Inside S. Asian political machine that used foreign influence to tip scales for Mamdani

 Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral campaign is powered by a South Asian political machine with ties to a Pakistani radical Marxist political movement — and foreign influence may have provided the tipping point in his primary victory, research shows.

For years, Washington has been alarmed about the prospect of foreign meddling in US elections stemming from online disinformation. Yet what if the foreign interference that policymakers so fear actually ends up playing out not in dark recesses of the internet — but in broad daylight on the streets of New York City? 

The immigrant-rights nonprofit Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM) — and its political arm, DRUM Beats — have built what insiders call the most effective field operation in city politics in recent memory. (The term “Desis” describes those of Indian subcontinental birth or descent who do not live on there.)

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Zohran Mamdani at a recent campaign rally in Jackson Heights, Queens, calling for full enforcement of New York’s sanctuary city laws.Corbis via Getty Images

According to the group’s own post-election claims, DRUM — described on its website as a “multigenerational, membership led organization of low-wage South Asian and Indo-Caribbean immigrants, workers and youth in New York City” — helped turn out more than 150,000 South Asian and Indo-Caribbean voters in June’s Democratic primary, with Mamdani beating Andrew Cuomo 573,169 to 443,229 in the third round of ranked-choice voting.

DRUM Bangladeshi turnout jumped 13% over 2021 levels; Pakistani turnout rose 11%. DRUM bragged that “almost half of all registered Bangladeshis came out to vote.”

In a September story on DRUM, the New York Times reported that turnout among South Asians in the primary increased by a staggering 40% compared to 2021.

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Kazi Fouzia, the director of organizing for Desis Rising Up & Moving (DRUM), speaking at a UN event.DRUM – Desis Rising Up & Moving

Mamdani, in an October Facebook post, cited this figure, writing, “This wasn’t an accident. From the very days of the campaign, we worked closely with organizations like @drumbeatsnyc and @caaavvoice, who canvassed more than one-third of all South Asian residents by the time of the primary. We made videos in Bangla and Urdu. We showed up everywhere, all the time. And we’re just getting started.”

That wave delivered Mamdani his margin of victory. According to a Facebook post by Bangladeshi author and community activist Quazi J. Islam, DRUM’s director of organizing, Kazi Fouzia, “had been campaigning for [Mamdani] since day one.”

In 2022, DRUM executive director Fahd Ahmed posted on Facebook about his “opportunity to engage with Mohiba Ahmed, Raza Gillani, and Ammar Ali Jan from Haqooq-e-Khalq Party,” calling the discussions “encouraging and impressive.”

The Post has reached out to Ahmed for comment.

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Pakistani political activist and academic Ammar Ali Jan of the Party for the Rights of the People moves in leftist cricles.Ammar Ali Jan / Facebook

Haqooq-e-Khalq, or HKP (“Party for the Rights of the People”), is a radical socialist movement founded in Pakistan by Cambridge-educated historian Ammar Ali Jan and veteran leftist Farooq Tariq. It calls for a synthesis of “nationalist movements of oppressed nationalities” and “the socialist movement.” 

Jan moves in the same global far-left network as Vijay Prashad’s Tricontinental Institute — funded by China-linked billionaire Roy Singham — and often appears with groups like the People’s Forum, which is facing congressional scrutiny for alleged Chinese Communist Party influence.

DRUM has co-hosted events with the People’s Forum and joined its “Shut It Down for Palestine” protests that have taken place across the country, including numerous events in New York, Washington, California and Philadelphia, which took place after the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel. 

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Raza Gallani speaking at a fundraiser for the mayoral campaign of Zohran Mamdani on Coney Island Avenue in Brooklyn this June.Haqooq e Khalq Party- HKP/ Facebook

In a January 2023 Facebook post, Jan announced plans to build “a solidarity network for Pakistani activists in the US.” Three key DRUM organizers — Raza Gillani, Mohiba Ahmed and Zahid Ali — were named in the post. All would play a central role in the Mamdani campaign effort.

Gillani, a Pakistani journalist and socialist organizer, joined DRUM as a communications specialist while continuing to identify as a co-founder of the HKP. In June, DRUM posted a video of Gillani leading a campaign rally in Queens with Mamdani standing behind him.

Mohiba Ahmed, a graduate student at NYU and longtime HKP member, served as a full-time community organizer for DRUM during NYC’s Democratic primary, only to reappear weeks later in Pakistan speaking at HKP rallies.

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Supporters of DRUM campaigning at City Hall in Manhattan in support of the Unemployment Bridge Program.DRUM – Desis Rising Up & Moving

Zahid Ali, a founding member of HKP now pursuing a doctorate at Rice University, was praised — in a post originally written in Urdu, the national language of Pakistan — by Jan, the party’s secretary-general, as a “struggle partner … who played a key role in Mamdani’s victory.”

While the Pakistani network handled one flank, DRUM’s Bangladeshi director of organizing, Fouzia, led the other. Community leaders credit her personally for mobilizing entire neighborhoods. 

Fouzia, who participated in a State Department exchange program in 2007, was, in her words, an “undocumented” migrant in the US until, she has said, receiving asylum.

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China-based billionaire Neville Singham and his wife, Jodie Evans, pour millions of dollars into leftist groups with influence in the US.Getty Images for V-Day

“We’re like a gang,” Fouzia told Politico in a July story about Mamdani’s primary win. “When we go to any shop, people just move aside and say, ‘Oh my God. The DRUM leaders are here.’”

The significant overlap between DRUM and DRUM Beats could pose legal liabilities as 501c(3) organizations like DRUM are barred by federal law from political campaign activity.

DRUM and DRUM Beats list the same address in Jackson Heights and have the same executive director, Fahd Ahmed. City records show Mamdani’s campaign paid DRUM Beats a total of $20,000 during the 2025 mayoral primary. Despite her campaign work, Kazi Fouzia is listed as DRUM’s director of organizing on her own LinkedIn.

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Zohran Mamdani at a press conference for the New York Taxi Workers Alliance at Diversity Plaza in Jackson Heights, Queens, on Oct. 30.Kevin C Downs forThe New York Post

The network’s ground game also played out online. According to analytics compiled from Mamdani’s social media accounts, reviewed by The Post, between June 1 and July 1, Mamdani’s Instagram followers jumped from 213,000 to nearly 3 million — a 1,295% surge — while TikTok grew more than 1,000%.

As the primary election neared, engagement by users in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh outnumbered those in the US. Coordinated messages like “Let’s go bhai!” (“brother”) were repeated in more than 750 nearly identical comments on Instagram.

There’s little doubt that the organization’s influence on the primary was decisive. A 13% jump in Bangladeshi turnout and an 11% rise among Pakistani voters would easily span the gap between Mamdani and Cuomo.

https://nypost.com/2025/11/03/us-news/how-a-foreign-political-machine-tips-the-scales-for-mamdani/

Nearly a million ready to flee NYC if Mamdani becomes mayor, possibly largest exodus in history: poll

 Hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers are prepared to bolt from the Big Apple if socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani wins Tuesday’s mayoral race — potentially setting the stage for the largest population flight in US history, an alarming new poll warned early Monday.

Around 765,000 people of the 8.4 million residents who call New York City home are preparing to leave, with about 9% of New Yorkers sharing that they would “definitely” leave the city if Mamdani is elected the 111th mayor, the Daily Mail reported, citing a survey conducted by J.L. Partners.

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Zohran Mamdani attends a canvass lunch on Sunday, November 2, 2025.James Keivom

If those residents were to leave, it would be equal to the population of Washington, DC, Las Vegas, or Seattle fleeing the city.

Another 25% of New Yorkers — about 2.12 million — said they would “consider” packing up and leaving.

Among high earners, 7% of those making over $250,000 a year said they would definitely flee.

Poll results highlighted widespread unease about the 34-year-old assemblyman taking over City Hall, warning that a mass departure could have severe economic consequences nationwide.

“If anywhere near that number actually left, the economic impact would be seismic,” pollster James Johnson told the outlet. “Older New Yorkers, Staten Islanders, and white voters are the most likely to say they would pack up and go.”

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People vote in the mayoral election on November 2, 2025.Getty Images

“When asked to sum up what Mamdani’s New York would look like, respondents called it a ‘disaster,’ ‘hell,’ and — cover your ears, kids — a ‘sh–hole,’” he added.

Men were more likely than women to say they’d leave — 12% of men and 7% of women say they’re sure to move, with roughly a quarter of each group considering it. Voters ages 50 to 64 showed the strongest desire to flee, with 12% certain and 33% weighing a move, according to the poll.

By race, 13% of white New Yorkers and 11% of Asian residents said they would definitely leave.

Staten Island voters led the stampede, with 21% saying they’d go and another 54% considering it. In Manhattan, 6% say they’d flee and 20% are unsure; in Brooklyn, it’s 8% and 18%.

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Mamdani speaks during a campaign event on November 1, 2025.Getty Images

The Carolinas, Florida, and Tennessee have emerged as top escape destinations thanks to lower income taxes and property taxes.

At least 1.9 million voters are expected to vote in the race, topping the 1.5 million who voted when Republican Michael Bloomberg defeated Mark Green in 2001, and believed to be the highest Big Apple turnout since nearly 2.5 million headed to the polls in 1969 to elect liberal John Lindsay.

As of Sunday night — when early voting ended — 735,317 New Yorkers had flocked to the polls.

Mamdani held a 6.6-point lead over former Gov. Andrew Cuomo with 72 hours left before the election, his narrowest margin since July.

A new AtlasIntel poll released Saturday shows Mamdani at 40.6%, followed by Cuomo at 34% and Republican Curtis Sliwa at 24.1%.

However, the latest RealClearPolitics average still puts Mamdani comfortably ahead by 14.5 points, keeping him firmly on track to become New York City’s next mayor.

https://nypost.com/2025/11/03/us-news/nearly-a-million-new-yorkers-ready-to-flee-nyc-if-mamdani-becomes-mayor-poll/

The Great Physician Exodus: How Bureaucracy, Burnout, Bean Counters Drive Doctors Away

 

By Brian C. Joondeph, M.D.

A new study in the Annals of Internal Medicine found that nearly 5% of U.S. physicians left clinical practice in 2019, representing a 40% increase in just six years.

It confirms what every practicing doctor already knows: America’s physicians are burning out, checking out, and getting out, with female physicians and those in rural areas being the most likely to exit.

The study, conducted by Rotenstein and colleagues from Yale, UCLA, and UCSF, examined over 700,000 physicians who treated Medicare patients and found that doctors caring for older, sicker, and poorer patients were more likely to leave the profession. Although the paper is descriptive rather than prescriptive, the message is clear -- the medical profession is hemorrhaging.

Medicine has become the only profession where the customer isn’t the patient, the boss isn’t the doctor, and the computer always wins.

The reasons for this mass departure aren’t mysterious; they’re baked into the system.

For many doctors, it’s death by a thousand clicks. The modern doctor’s day is no longer defined by caring for patients but about feeding the bureaucratic beast. Electronic health records were promoted as time-savers, but they quickly became time thieves. 

For every hour of patient care, physicians spend nearly two hours on documentation and desk work. None of it enhances health care, but all of it keeps lawyers and administrators satisfied. Sacrificed are evenings with family, replaced by late-night charting marathons to satisfy billing requirements.

Then there’s malpractice anxiety, the ever-present sword of Damocles. Roughly one in three physicians has faced a lawsuit at some point in their career. Even in states with tort reform, a single bad outcome or an opportunistic attorney can bring years of stress and financial burden. 

The result is “defensive medicine,” where tests and referrals are ordered not because patients need them but because lawyers might. There is also the psychological stress. Any physician who has been sued, whether the case had merit or not, carries that scar forward. Every future patient becomes a potential plaintiff.

Add to that decreasing reimbursements and increasing costs. Medicare physician payments have fallen 33% since 2001 after adjusting for inflation, while practice expenses have risen 59% during the same period.

Insurers set payment rates that barely cover overhead, while inflation, staffing shortages, and mandatory technology upgrades push expenses higher. Independent physicians, those who still see medicine as a calling rather than a corporate job, are selling out to hospitals. 

According to the AMA, “The share of physicians working in private practices in 2024 was 42.2 percent, a decline of 18 percentage points from 60.1 percent in 2012.” In other words, less than half of doctors remain in private practice.

Private equity’s involvement in medicine has surged. Their approach is straightforward: Acquire practices, increase productivity, cut expenses, and sell for profit. For doctors, this translates to more metrics, less independence, and ongoing pressure to see more patients in less time. The outcome isn’t about efficiency -- it’s corporatized medicine, where healing becomes a profit center and burnout a rounding error.

Blue Cross Blue Shield now uses AI algorithms to cut payments to doctors they believe are overcharging for their most complex patients. Yet politicians face no such “adjustments” for their own ongoing fiscal malpractice.

Surveys reveal that approximately 45% of U.S. physicians currently report symptoms of burnout, and 1 in 5 doctors plan to leave clinical medicine within the next two years.

Where are all these doctors heading?

Some retire early, feeling exhausted and disillusioned. Others find new careers in consulting, biotech, or administration -- anything that doesn’t require insurance pre-authorizations or “productivity dashboards.”

A growing number switch to concierge or direct-pay practices, charging cash and bypassing the insurance middleman entirely.

It’s not that doctors no longer want to care for patients, but they simply can’t within the current system. As one colleague said, “Medicine used to be about healing the sick. Now it’s about satisfying the spreadsheet.”

Who will be left to care for us? A 2024 AAMC report found “the nation will face a physician shortage of up to 86,000 physicians by 2036.”

But that may be optimistic. As more doctors leave the profession, their replacements will likely come from three sources: foreign medical graduates (FMGs), nurse practitioners (NPs), and physician assistants (PAs).

FMGs have long been vital to America’s healthcare system, especially in underserved rural regions. However, obtaining an H-1B visa is complex, costly, and unpredictable.

The Trump administration proposed significantly increasing H-1B visa fees, up to $100,000, which, if enacted, would effectively prevent most foreign doctors from practicing in the US.

While many FMGs are excellent healthcare providers, language and cultural differences can create communication challenges, especially in high-pressure situations.

NPs and PAs are valuable members of the care team, but they are not physicians, and pretenting otherwise weakens both quality and accountability. Their overall training typically makes up about one-sixth to one-eighth of a physician’s clinical hours.

More patients now see an “advanced practice provider” instead of a doctor, often without being informed. While that might be acceptable for simple issues, it becomes risky for complex, undiagnosed, or high-risk cases.

The chickens have come home to roost. Patients are waiting longer for appointments and traveling farther to find doctors still accepting new patients. It now takes an average of 31 days to schedule an appointment in the 15 largest U.S. metropolitan areas. 

Emergency departments are overcrowded, urgent-care centers are expanding rapidly, and telemedicine is being stretched beyond its practical limits.

In the long term, the physician exodus threatens not only access but also the core of medicine itself.

When doctors lack the time or autonomy to think deeply about their patients, care becomes purely transactional. The sacred bond between doctor and patient is replaced by cold efficiency, measured in “clicks per encounter.” Physicians are now just another “service provider.”

Fixing this won’t be easy. It starts with reducing bureaucracy, reforming malpractice laws, and paying physicians fairly for their time and expertise. Regulators must stop treating doctors as interchangeable cogs in a health care system. 

Technology, when used correctly, can be helpful. Artificial intelligence could one day take over the boring tasks of charting and billing, letting doctors focus more on patient care. But unless the culture changes -- if medicine stops prioritizing judgment over metrics -- the exodus will continue.

What we face isn’t just a labor shortage; it’s a moral crisis. A country that pushes away its healers with red tape, lawsuits, and bean counting shouldn’t be surprised when fewer people want to heal.

If we continue treating doctors like data clerks, we’ll get what we deserve: A healthcare system managed by accountants, defended by lawyers, and staffed by whoever’s left. And the ones who suffer the most won’t be the bureaucrats or executives; they’ll be the patients, waiting for a doctor who no longer answers the call.

Brian C. Joondeph, M.D., is a physician and writer.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2025/11/the_great_physician_exodus_how_bureaucracy_burnout_and_bean_counters_are_driving_doctors_away.html