Rep. Tom Suozzi declares he’s a 'democratic capitalist.' What’s that?

**Brian Lehrer** (0:05)
From WNYC, I'm Brian Lehrer. This is my Daily Politics Podcast. It's Tuesday, July 14th.
With us now, Queens and Nassau Democratic Congressman Tom Suozzi, and he's here not just as a Democratic Congressman, but as a Democratic Capitalist. After three Democratic Socialists got nominated for Congress in the New York primary last month, Suozzi helped compose the document called The Promise to America, signed originally by 15 House Democrats or Democratic candidates. The Promise to America rejects socialism and embraces the word capitalism to describe one of its six principles. The six are capitalism, safety, fiscal responsibility, effective government, common purpose, and patriotism. What's more, for a document written by Democrats, it's pretty harsh in describing the party. It says, quote, the Democratic Party has lost sight of what has helped it govern and lead successfully, historically, unquote. Tom Suozzi's district includes a little bit of Northeast Queens, all of Northern Nassau County, and a bit of Central Nassau and Long Island. The Promise to America website notes he was one of only two Democrats to flip a Trump majority district from red to blue for Congress in 2024 Congressman, always good of you to join us. Welcome back to WNYC.

**Tom Suozzi** (1:26)
Hey, Brian, always great to talk with you.

**Brian Lehrer** (1:28)
How do you mean the word capitalist in Democratic Capitalist? Why embrace that word as a defining label for yourself?

**Tom Suozzi** (1:35)
I think it's important to recognize that our system of our economy in the United States of America has been the envy of the world, and a system based upon competition has resulted in more innovation, has lifted more people out of poverty, has made people's lives better.
There are very rough edges that come with capitalism. Fortunately, we have a system of democracy in our country that says all men and women are created equal, and even if you're not a good competitor, you should still have a decent life. You shouldn't be relegated to a life of misery. So there are many things that capitalism has not done a good job on in our country, especially currently with income inequality and with not enough people having affordable health insurance or housing or facing different problems we have today.
But the best system throughout history has been capitalism, not socialism. Do we need to do things to do better job here in our country? Absolutely. I'm not defending the status quo anyway whatsoever. But we need to rely upon this system of competition, which has resulted in the positive things I've mentioned. But we also need to do better job of, for example, rebuilding the middle class in America, of making sure people can afford to buy a house and educate their kids and pay for health insurance and retire without being scared. I'm a Democrat. I've always been a Democrat. I'll always be a Democrat. But I'm a Democratic capitalist, not a Democratic socialist.

**Brian Lehrer** (3:06)
You know some people these days will find it cringy to proclaim yourself a capitalist as a core defining feature, like you're embracing the oligarchs. And I know you just talked about some principles of equality, but why shouldn't people react that way?

**Tom Suozzi** (3:22)
Well, I guess they'd have to know me. I mean, I've devoted my life to trying to make people's lives better and to fight against the rough edges that have been created in our society to try and make people's lives better. And I think the answer, I think that the Democratic socialists, as well as Donald Trump, have done a good job of saying, I feel your pain and I know you're unhappy with things and our answer is to blow everything up. And I don't think the answer is to blow everything up. I think it is to try and fix the things that we have. You know, if you've ever done a fixing up something at your house or remodeling, you know, it's easy to demolish things, but then you have to rebuild it.
I think we need to repair, we need to mend it, not end it as Bill Clinton used to say.

**Brian Lehrer** (4:09)
So, what to you is the word socialist? Because Mamdani and others, Bernie Sanders, would certainly say that they are, you know, in the business of building things, not simply destroying things. So, what in economic terms that Mayor Mamdani or Bernie Sanders or the congressional nominees advocate for in their platforms, economic things, are you explicitly rejecting?

**Tom Suozzi** (4:36)
Well, if you look at the platform of the Democratic Socialist, there's a lot of things not just related to the economy that are kind of scary things, like abolish the Senate and abolish the presidency, and defund the police, and get rid of prisons, and defund the Department of Defense. But as far as economic terms go, Mayor Mamdani wants to increase the taxes in New York City dramatically. And the problem is, is that people are leaving New York City, and leaving New York State, because our taxes compared to the rest of the country are so much higher. And it's not working. People, when I was born in 1962, there were over 40 members of Congress from New York State. Today there's 26 members of Congress, and the next census it's going down. People are leaving our state because they can't afford to live here.