Refugee who fled socialism warns Mamdani’s policies mirror Venezuela collapse

A Venezuelan refugee who has fled the political persecution warns that the socialist coverage is pushed by the mayor of New York Metropolis Zohran Mamdani will carry the identical hardships for America.

“Younger people who find themselves now making an attempt to assist socialist concepts as a result of they assume this time can be totally different – it could be no totally different,” Franklin Camargo, 27, instructed Fox Information Digital. “You do not need the federal government to dictate your life. You do not need the federal government to stop you from having ambitions, having needs, to try to your personal happiness. Imagine me, you don’t need that.”

Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist who in June the nomination of the Democratic Celebration for the Mayor of New York Metropolis in June, had aimed a marketing campaign to make the town reasonably priced for the common resident. His platform contains freezing rental costs, investing in public housing, metropolis -farming supermarkets, “free” childcare and better taxes on corporations and the wealthy. Mamdani has argued for extra equality within the metropolis, the state and all through the nation, and has argued that there shouldn’t be billionaires.

However Camargo, who escaped the regime of the dictator Nicolás Maduro, states that the issues with which New Yorkers are confronted are the results of authorities intervention and statism, not individualism or capitalism. He claims that coverage defended by Mamdani are “anti-American” and have led to disastrous ends in Venezuela, Cuba, the Soviet Union and North Korea.

Democratic mayor candidate Zohran Mamdani speaks at his main election celebration, Wednesday 25 June 2025 in New York. (AP Photograph/Heather Khalifa)

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Camargo was solely a yr previous when Hugo Chávez got here to energy in Venezuela in 1999. His mother and father and grandparents lived in a affluent nation, as soon as the fourth largest GDP per head of the inhabitants on this planet. However Camargo grew as much as collapse Venezuela beneath “aggressive” socialist coverage: rental controls, nationalization of industries, censorship and assaults on the wealthy.

“They made it unimaginable for the common particular person to outlive with out the assistance of the federal government,” Camargo recalled.

As a toddler, Camargo visited the US twice on household holidays. These journeys left an enduring impression.

“I do not forget that I used to be stunned by the expertise, the vehicles, how organized this nation was,” he mentioned. “I used to be even impressed by the supermarkets – the number of Oreos, the number of milk,” he remembered.

A feminine shops within the dairy a part of a grocery store within the municipality of Manhattan, New York, on January 27, 2024. (Photograph by Charly Triballeau / AFP) (photograph by Charly Triballeau / AFP through Getty Photographs) (Charly Triballeau/AFP through Getty pictures)

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Camargo knew nothing about politics or financial system, however realized that totally different concepts had been utilized in america, and he needed to study extra.

In his teenage years, Camargo immersed himself within the works of economists Milton Friedman, Adam Smith and American historical past. He turned a pronounced advocate for capitalism and gave speeches and media interviews.

His activism bore severe prices. Whereas learning medicines, he was deported and a “terrorist” branded for difficult socialist ideology on campus. His cousin was imprisoned and tortured for his political opinions. Confronted with threats for his personal life, Camargo fled to america in 2019 and now works as a political commentator and presenter for Prageru.

He fears that the identical failed socialist coverage will get a grip in progressive cities akin to New York.

“Mamdani is a Venezuelan, a Soviet Union, a Cuban sort of socialist,” mentioned Camargo. “He’s speaking about nationalizing the technique of manufacturing. Chávez did that in Venezuela in most industries. He’s speaking about destroying billionaires. Chávez thought that the wealthy had an excessive amount of cash, and he went after them. And he constructed an equal society – everyone seems to be simply as poor. Greater than 90%.”

Individuals stand in line to purchase bread in a bakery in Caracas, Venezuela, on Friday, March 17, 2017. (Getty Photographs)

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He calls on Individuals to embrace the concepts and values that make this nation distinctive.

“America is the best nation on earth due to the values that this nation based,” he continued. “In 1776 there was nothing prefer it existed – the concept that the federal government ought to solely exist to guard particular person rights, and that each particular person has the best to pursue his personal happiness. That doesn’t imply that the federal government will make you cheerful.”

“It doesn’t imply that the federal government provides you with meals or housing … otherwise you give one thing that you simply want without spending a dime,” he added. “As a result of because the well-known quote says:” A authorities that’s large enough to offer you all the things large enough to take all the things away from you. “

He warned younger Individuals who embrace socialist guarantees that they’ll remorse it.

“Each time the socialism has been applied, it would not work,” mentioned Camargo. “This time there might be no totally different.”

The Zohran Mamdani marketing campaign didn’t instantly return Fox Information Digital’s request to remark.

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