India Walton says Hochul ‘has a responsibility’ to endorse Mamdani

Assembly Member Zohran Mamdani, who won the Democratic primary for New York City mayor last month, isn’t the first democratic socialist to have such success in a major city in New York.

Four years ago, India Walton surprised Democrats in Buffalo and around the state when she bested then-Mayor Byron Brown in the Democratic primary for mayor of Buffalo. No one expected the democratic socialist to defeat the Buffalo institution running for a fifth term – and many Democrats didn't take the upset very well.

Gov. Kathy Hochul, who was a newly minted executive in the summer of 2021, declined to endorse Walton, despite Democrats in her home of Buffalo choosing her as their candidate. At the time, she said that she would endorse no one because her focus was on governing, not politics. State Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs, who had held the position for years, also said he wouldn’t endorse Walton. He even took it a step further, suggesting that Democrats wouldn’t have an obligation to endorse Ku Klux Klan leader David Dukes if he won a Democratic primary. Jacobs’ comparison of a Black democratic socialist to an infamous Klan leader drew swift and widespread backlash. 

Though she did not have support from state Democratic institutions, Walton did receive backing from some Democrats, including U.S. Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, and the Erie County Democratic Party. Ultimately, though, she lost the general election to Brown, who ran a successful write-in campaign.

Like with Walton, the leaders of the state Democratic Party have not yet announced their support for Mamdani, even as other Democrats and unions have begun lining up behind him. Walton spoke with City & State about what it’s like to watch a situation similar to hers unfold over 350 miles away, her thoughts on the direction of the Democratic party and her hope that Democratic leadership won’t make the same mistake it made four years ago. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What are your thoughts about seeing Gov. Hochul once again declining to endorse a democratic socialist who won a Democratic primary for a major city in New York?

I’m not surprised at all. I mean, this is a person who once had an A+ rating from the NRA and was pro-life. (City & State could not find any evidence that Hochul has publicly expressed pro-life positions.) So she comes from a pretty conservative background. She runs as a Democrat because this is New York state, and that's how she gets into office. But she's not progressive by any means.

Do you think she will come around this time in a way that she didn’t with you? Or do you think that Hochul will leave Mamdani out to dry?

I do think that because she has (Lt. Gov. Antonio) Delgado as an opponent early on, and she knows the value of the downstate vote, I think that she may come around. If she's smart, she will. And I think that she's a politically astute person, so I could foresee her coming around and endorsing him eventually.

What was it like seeing Mamdani win, especially with your history of running against a heavy favorite and shocking everyone to win?

I watched the race very closely. I think I paid more attention to what was happening in New York City than I did in Buffalo, because it was exciting. I watched with so much joy and so much pride. Every time I saw the polls and I saw him closing in, I knew that it was real, and I knew that it was more real than other people thought it was. I had a feeling going into (Election Day) that he was going to pull it off in the first round.

What advice, if any, do you have for him now that he’s headed into the general, where like you he is running against the incumbent who isn’t on the Democratic line?

I think my best advice to him is to stay the course. I think he's been doing a great job so far. It's my hope that he'll be able to talk more about the issues and his platform, and not always be defending things that other people said, or giving English lessons or foreign language lessons about what words mean to people. I think that he stays the course, he continues to energize and motivate his base, both of voters and volunteers. And just dig in deeper.

Returning to the governor, and to an extent Jay Jacobs as the chair of the state Democratic Party, do you think they have learned anything from their situation with you?

I don't think they learned a single thing. I still have not received an apology from Jay Jacobs. (Jacobs issued a public apology for comparing Walton to former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke.) I think that the lesson in this is that to unify the party, you get behind the Democratic nominee like you always said that you did. Like you told us to do last year when Kamala (Harris) was running. 

I think that there are two different sets of rules for two different types of Democrats. When it comes to a moderate Democrat, we need to vote blue no matter who. But when it's a progressive who is fighting for working class people, then everyone has apprehensions or wants to have personal conversations and wants to be convinced. Democrats are so procedural. This is the procedure. He won the nomination fair and square, and they need to line up behind him and support him. And not only in word, but in deed. They need to be doing it with money, with capacity, with volunteers and with their full throated support.

I recently asked the governor about her decision not to endorse yet, and she said that she is still talking with Mamdani and can take as much time as she needs. Is this the kind of language you expect to hear from the leader of the state’s Democratic Party?

It's the type of language that I expect to hear. It's not the type of language that I want to hear. I would want her to display more leadership than that. And it's not as if Zohran is a stranger to her. He's been an Assembly person for quite some time now. She should be very familiar with him and his record and how he votes and what he stands for and what he believes in. So I think that is the coward's way out. And I think that as the leader of the party in New York state, Kathy Hochul has a responsibility to stand tall, stand firm and stand on business and go ahead and endorse him. 

We’re already seeing moderate Democrats like Rep. Tom Suozzi coming out and warning against taking the wrong lessons from Mamdani’s win, (arguing) that people didn’t vote for socialism, but for affordability and that moderate Democrats who can connect with the working class again are the future of the party. What would you say to those Democrats?

That is the most idiotic thing that I've heard today. I mean, the reason for Zohran’s platform of affordability is because he carries the values of democratic socialists. I think democratic socialists running on a very similar platform – winning the primary in Buffalo in 2021 and now a democratic socialist with a very similar platform winning the primary in 2025 – are not isolated incidents. It is a mandate. It means that the people do want platforms and policies that are centered on economic equity and affordability, and moderate Democrats have not given them that. The problem is that when the Democratic voters choose economic progress over moderates who prioritize their corporate donors, (moderates) then collude with whom they claim to be our opposition – meaning Republicans and the GOP and millionaires and billionaires – to stop us from making progress for working class people.

Do you think that you may run for office again one day?

That remains to be seen. I really need to see people in Buffalo catch up. Right now we have the chairman of our Democratic party (Jeremy Zellner) who is also the commissioner of the (Erie County) Board of Elections. We're not asking enough questions of how our political system is set up to keep people like me out. And I'm kind of tired of fighting to get in. They don't want me there. So I have other things to do with my time.

And I hear that Zellner is perhaps the favorite to win state Sen. Sean Ryan’s seat should he succeed in November to be the next mayor of Buffalo.

He’s a favorite of himself. No one else wants him there.

Though he has a fair amount of influence.

We have a solution for him. He’s not getting that seat.

Who would you and fellow progressives like to see in that seat?

(Assembly Member) Jon Rivera. The thing about it is that no one can win that seat without clinching the city vote. And overwhelmingly, Jeremy is not very well-liked within the city of Buffalo. In Erie County, Buffalo is the only municipality that doesn't have our own (Democratic) committee. We're lumped in with all of the other county committees. Jeremy's been using us, and especially particularly the Black vote, through Unity Coalition as pawns in his little checkers game. You can't even call it chess because it's oversimplified, and we're on to him. People are exhausted and done with him and his lack of leadership.