Hedge-fund billionaire Bill Ackman plans to bankroll a New York City mayoral campaign, arguing that his affluent associates are poised to flood the election with money in an effort to defeat Democratic Socialist frontrunner Zohran Mamdani.
Ackman said he was “gravely concerned” because he believed the left-wing candidate’s policies would be disastrous, triggering an exodus of the wealthy that would endanger New York’s public services by hollowing out its tax base.
Arguing that his own support of President Trump would automatically disqualify anyone Ackman might put forward, the activist investor said he was making a public appeal: Anyone capable of taking down Mamdani in the Nov. 4 election should step forward and volunteer.
“Importantly, there are hundreds of millions of dollars of capital available to back a competitor to Mamdani that can be put together overnight (believe me, I am in the text strings and the WhatsApp groups) so that a great alternative candidate won’t spend any time,” he wrote.
“So if the right candidate would raise his or her hand tomorrow, the funds will pour in.”
It’s unclear whether New Yorkers would honor such a candidate. The recent intervention by Elon Musk in Wisconsin’s state supreme court election indicated the voting public does not always respond well to billionaires using their money to sway races.
New York mayoral races are notoriously unpredictable due to the city’s chronically low turnout. In 2017, for example, Bill de Blasio won reelection with only 14% of registered voters coming out to support him.
A large influx of New Yorkers heading to the voting booth because they are as concerned as Ackman could easily affect the outcome. If Cuomo can hold on to enough fundraisers, political pundits also point out, it’s possible he could run as an independent like Adams, splitting the left vote and spoiling the race.
Ackman, however, argued all these factors would support the emergence of a centrist candidate looking to position themself on the national stage. It could even be another businessman like Bloomberg, he suggested, although Ackman in an earlier post appeared to indicate he would not seek to run himself.
“For the aspiring politician there is no better way to get name recognition, build relationships with long-term donors, and to showcase oneself,” the hedge fund manager wrote, pitching the campaign like a business deal. “The risk/reward of running for mayor over the next 132 days is extremely compelling as the cost in time and energy is small and the upside is enormous.”
Billionaires are against Mamdani, eh? Something tells me he is the right guy for the job then.
Surely this billionaire Trump supporter cares about the interests of democratic voters
What a “centrist” guy this billionaire Trump supporter is.
Surely, the billionaires have the common people’s best interests at heart, right?
Right?!?!
An amazing endorsement from Ackman.
I mean, this guy must live in an insane bubble if he doesn’t understand that this will help Mamdami more than if he had endorsed them. I am sure NYC voters will just rally around a guy who, through funding, owns its allegiance to billionaires.
So kind of this guy to give Mamdani an incredible basis for an ad campaign.
Like, for real, does this rich fuck not understanding that the vast majority of the American populace wants to see more blue shells? Honestly, how could it be more clear? All Zohran has to do is something like:
There’s an old proverb that says you should judge a person by the enemies they’ve made. Well, I’ve made an enemy of the billionaire Bill Ackman, and he’s pledged a blank check to whoever runs against me. But, there’s good news: votes decide elections, not money. I’m not listening to the money. I’m listening to the voters. I’m listening to you. Let’s win this together.
Ok where can I find a crochet blue shell because that’s pretty rad
Yeah. Mr. Mangione would be the only person who I think of who could be competitive against Mamdani, on a campaign to “deny, defend, depose” corrupt billionaires and corporations from NYC.
Lmao holy shit, could you imagine if the other Mario brother gets acquitted and then Mamdani gets him to sign on as some sort of high-level city official? Honestly, considering the caliber of human that the current regime is appointing at the national level, we could do a damn sight worse than “some random engineer who got thrust into the spotlight, likely framed, and is now the patron saint of Healthcare as a Human Right”
does this rich fuck not understand
No.
Billionaires should not exist.
Ackman said he was “gravely concerned” because he believed the left-wing candidate’s policies would be disastrous, triggering an exodus of the wealthy that would endanger New York’s public services by hollowing out its tax base.
wtf? Is this really the route they’re going to take? I know, pay your fucking share of taxes and then there wouldn’t be a “hollowing out.”
If it’s a choice between hollowing out the billionaire population or the middle class, I choose the billionaires.
It’s not like they were paying taxes to begin with.
If it’s a choice between hollowing out the billionaire population or the middle class, I choose the billionaires.
Canoes?
A billionaire just causally announcing that he can influence, finance and promote an election using his money in order to get what only interests themselves … rather than in allowing democratic processes elect someone the people actually want and need.
All that money spent against them when they could idk just stop being little shits and pay their fair share. With interest of course
This is the biggest endorsement Mamdani could get. I hope New Yorkers are paying attention.
Billionaires hate him, genocide enablers hate him, fascists hate him, Nazis hate him, government criminals hate him, citizen concerned for fellow citizens love him.
This Texan Jew is about to send some donations to a Yankee antisemite.
*references to antisemitism are sarcasm based on comments from people who apparently loooove fascism*the left-wing candidate’s policies would be disastrous, triggering an exodus of the wealthy
Is that a promise? Look dude I’m already sold on him, you don’t need to keep selling him
That is what they always claim, don’t they? You can’t tax the rich, they’ll leave!!
Cool.
Where?
Where will they leave to? Europe? Good luck, taxes are way higher there (not enough , though) either way, you’ll be gone from what made you rich in the first place. You’re not going anywhere
Florida. We have no income tax, an increasing population of millionaires, mosquitos, alligators and homeless people.
Ohh! What’s not to like? 😵💫
They’ll go to some red state where fascist stormtroopers keep their boots on the necks of the poor… (ok yeah florida)
It’s wild that they billionaires are openly just saying “whoops, we can’t be letting the people elect someone good for them, here let’s fix that”.
It’s beautiful. Mamdani and any other socialist will campaign on this hard. These mfkers have gotten really dumb having amassed wealth in an environment where their ancestors had made relative peace with the working class in part by propagandizing that rich people are food for the workers. They seem to think that the status quo where people aren’t wholesale anti-rich is a stable equilibrium. I guess they’re not reading the latest data.
We need to fix democracy in this country. We can’t keep allowing the poor and brown-skin people to vote in favor to their best interest. At least the GOP, MAGA and Billionaires are swiftly working in a solution for this problem.
So they are ok with spending hundreds of millions of dollars, just not in any way that actually improves the city for the people that live in it?
It’s not about the money, it’s just misanthropy.
Exactly. The ‘public services’ he wants to save is bribery to avoid paying his fair share. This guy is offering a ‘powerful people’ club membership so he can avoid giving back to a society that enabled his mindblowing fortune. Our system has gotten so used to it he’s totally good with saying it all out loud as if he’s some sort of victim.
Society’s cancer.
A leech trying to explain why it’s good it’s sucking your blood.
“It’s not to make sure that I have a lot; it’s to make sure that I have a lot more than everyone else. Forever.”
People of NYC: your vote is far more powerful than this dude throwing his lunch money at the opposition.
Huh. I wonder why he just doesn’t vote for the other person. Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work? Isn’t that what poor people do? I was told voting was important… /s
That got tossed overboard by Citizens United. Money is free speech, and for most cases money is a big bag of votes.
Ackman is also a part owner of X, and that platform will also definitely be a big part of an effort to defeat Mamdani.
Edit: a family member just asked me what I think of Mamdani wanting to put a tax on all hiring, saying he proposed a 35% tax on the salary of all new hires. I googled this, and the only results are on X. The fix is in.
35% tax on salary is fine with universal healthcare, child care, education, housing, and food. I would give you 50% rates for that.
People think this is a scare tactic but that is what people want. Instead most pay 22%-24% anf can’t afford any of the above things.
https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/taxes/federal-income-tax-brackets
IS he promising universal housing and food? Big if true.
Estonians pay a nearly 50% tax on salaries, we get universal healthcare and education, but not the other stuff you listed. Would definitely be way happier if we got that. Happier than a couple of euros more post-tax salary could make me.
This is a hypothetical.
However, he wants affordable housing built by unions for new yorkers. Also city owned grocery stores to provide affordable and better options.
So let me get this straight. Current tax law favors billionaires. He’s concerned that progressive policies will target taxing billionaires forcing a mass exodus of billionaires thereby undercutting the tax base. In other words they’re already not paying taxes but taxing them more will make them leave. Make it make sense.
It’s sad because it does have to be a global movement. If my country decides to heavily increase taxes on the wealthy - as should be done - this is exactly what happens because they can just easily move to Switzerland or Monaco, or some other tax haven, and laugh us right in the face. It’s the genius of capitalism
Evidence shows that while rich people threaten to leave for tax or financial reasons, they rarely do.
Because generally speaking they aren’t that hit. Sweden, for example, removed its wealth and inheritance tax reeal fast once it was introduced in the 90s.
Norway introduced such measures with their current government and suddenly you have a ton of wealthy Norwegians finding their way to Switzerland. So yes, you do see it happening, and the more you’ll increase it the more likely they are to move and take their resources with them. I’m not arguing that we shouldn’t gax the rich, of course, but that it needs to be globally coordinated (which it will never be)
US taxes don’t really work like that. Any money earned in the US is subject to taxes, regardless of where the person lives. The only taxes they would avoid are state taxes.
Of course, this guy is a city mayor, so he’s not doing federal taxes.
It is at least plausible that taxation could cause a move, but if you are rich in NYC moving out would be forfeiting some of the prestige. Who wants to admit that money issues caused them to leave “billionaires row”?
IE. The rich can easily avoid state taxes but it takes special “accounting” to avoid national taxes.
Guess what we in Switzerland have though? Wealth tax and inheritance tax.
In USA it’s not even nationally coordinated. Forget about globally. That’s the whole point. The state doesn’t fix capitalism but rather violently enforces it.
That’s not how it works. If you’re American, you pay taxes to the US no matter where you live. If you work overseas you may have to ALSO pay taxes to the country you’re living in, unless you expatriate yourself (where the word “expat” comes from) or denounce your US citizenship completely and emigrate. It’s a mess.
Let them cry all they want, because they’re not going to leave. And if they do – good riddance. They contribute nothing to society anyway.
If you’re American, you pay taxes to the US no matter where you live.
lol… That’s not how rich people do things.
That’s why the founding enslavers setup a federal system of states. So the states could compete with each other to see who best serves capital.
