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Socialists and Republicans<\/span> agree on one thing: The insurgent left flank of the Democratic Party is ascendant.<\/p>\n After primary election night in New York marked a high-water point for the left, a GOP prankster left a bouquet of flowers at the door of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who was widely seen as one of the night\u2019s biggest losers.<\/p>\n \u201cThree losses in one night is tough,\u201d said Mike Marinella, the spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, in a statement. \u201cWe wanted so-called \u2018Leader\u2019 Jeffries to know our thoughts are with him, his candidates, and whatever remains of his influence in the Democrat Party.\u201d<\/p>\n He was referring to three House candidates with the backing of Mayor Zohran Mamdani<\/a> \u2014 two of them card-carrying members of the\u00a0Democratic Socialists of America \u2014 who notched victories against more established opponents.<\/p>\n In New York\u2019s 7th Congressional District, state Assembly Member Claire Valdez<\/a> handily beat Antonio Reynoso, a progressive backed by outgoing Rep. Nydia Vel\u00e1zquez; in NY-10, former City Comptroller Brad Lander swept away Rep. Dan Goldman; and in the closest and perhaps most surprising result of the night, former Columbia University pro-Palestine student organizer Darializa Avila Chevalier<\/a> narrowly edged out Rep. Adriano Espaillat, a powerful figure in Manhattan Democratic circles and chair of the Democratic Party\u2019s Congressional Hispanic Caucus.<\/p>\n In the wake of the stunning sweep, Republicans spent Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning gloating at the electoral headache they foresee the insurgent strain of left-wing populism causing for the Democratic Party. Or rubbing salt in the wounds of their enemies: President Donald Trump seemed giddy on Wednesday over the loss by Goldman, a centrist pro-Israel Democrat and an old foe from Trump\u2019s first term who worked as lead counsel in his first impeachment inquiry.<\/p>\n \u201cWeak and pathetic Congressman Dan Goldman just lost, BIG!\u201d Trump wrote on social media. \u201cI guess people didn\u2019t like him illegally targeting President TRUMP. In any event, this jerk is finally GONE!\u201d<\/p>\n Not everyone on the right was laughing, however. Christopher Rufo, the messaging wiz who helped build<\/a> a comprehensive conservative rebuttal<\/a> to 2020-era \u201cwokeness,\u201d took to X<\/a> to mutter darkly about therising threat of socialism, a phenomenon he described as the left moving \u201cfrom \u2018woke\u2019 to Third-Worldism.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThird-Worldism is a more serious threat to life, liberty, and property,\u201d Rufo wrote.<\/p>\n Trump, too, took a moment to be serious and call the candidates \u201ccommunists,\u201d making an impassioned pledge: \u201cAmerica the Beautiful will NEVER be a Communist Country!!!\u201d he wrote Wednesday.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The victories of all three left-wing congressional candidates appeared to confirm a staying power for Mamdani\u2019s popularity and power six months into his term in office, with numerous commentators declaring him a kingmaker. But Republicans predicted his profile is just as high at a national level \u2014 and not in a way that some Democrats would like.<\/p>\n \u201cRepublicans need a national boogeyman,\u201d said one GOP operative in the House. \u201cI think it\u2019s going to be very difficult for your mainstream Democrat in a toss-up district to separate themselves from Mamdani and those kinds of socialist insurgents who are running in these primaries. And our view is that they are just unelectable in a swing district where you\u2019re trying to win voters in the middle.\u201d<\/p>\n Corbin Trent, a former aide to Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, said he thought that GOP strategy was destined to backfire.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThese ideas that [democratic socialists are] lifting up again are very divisive, but I think we\u2019re misinterpreting who they\u2019re divisive with,\u201d Trent told The Intercept Wednesday. \u201cThey\u2019re divisive with people that are going to D.C. dinners, they\u2019re divisive to people at fundraisers, they\u2019re divisive to people in Beltway, and they\u2019re certainly divisive among the big donor class. But I think what [Republicans are] going to be surprised by is how they\u2019re not divisive among the electorate, among the 80 percent of Americans that have been struggling to understand how it is they live in the richest nation in history \u2014 and yet they can barely scrape by.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n In the attacks, Trent saw a potential for the class-based politics of affordability<\/a> championed by the Democratic Socialists of America slate in New York, along with other insurgent primary winners like Maine Senate nominee<\/a> Graham Platner, who was so successful in winning over supporters that his establishment-backed opponent stopped campaigning<\/a> weeks before the primary.<\/p>\n