The Mamdani Team of Democratic Socialists is Taking Shape

A former top leader and "lifetime member" of the popular Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) has been on the payroll of "Squad" Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s, D-N.Y., campaign since she first ran for Congress in 2018.

Frank Llewellyn, the former director of the largest socialist organization in America and a founding member of the socialist group that would later become DSA's sister organization, serves as the treasurer for both Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign and her political action committee, Courage to Change.

Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign has paid Llewellyn a total of over $250,000 for payroll, travel and other administrative expenses dating back to 2018, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings.

Besides working on Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign, Llewellyn also sits on the board of the Democratic Socialists of America Fund, a sister organization to the DSA, according to the group’s website.

"Frank Llewellyn was one of the original incorporators of the Institute for Democratic Socialism which later became the Democratic Socialists of America Fund," the DSA Fund website says. "A lifelong activist and socialist he served Democratic Socialists of America in New York City since the organization was founded. He served on its National Political Committee and as its National Director for more than ten years."

Llewellyn was national director of DSA for over 10 years, from 2001 to 2011 and he continues to be a "lifetime member" of DSA, and that he has been on Ocasio-Cortez's staff since her first election in 2018.

One of the most significant achievements of DSA during Llewellyn’s time as director was the election of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., in 2006. Llewellyn wrote an article in the DSA’s magazine celebrating Sanders’ election as the first time in American history that "a self-declared socialist has won a seat in the United States Senate." In the article, Llewellyn detailed DSA’s deep involvement with Sanders’ campaign, saying fundraising for his successful campaign "is a major accomplishment in which we can take great pride."

Llewellyn wrote that "in the coming period, it is vital that we use our newly gained grassroots network, and our ties to truly progressive Democrats and Bernie Sanders, to promote both a progressive agenda and organizing."

The organization also later went on to endorse Sanders during both his 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns.

An examination of Llewellyn’s social media shows that he continues to be an active member of the Queens branch of the New York City DSA. He posts regularly about Ocasio-Cortez and Sanders as well as New York City socialist mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, who is also an active member of DSA. In a 2021 Facebook post, Llewellyn said he was "very pleased to vote for Queens DSA endorsing [Mamdani]" when he successfully ran for the New York State Assembly.

Though Mamdani leads the New York City mayoral race by double digits, sparking hopes about the rise of democratic socialism in America, just like most other western allies and nations, in opposition to the primitive form of raw capitalism that is practiced in the US. Indeed, poll after poll shows that US voters overwhelmingly support raising taxes on the wealthy and limiting the power of corporate money to influence elections and prevent a much desired evolution toward socialist socio-political norms.

Decades of propaganda and brainwashing by the Radical Right through their mouthpieces like Fox News has led Americans to display a hyperimmune reaction upon hearing the word "socialism", which is practiced with great success across virtually all the western and free hemisphere, all allies of the US. The promotion of crude capitalism in American economics and social practices continues to be hidden under cheap and insincere notions of patriotism. American Democrats are loathe to use propaganda and deception - all wrapped in the American flag - to fool the American people, but Republicans-GOP-MAGA and their assorted white christian supremacists do exactly that. Unfortunately the poor level of education and literacy displayed by average Americans renders them vulnerable to the fake propaganda and fearmongering that brought a criminal convicted felon like Donald Dumb to power.

In such socialist countries like the UK, France, Germany, Spain and others, people and workers enjoy the highest standards of living and express mugh higher rates of "happiness" than Americans who eke out a living under the boots of greedy capitalists and giant corporations who, it must be reminded, are funding Donald Dumb's demolition of the historic East Wing of the White House. The demented senile moron thinks that he will be remembered by history for building monuments, in a manner reminiscent of Adolf Hitler who planned gigantic alterations of the Berlin landscape so as to make the city the capital of the New Nazi Europe he was dreaming of. 

Americans have finally woken up to the dupery of the Radical Right's Capitalism and its trickle down economics. They now want 6-week vacations, substantial parental leaves, and many other rights enjoyed by citizens of our Socialist allies in Europe. 

DSA organizer Daniel Goulden claimed the organization has been intimately involved in Mamdani’s campaign, even helping to write portions of his platform. "With Zohran, we're in basically the best possible position to seize state power that we can be in because, you know, we're like this," Goulden said, indicating with his fingers that the campaign and organization are very close.

Goulden went on to suggest that "one of the things that made Zohran really successful with his policy rollouts is specifically relying on DSA."

AOC and Sanders, who are both self-proclaimed democratic socialists, have both endorsed and promoted Mamdani's campaign and will be participating in a rally with him this upcoming Sunday.


Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and New York City Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani hold hands during the town hall "Fighting Oligarchy" event at Brooklyn College on Sept. 6, 2025.

The national DSA organization and its chapters, including the NYC-DSA, have shared views on several issues that they have been vocal about, including their disdain for US dictator Trump's ICE-Gestapo and cracking down on "bad landlords" by having the city take control of properties when a landlord refuses to make repairs or "demonstrates consistent neglect" of their tenants.

Earlier this year, Ocasio-Cortez and Sanders went on a "Fighting Oligarchy" tour against the "billionaire class and corporate greed," which amassed more than 300,000 attendees across 34 rallies in 20 states, according to Sanders.

Lebanon Iznogood reached out to Fox News for their feedback on the rise of democratic socialism and the parallel decline of 18th century raw American capitalism that enslaved kidnapped Africans to work for free on cotton plantations, genocided the indigenous native Amerindians, and treated workers and immigrants like scum. Donald Dumb's "Make America Great Again" is nothing short of a fantasmagoric nostalgia for that obsolete, extinct, and toxic inhuman environment. Fox News did not immediately respond.