Immigrant business owners revolt against Mamdani’s ‘Soviet’-style grocery plan

An immigrant-led nonprofit is preparing to slap New York City with a lawsuit now that democratic socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani has unveiled plans for city-run grocery stores to sell products at 30% below market rates, the New York Post reported.

The board of the Multicultural Business Coalition voted to file a lawsuit in the coming weeks to block the initiative after Mamdani announced on Monday that fresh produce, meat, seafood, and “20 other essential items like cheese, milk, and bread” would be sold at a steep discount relative to privately owned stores — with “no exceptions.”

‘The mayor doesn’t seem to want to sit down with us.’

A letter notifying the mayor’s office of the coalition’s intent to pursue legal action is expected to be sent in the coming days, the Post reported. Frank Garcia, the group’s chairman, said the challenge “should be a non-partisan initiative.”

“The mayor doesn’t seem to want to sit down with us,” Garcia told the Post, warning that Mamdani “won’t be able to bully these lawyers.”

Founded earlier this year, the MBC represents roughly 65 organizations of business owners and merchants across the New York-New Jersey region, including Hispanic, Asian, Caribbean, African, Middle Eastern, Jewish, and South Asian-owned businesses.

However, the coalition is not alone in the fight against Soviet-style grocery stores in the Big Apple. Several other groups representing grocery store owners have spoken out against Mamdani’s plans, fearing that their bottom line could be jeopardized by city-run markets.

Radhames Rodriguez, president of the United Bodegas of America, told the Post that “having items that sell for 30% less than our prices means nobody will go to our stores.”

RELATED: Socialist Mamdani says city-run grocery stores will undercut supermarkets by 30%

Adam Gray/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Grocery executive John Catsimatidis, the owner of Gristedes and D’Agostino Supermarkets, has also bashed the proposal. In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, Catsimatidis argued that the mayor’s program “would collapse our food supply, kill private industry, and drag us down a path toward the bread lines of the old Soviet Union.”

To address concerns that the initiative could undercut privately owned stores in neighboring areas, Mamdani said the city-run grocery stores would not sell cigarettes, alcohol, lottery tickets, or hot food — items that typically generate some of the highest profit margins for bodegas and convenience stores.

“We know that a lot of what drives revenue for these bodegas, grocery stores, those are things that make it possible for them to continue to operate. Those are not things we have any interest in competing for,” Mamdani said.

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!