural outcomes even as the underlying point was basically true."
memetic_sisyphus on X - "I’m in awe of this post I have to break it down: “The rhetorical shift” (right off the bat, he’s not saying the shift or policies were bad, just not the harsh plain language in which those ideas were expressed) “among liberals and leftists against white people in general and white men in particular was politically stupid” (politically bad, not bad. As in it hurt their ability to gain more political power, not that it was morally reprehensible) “and led to bad political and cultural outcomes” (we lost elections that was the bad part) “even as the underlying point was basically true.” (Really drives home that he essentially still holds all of those beliefs, he just thinks progressives need to be more dishonest so they can gain more political power, maybe then they can be honest again). Really is a master class in progressive sleaze."
Meme - Michelle Tandler @michelletendler: ""will it grow our power?" The mask is off on this one..."
cea weaver: "With every decision we make we have to ask - Will this help us reach unorganized people? Will it grow our power? We can't expect different results using the same strategy, the same decisions, the same too-small set of organizations + people"
Left wingers spend all their time thinking about power, and plotting about how to get it. That's why you have the long march through the institutions
Jay Martin 🏠 🏢🏚️🌇 on X - "One thing that wasn’t mentioned in the interview is Cea’s refusal to acknowledge that 2019 rent law she pushed for has functionally bankrupt 1/3 of the rent stabilized housing stock. That’s tens of thousands of buildings and hundreds of thousands of apartments that don’t have money to be maintained. (While her boss runs around calling to freeze funds further.) Easily the most destructive component of the law being vacancy control which has had the duel effect of reducing the quality of housing by eliminating the ability cover costs but also gut the value of majority rent stabilized buildings. That value was the primary means to fund building improvements. Vacancy control must be changed to improve housing in this city because there simply isn’t a government on this planet that can effectively save this housing in time."
George Alexopoulos on X - "This is not the face of a true communist. This is what it looked like when her peers & professors broke her in college. It was only when she Said The Words that they stopped bullying her and embraced her as family. Her pain & guilt went away when she found new targets for the Collective to bully, and it was replaced with an ironic, sarcastic smile. We laugh but many reading this already have (or may eventually) lose their daughters to the same cult formula. Be on guard. I've known people who ditched their entire family, replaced it with their "new family." Their minds are locked in adolescence, having played a character their entire adult life. They don't know who they are, because they haven't had time to construct their own identity free of outside input. So when you take the mask off, they psychologically revert to the most stable previous version: A confused, guilt-ridden, spoiled, sheltered child surrounded by bitter, jealous, violent sociopaths who just wants everyone to stop being mean to them."
Kalman Yeger on X - "As someone with significant differences with this appointment, I would note that there are undoubtedly many decent ways to report news that don't involve staking out this woman's place of residence. Public service has its price; this should not be it."
Sohrab Ahmari on X - "When Weaver led Housing Justice 4 All, they were notorious for protesting outside of legislators’ houses. She pioneered, in some ways, this sort of activist invasion. Ironic to now see people saying she should be left alone at her residence."
Jesse Arm on X - "As the Democratic Party elevates more white millennials from comfortable backgrounds who have built entire identities around cosplaying as radical revolutionaries—and have largely been coddled or celebrated for it—public meltdowns at the first hint of scrutiny will likely become a recurring feature of American politics."
Mamdani Housing Official Cea Weaver Is a Lunatic | National Review - "Venture aloud that the new mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, might just have a touch of the communist about him, and you will run immediately into a wall of indignant pedantry. “He’s not a communist,” his apologists will insist. He’s a “communitarian.” Other preferred substitutions include “collectivist,” “Fabian,” “democratic socialist,” and, in the less intellectually inclined depths of the well, “just, like, someone who cares about other people.” Whatever. A commie by any other name still smells as foul. Besides, far more important than whether Mamdani wishes to be more closely associated with the Judean People’s Front or the People’s Front of Judea is what he is actually doing with his power — and, alas, what Mamdani is actually doing with his power is appointing lunatics such as Cea Weaver to run the Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants. Given that New York City has more people living in rented housing than any other American city has residents, this is a position from which a great deal of mischief can be made. If Cea Weaver did not exist, one would be hard-pressed to invent her. Weaver seems to have been designed in a laboratory to work in the Ideological Compliance Department of the East German Kommunale Wohnungsverwaltung, but, as the result of an unfortunate accident with a time machine, ended up overseeing housing policy in the most important city in the United States. She believes that “rent control is a perfect solution to everything” — not least because it is an “effective way to shrink the value of real estate.” She considers that “private property is a weapon of white supremacy,” she believes that “homeownership is racist,” and she holds that the highest aim of government ought to be to “impoverish the *white* middle class.” And they say that ambition is dead in America! In Weaver’s estimation, the United States “built wealth for white people through genocide, slavery, stolen land & labor,” “white supremacy built the north and the south,” and the most reasonable response to these presuppositions is to “endorse a no more white men in office platform.” Unwilling to limit her racism to the temporal realm, she also enjoys fantasizing about her enemies roasting in the afterlife. “I wish I believed in god,” she declared in 2019, “so I could believe that all men who take credit for women’s work and all white men who take credit for the work of women of color would one day burn.” Perhaps this was what Mayor Mamdani was referring to when, in his inaugural address, he promised “the warmth of collectivism”? Naturally, Cea Weaver’s approach to housing will not work. But, then, Cea Weaver’s approach to housing is not supposed to work so much as it is supposed to collapse the system completely. A year ago, Weaver told Sam Seder that, once she and her friends had won power, the government would be able to say to landlords in New York City, “Hey, um — you know — you are not maintaining this building, and we are the City of New York, we have an interest in making sure that housing is well maintained, and — and we’re gonna take this building away from you.” This, of course, is a classic two-step trap of the type that has been beloved by communists for more than a century. First, by capping rents at unsustainable levels, the authorities render it impossible for property owners to repair and maintain their buildings. Then, when those repairs and maintenance don’t get done, the city takes the building on the grounds that the landlords are derelict. The result is what Weaver has openly wanted all along: namely, “massive government interventions” and “public housing for everyone.” Or, as anyone who has ever cracked a history book would put it: catastrophe. Whatever excuses the early communists might have had for their failures can under no circumstances be proffered today. The record of those who have declared that “property is theft” is, without exception, one of wrecked societies and immiserated lives. Cea Weaver is not an intelligent, lettered, or accomplished person, and the zeal with which she compensates for those shortcomings will not help her overcome the inevitable. If her preposterous ideas are put into action, the usual consequences will ensue. Hopefully, things will never get that far. Communism — however enthusiastically it has been rebranded — is not how the United States works or, indeed, how the United States can work. There are many policy options available to the voters of this country, but communism and racial separation are not among them. This is not a communist country, and our system is not compatible with communism’s demands. At the government level, communism empowers the state in ways that are forbidden by our Constitution; at the individual level, communism makes claims on the rights of the citizen that have been foreclosed by our most fundamental laws. Cea Weaver may long for a parade of kulaks to liquidate, but this is the United States, dammit, and there is no obligation on anyone to provide them to her, or her ridiculous Bolshevist boss."
Laura Powell on X - "People are talking about the hypocrisy of Mamdani aide Cea Weaver related to her mother owning an expensive house, but less discussed is the fact that she personally is a gentrifier in NYC. So many people move to expensive cities and then rail against gentrification, while somehow managing to avoid any feeling of cognitive dissonance."
New York Post on X - "Zohran Mamdani’s woke, privileged tenant advocate Cea Weaver breaks down crying when asked about hypocritical gentrification comments"
Natalie Shure on X - "perhaps she did that because it’s upsetting when bad faith tabloid reporters camp outside your apartment to hound you over 7-year-old tweets and what your parents’ house looks like"
Sean Fitzgerald (Actual Justice Warrior) on X - ""How dare the press ask a government official about her desire to *force the white middle class into poverty* she was just a 31 year old child, working on the same policy she's going to be in charge of now, when she wrote that stuff she 100% sticks by" - This lady"
Clearly, if a left wing government official cries on being questioned, that's due to sexist harassment, and definitely not showing that you are unable to take accountability or are able to be an adult and work on important matters
Vladislav Davidzon on X - "As a post Soviet person and the great grandson of a top level NKVD man - don’t like seeing commissars in American politics - but this generation of them isn’t just casually cruel, ideological, entitled and predatory - they also seem to be brittle and weak and mentally ill. Worst of both worlds."
Jacob Shell on X - "I think there's no question that as the millennial left begins to gain more positions of power (inevitable), there is going to have to be an intellectual reset if theyre going to govern anything effectively. I don't mean they have to become "neoliberals" or whatever, but the politics of yelling at your uncle at Thanksgiving for being white needs to be explicitly classified as a bad thing; a serious politics of actual socdem governance (e.g. Mamdani could hire advisors from Scandinavia) should be embraced. But there's no way to have that reset if what predominates is the attitude of "hey theyre just 'dumb tweets' man, we never really thought that...and anyway if we did think that it was a good thing, and if at the time you strongly disagreed with the attitude exemplified by the 'dumb tweets' we still think that means you're a racist nazi, even if at the same time we also demand 'amnesty' for the 'dumb tweets'" -- well if that attitude predominates then clearly there can be no intellectual reset! And unfortunately I think this frame is going to win out."
Meme - Wokal Distance @wokal_distance: ""When I am Weaker Than You, I ask you for Freedom because that is according to your principles; when I am Stronger than you, I take away your Freedom Because that is according to my principles.""
David Klion @DavidKlion: "Cancel culture isn't real but I wish it was, as I think about the likely next moves of everyone who worked in this administration"
David Klion @DavidKlion: "I know Cea slightly and have always found her impressive and serious. I see that one of her regrettable tweets was a 2018 QT of one of mine, probably also regrettable but long-deleted. As millennials achieve political power, we're going to need a general amnesty on bad old tweets"
Councilwoman Vickie Paladino on X - "Psychotic. There’s no other way to put it. The funny thing is she rails against white gentrifiers, meanwhile Mamdani would still be a failing SoundCloud rapper if it wasn’t for the suicidal political idiocy of those same white gentrifiers. Pre-gentrification Astoria would’ve sent Zohran Mamdani packing. That’s just a fact. Thing is, they’re not actually against gentrification at all. They just want it socialized; they hate the idea that some of the older NYC middle class (who they hate) still exist and want to use the machinery of government to force them out once and for all by bankrupting them in the name of ‘affordability.’ It’s actually the ultimate gentrification project. These people are monsters, truly."
Matt Taibbi on X - "“Impoverish the white middle class” is fascinating because it shows the belief system isn’t about elevating historically disadvantaged groups, it’s something much weirder, and race-based."
Thread by @jaymart222 on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "Unbelievable. Yesterday the Mamdani Administration submitted its objection to the bankruptcy sale of a property arguing that the sale shouldn’t go through because the laws in which the mayor has advocated for have made the building an unsustainable business. To interpret what this means. It’s the city of New York validating in court that the rent stabilization system as it exists is a taking. Again, this validates in court documents that the administration knows the current rent levels make the building unsustainable to operate. Heres the full brief. cases.stretto.com/public/x447/13…"
Left wingers want to make it impossible for private companies to operate, so the state can step in and take control
End Wokeness on X - "NYC Mayor Mamdani's Tenant Director, Cea Weaver: "We'll transition from treating property as an individual good to a collective good. Whites especially will be impacted.""
Vitaliy Katsenelson on X - "I came to America to escape people who talk like this. “Having a different relationship to property” is communist code for ownership being conditional and political. It is the same idea that destroyed entire societies, now rebranded with softer language and moral smugness. Property rights are not optional. They are the operating system of a free society. Every serious economist in history agrees on one point: incentives matter. Ayn Rand said it perfectly: “You can ignore reality, but you cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.” Housing is expensive because activists and politicians make building illegal, slow, and politically toxic. Fixing supply is hard. Attacking ownership is easy. That is why failed thinkers always choose the latter. I have more respect for flat earthers than communists. Flat earthers are harmless, and everyone agrees they are idiots. Communism keeps getting recycled as virtue despite its body count and total record of failure. Communists, democratic socialists, or whatever they like to call themselves nowadays are society’s most dangerous idiots, especially when they are elected into positions of power. I lived under collective property. It meant decay, shortages, corruption, and people pretending to work while the system pretended to function. I did not come to America to hear these ideas again, dressed up as justice. I came here because this country understood something rare: freedom requires ownership. I have seen how this ends. It never ends well."
Defiant L’s on X - "NYC's Tenant Director, "People like home ownership because they like control and that’s been perverted into deep racism and classist society""
Rock Chartrand🤑 on X - "What’s shocking isn’t just the policy. It’s the brazenness. Politicians can openly call to dismantle property rights, endorse collective seizure, and single out racial groups for harm, all while swearing an oath to uphold a Constitution built explicitly to prevent that. And nothing happens. The oath isn’t ceremonial. It’s a promise to defend individual rights against exactly this kind of collectivist abuse. Property rights aren’t a policy preference. They’re a moral and legal foundation. Once you declare property a “collective good,” you’ve already declared that individuals exist at the state’s permission. That’s not reform. That’s repudiation. Calling for discrimination and racial targeting while holding public office isn’t activism. It’s a confession of unfitness. If the oath meant anything, this wouldn’t be debated. It would be disqualifying. The real scandal is that it isn’t. When officials can openly advocate violations of rights without consequence, the problem isn’t just bad politicians. It’s a culture that’s stopped taking its own founding principles seriously."
Mario Nawfal on X - "🚨🇺🇸 NYC MAYOR MAMDANI'S HOUSING OFFICIAL: "YOUR HOME SHOULDN’T REALLY BE YOURS" According to Cea Weaver, a top housing advisor for NYC Mayor Mamdani, the idea of owning your home the way people always have is outdated. She says we’ve treated property as something personal for “centuries,” and now it’s time to see it as “collective.” Her words? Families (especially white ones, of course) need a “different relationship to property.” In other words: stop thinking of your house as yours, and start thinking of it as something shared. This isn’t a fringe activist on TikTok. This is a person in charge of housing policy for New York City. Heads up: this "shared equity" talk is a nice way of saying ownership might not mean what you think it does anymore. Source: @EndWokeness"
Clifford Asness on X - "Funny when you call these people communists a ton of lefties rise up to explain to you, dripping with condescension, that they aren’t communists they are “democratic socialists.” You are supposed to feel ignorant and shameful for using the word wrong. Then they say “Private property == theft” They are full on communists in any practical sense that word has ever been used. Read the DSA platform or watch their videos (https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLw8a1JrIbYQH7EPFythBZNoa6qSB9ae6X&si=xAnT9ic54uaXgxrp). It’s Cuba not Denmark. You are being lied to."
stevemur on X - "Just three years ago, I had a polite but firm disagreement with progressive friends. “What harm do you think comes from shifting society left?” one asked. “Ultimately, leftism without limits can lead to seizure of private property. Do you like your home? Do you want your kids to be able to own a home? Some of the worst regimes in world history began that way.” was my basic answer. They scoffed that America was in any danger of losing respect for private property."
Thread by @xwanyex on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "Another kind of unfortunate asymmetry for Republicans is that regular people find the prospect of fascism legible and believable in a way that they do not with leftist extremes. A young person making fascist threats sounds plausibly scary, but a young person ranting about expropriating property sounds to many people silly and naive. This often means that Republicans are judged by the imagination, by what people think they’d want to do if they got supreme power. But nobody cares what the left would do if they got supreme power, because that’s silly and there are checks and balances and that’s never going to happen, anyway, and don’t you know that that’s not what mainstream Democrats believe? Republicans are judged by the dog whistle, the thing they didn’t even say. But when a Democrat makes statements that reveal explicit racial hatred, we put them in a new category that doesn’t affect the reputation of Democrats, more generally."
Councilwoman Vickie Paladino on X - "Notice how they never talk about NYCHA being poorly maintained. The worst slums in the city are run by the government. But you never hear them talk about that. Because they don't actually care about improving anything at all, they're interested in developing a pretense for seizing private property. That's all ANY of this is about. If they REALLY were interested in building some kind of good faith and trust around their plans for housing socialization, the FIRST thing they'd be doing is getting NYCHA into shape. They'd be focused like a laser on it, in fact. Fixing NYCHA by making it livable, safe, and efficiently managed would go a very long way towards the argument that the city can be trusted with expanding public housing. There would be some credibility behind their performative outrage about 'slumlords' if our city government wasn't the biggest slumlord itself. But they're not doing that. Because they don't care. And they're not capable even if they did care. NYCHA can rot, because it's already in public hands so there's no more power to be extracted from it. Instead they're simply constructing a rationale to go after private property for no other reason than the fact that they don't think private property should exist. That's it, that's all. And once they've seized the private property and 'socialized' it? Well, then it can rot too, just like NYCHA. Because the point was always the seizure, not improving conditions for anyone. And magically, the outrage over poor living conditions for these properties will vanish too."
Coddled Affluent Professional on X - "Mamdani et al. don’t have the will, intelligence, or organizational capacity to do the tough, complex, unglamorous work that would be required to improve NYCHA housing or force reform of the MTA and actually make things better for New Yorkers. Instead they’re just going to do their communist cosplay and run around threatening and hassling business owners and landlords. It’s important to understand that this is just another variation of ‘managed decline.’ You can just look at the soft, entitled faces of the characters on Team Mamdani: these aren’t people who are going to care passionately about things like optimizing elevator maintenance or window repairs in public housing projects. They’re going to have their little set pieces that they put up - shutting down a business here, expropriating a building from a troubled landlord there - and then pat themselves on the back for it. They’re ‘dismantlers’ - they’re motivated by performative narcissism and they’re going to gravitate to little spectacles where they can project self importance rather than taking stock of what actually needs to be done."
Mamdani Watch on X - "Zohran Mamdani: “We will slowly buy up the housing on the private market and convert properties into communes.” He is fully a communist."
Clearly, calling him a Communist is far right misinformation
Bronx building Mamdani highlighted to showcase NYC's new housing commissioner's talents has nearly 200 violations - "A Bronx apartment building Mayor Mamdani showcased to highlight the talents of his new housing commissioner, Dina Levy, has racked up nearly 200 unresolved violations, The Post has learned. The 102-unit building at 1520 Sedgwick Ave. in Morris Heights as of Saturday had a staggering 194 open housing-code violations dating back to 2016 — including 88 “Class C” violations considered “immediately hazardous.” They included rat and roach infestation; broken doors and refrigerators; and mold, records show. Mamdani visited the affordable-housing complex best known for being the birthplace of hip-hop on Jan. 4 to introduce Levy, 54, a longtime tenants’ rights advocate and former state housing honcho, as his new Housing Preservation and Development commissioner. He gushed how Levy — who grew up the silver-spooned daughter of two high-powered DC lawyers – has non-profit experience in building and overseeing affordable housing, a perfect fit for his leftist housing agenda that seeks to replace private landlords wherever possible. Levy, who will make $277,605 a year as HPD commissioner, helped facilitate a 2011 deal for nonprofit Workforce Housing Advisors to buy and rehab the Sedgwick Avenue complex from private landlords. Levy did this with help from a $5.6 million HPD loan she and her own nonprofit, the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board, brokered to stabilize the building’s finances and maintain its “affordable” rental status, recalled Mamdani... It has more than double the dangerous “Class C” violations racked up at 85 Clarkson Ave., a dilapidated, privately owned 71-unit complex in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, Mamdani showcased three days earlier as a poster child for everything he believes is wrong with the city’s publicly-subsidized housing stock. Tenants told The Post conditions were better under the old, private landlord. “I have been here over 20 years, and I preferred it when it was under private management because they used to screen people in and out of the building,” said Mordistine Alexander, among the dozens of tenants at 1520 Sedgwick whose homes have open HPD violations. Alexander, 49, who has rented her three-bedroom apartment since 1999, said the unit routinely lacks heat and hot water, its bathroom and kitchen facades are crumbling and windows need to be replaced She said she’s been without a kitchen light for months — despite asking for fluorescent light bulbs to be replaced since October. And she said she had to take care of fixing a major rodent problem in the unit herself because she “couldn’t wait any longer” for Workforce Housing Group to respond. “Since [the nonprofit] took over, the building has deteriorated. They lack porters. No one is maintaining it, and the complaints fall on deaf ears – especially if you complain a lot,” said Alexander, adding she wishes Levy never won her fight to turn the building over to the nonprofit. Yet Mamdani wants more complexes like the Sedgewick Avenue building. He supports Stalinesque legislation designed to control how private property is sold so that more nonprofits can oversee rent-stabilized apartments. “You have to laugh at the hypocrisy,” said Councilwoman Joann Ariola (R-Queens). “These nonprofits are proving themselves to be little more than taxpayer-funded slumlords, and this blatant double-standard is all part of the administration’s planned attack on private ownership in New York City.” Like Cea Weaver, the much-maligned lefty boss of Mamdani’s newly created Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants, HPD Commissioner Levy grew up in privilege. She is the twin daughter of lawyer Ed Levy and his late civil-rights attorney wife Mary, who owned multiple properties, including a townhouse in historic Georgetown they sold in 2023 that is currently worth $1.4 million. She has said she is a native of affluent Maplewood, NJ. Levy, a Delaware University graduate, has been a rebel-rousing, radical tenant advocate for decades, even spending time in the slammer as a young organizer... Levy boasted in the 2011 interview that her “rough, caustic style” irks landlords. The Sedgwick Avenue site has more open HPD violations than roughly three-quarters of the privately owned, rent-stabilized buildings in NYC — but Mamdani is “too focused” on pushing the abolition of private property, said Kenny Burgos, a former Bronx assemblyman who heads the New York Apartment Association that represents landlords of rent-stabilized units. Nonprofit-managed housing “consistently run higher violation counts despite having government-backed loans and [being eligible to avoid] paying property taxes, so they should have a lot more freed-up cash to make these buildings run efficiently, and yet are unable to do so — even with good intentions and no goal of profit,” added Burgos."
Clearly, the only reason 1520 Sedgwick Ave. is in such a bad shape is due to private landlords
Time to nationalise housing to smash slumlords!
Meme - Chris Freiman: "This is actually a fairly common rhetorical move-characterizing socialism in completely benign, unobjectionable terms ("treating people equally," "giving everyone a fair share") instead of accurately describing it as the forcible collectivization of productive property"
Ryan Saavedra @RyanSaavedra: "This is an actual sentence in a news report from The New York Times. Truly insane."
"The closest Mr. Mamdani gets to socialism is in his belief in treating people more equitably."
A Man Of Memes on X - "The NY Commie Housing Plan is absolutely wild. Here are the steps:
1. Freeze rents. Costs go up, rents don't. Owners have less and less ability to maintain properties and address repairs. Properties fall into disrepair.
2. Government comes and says "Hey! You're a slumlord!" And slap them with all sorts of violations. The property, due to accumulating deferred maintenance and frozen rents drops drastically in value.
3. When the owner has had enough and decides to cut losses and sell, he has to give 1st right of refusal to non-profits (run undoubtedly by "friends" of the government) or to the government itself. Naturally sales price is tiny given the drop in value.
4. Meanwhile, tenants are forced to live in worse and worse conditions and the only alternative is what? Government housing? We know what that's like.
Who wins here? Property owners (tax payers)? Nope. Tenants? Only if you think living with roaches and water leaks is a win. The "non profits"? Yes they will line their pockets. The commies in charge? THAT is one thing you can absolutely bet your sweet butt cheeks on. They will get rich. This will also stop new development in its tracks. Now the only new housing will be built by the government. You ever lived in government-built housing? It's stuff of nightmares. Watch these 🤡🤡🤡 ruin NY and then watch for this playbook to come to a city near you. Elections matter. Once you put these morons in charge, it's very hard to get rid of them. And it's even harder to undo the damage they (always) cause. Get involved with your local elections. Get involved with housing advocacy and lobbying groups in your market. We never seem to really wake up until this type of insanity affects us directly and by then it's too late."
Meme - Kane @kane: "> "capitalist slums"
> look inside
> it's state price-controlled"
Pamphlets @PamphletsY: "BREAKING - Mayor Mamdani Inspects Capitalist Slums of NYC on 1st Day."
AP on X - "Who Will Build NYC if Builders Are the Enemy? As a New Yorker Jew, I'm surrounded by people who have been in real estate their entire lives. I am not trying to feed a stereotype, but that's my reality. They aren't activists or online commentators. They are people who bought their first buildings with all their savings, carried debt through rate hikes, fixed things themselves when there was no money to hire, and stayed in New York through high crime, recessions, 2008, COVID, rising taxes, insurance increases, and an ever-expanding book of laws and codes. None of them were promised fairness before they started, and none of them were protected from risk. They succeeded very slowly, and painfully, but with responsibly. That experience is exactly what is missing from the worldview of Zohran Mamdani, and it shows in every part of his housing agenda. Mamdani has never built anything. He never signed a personal guarantee, never met payroll, never carried a mortgage through a rough month, never had to choose between fixing a boiler now or hoping it survives another winter because there is no cash. He has only operated in a political world where consequences are abstract and other people absorb the risk. When you have never operated in the real economy, it becomes easy to believe that shortcuts are solutions. It is also why his message resonates with a certain type of voter. The people demanding “housing reforms” are not bad people. They are frustrated renters who feel like the system is rigged against them. I understand the frustration. But frustration doesn't change math. Housing is hard. Ownership is a very slow process. Building anything meaningful in this city takes years of stress, and debt. The people calling for "landlord policies" often want the outcome without the grind, the stability without the risk, and the reward without the years of sweating that every responsible adult who succeeded here had to endure. But it does not work like that. NYC is in housing crisis. Citywide vacancy sits around 1.4 percent, a level economists consider an emergency. Median rents keep rising anyway, with Manhattan near $4,800 and Brooklyn around $3,800, even under an already thick layer of regulation. The reason is obvious. Supply has not kept up. In a good year, New York adds roughly 30,000 units. The city needs hundreds of thousands more over the next decade just to stabilize prices. At the same time, construction costs here are among the highest in the country, financing is extremely difficult, and insurance is wildly expensive. Mamdani’s proposals take that fragile situation and make it worse. When you cap upside while leaving downside unlimited, rational people stop participating. Developers do not argue on X. Lenders do not protest. They simply reallocate. Projects stop coming up. Renovations are postponed. New construction dies before a shovel hits the ground. The people I know in real estate are not angry. They are disengaging. Some are buying elsewhere. Some are sitting on cash. Some are done entirely. And when that happens, tenants do not win. Buildings deteriorate, supply tightens further, and rents rise anyway. What Mamdani offers is emotional satisfaction, not solutions. He tells voters that prices are high because someone else is greedy, not because the city has spent decades making housing harder and almost impossible to build. He frames landlords as villains instead of participants in an ecosystem that only works when incentives align. That framing feels good, but it does not produce housing. It produces resentment, fear, and withdrawal. Everyone I know who made it in this city did it the same way. Slowly, without shortcuts. Policies written by people who never did that do not create fairness or affordability. They create shortages. NYC doesn't have a landlord problem. It has a confidence problem. And a city that teaches people to hate the builders while demanding more building is a city sabotaging its own future."
Jim Meigs on X - ""What Mamdani offers is emotional satisfaction, not solutions." So many Progressive policies work this way:
1. Tell people they are the victims of some exploitative group (in this case, landlords).
2. Promise to punish that group.
3. Assume that, once the bad people are punished, the good stuff they've been hoarding will naturally flow to people more deserving.
4. Be shocked that things get worse instead of better.
5. Find a new group to blame."
Zohran Kwame Mamdani on X - "The oligarchs who want us to return to work to goose the stock market are the same ones with thousands of luxury condos as investment properties, sitting empty while NYers die on the streets & in shelters. Seize these properties. House the homeless. Enact a #HomesGuarantee."
Brianna Lyman on X - "🚨CNN Host and panelists get caught in lie about Mamdani🚨🚨
Last night on CNN a guest laughed at me when I said Zohran Mamdani is incompatible with our republic, specifically because he's called for seizing private property.
Abby Phillips: "He's never said anything about confiscating property"
Errol Louis: "I moderated two debates, I've interviewed him half a dozen times--"
Me: "So then you'd know that he said luxury condos should be taken if they're not being used"
Louis: " --there is no confiscation"
Adam Mockler: "This is a perfect example, the MAGA media ecosystem is to make Zohran seem like this extreme jihadist"
Calling for the seizure of private property IS extreme, is fundamentally hostile to the founding and IS something Mamdani said (even if Abby Philipps, Errol Louis, and Adam Mockler didn't know about)"
Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 on X - "An estimated 50,000 rent-stabilized apartments in NYC are empty. When Mamdani gets into office expect that number to skyrocket. Owners would rather rent to nobody than operate at a loss. Socialism has never worked, it never will. (the . free . press)"
Clearly, the solution is to confiscate these properties
Breaking911 on X - "MAMDANI: "If your landlord does not responsibly steward your home, city government will step in."
Councilwoman Vickie Paladino on X - "What he means is that pretty much every tenant complaint will move rapidly into property seizure. Look for DSA activists to begin agitating tenants to file frivolous complaints just to instigate seizures. This is straight up tyranny. Best be prepared for what comes next, because it will get ugly fast. If you’re a small landlord that rents an apartment in your own home I strongly suggest you notify your tenants that you will no longer be renting, because Mamdani WILL take your home. And renters — get ready for rents to SKYROCKET to mitigate these risks to the landlords to choose to remain in the market."
