I read the DSA’s platform so you don’t have to.

This November, New Yorkers might elect a card-carrying democratic socialist as their next mayor.

Zohran Mamdani, a dues-paying member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), is now the frontrunner to be New York City’s next mayor. If he goes on to win the general election, DSA’s platform—previously dismissed as a fringe wishlist—could start shaping policy from inside Gracie Mansion and across America.

That should give all of us commonsense Americans pause.

I recently read the Democratic Socialists of America’s political platform. All 30 pages of it. Here are a few of its signature proposals:

  • Extend “voting rights to non-citizens?”
  • “Disarm law enforcement officers,” and abolish prisons?
  • Nationalize “businesses like railroads, utilities, and critical manufacturing and technology companies?”
  • Prohibit any “new fossil fuel projects from being authorized or built?”
  • Provide “free abortion on demand?”
  • Allow trans minors to access “gender affirming care” – like puberty blockers – “without parental consent?”

First, credit where it’s due: the writers made sure no potentially aggrieved group went unnamed. It’s exhaustive, inclusive, and deeply committed to covering every corner of the activist landscape.

That said, the rest of it reads like a case study in what not to do. The platform makes sense only if you ignore both history and human nature. Here’s why:

1. The “Democratic” in Democratic Socialism Is a One-Time Offer

Historically, socialist revolutions begin with a democratic vote—but rarely continue with one. Power consolidates quickly. The new elite doesn’t call for more ballots; they call for loyalty. If democracy is truly the goal, then why build a system that abolishes opposition?

2. Central Planning Doesn’t Work

No major country that tried communal or government ownership of the economy ended up better off. What they got instead: poverty, rationing, and—at the extremes—starvation. The record is long and grim.

3. Socialism Demands a New Kind of Human

Unfortunately, we don’t have that kind of human. Real people respond to incentives. They work harder when there’s a reward for it. Take away the incentives, and effort evaporates—unless you reintroduce it with force.

4. Equal Rewards do not Equal Effort

If everyone gets the same outcome regardless of input, no one is motivated to do more than the bare minimum. The result? Collapse—unless, again, you fall back on coercion.

5. A World Currency Would Be a Disaster for the Poor

The DSA hints at global monetary reform. But one currency for all nations strips poorer countries of a key tool: the ability to devalue their own currency to boost exports. It’s economic malpractice disguised as idealism.

6. Global Governance? What Could Go Wrong?

Pushing toward a single world system—shared currency, shared government—means smashing together cultures, laws, languages, and economies. The jealousies and resentments that would follow aren’t just theoretical. They’ve sparked genocides before.

7. It’s Not Kind. It’s Just Old-School Communism.

Repackaged, yes. Softer fonts, more inclusive language. But the underlying structure? It’s the same thing that’s failed again and again under different flags.

8. Beware the First Revolutionaries

One final note: if this movement does succeed, it won’t be the radicals who inherit power. History shows that the smartest, loudest revolutionaries are often the first to be purged—viewed as threats to the new regime.

On first read, I honestly thought the DSA platform was satire. But here’s the dangerous truth: many of its young supporters weren’t alive for the horrors of 20th-century autocracies. They haven’t been taught about them either.

Maybe we should print flyers. Staple them to lamp posts. Scatter them across campus quads. If not, we could see a new generation of “Democratic” Socialists taking over America’s biggest cities.

What could possibly go wrong?