Rep. Michael Rulli, a Republican from Ohio, has raised concerns about New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s proposal to establish government-owned grocery stores, warning that the plan could devastate the U.S. food industry. Rulli, whose family operates a small chain of two grocery stores in Youngstown, Ohio, argued that the plan would eliminate competition, erode profit margins, and ultimately lead to higher prices for consumers.
Mamdani, a self-declared democratic socialist, has proposed a pilot program of five government-owned grocery stores – one in each New York City borough – in a bid to reduce food insecurity in underserved areas and bring down grocery costs. However, skeptics like Rulli note that grocery stores already operate on razor-thin profit margins, generally between 1% and 3%.
His family owns and operates Rulli Brothers, a small chain of two grocery stores in the Youngstown, Ohio, area. ‘My brothers run that store, our family store… they have gone between [1.25%] and 1.7 net in the last five to six years,’ Rulli said. He warned that the pilot program, which currently calls for five stores, could be expanded to affect businesses both large and small if it gains traction. ‘Say you’re going to Cleveland, Ohio. And the mayor opens up ten government-run stores, half the cost of all the other different stores,’ Rulli posed. ‘Whether it’s a mom-and-pop or… a Kroger, or you can have a Harris Teeter, all these different players – all of them would go out of business, and you’d only have the government-run business. So once you have only government-run business, there’s no incentive for there to be creativity, competition, variety.’ He said costs could eventually go up as well if competition was muted.
Rulli argued that this would affect working-class Americans the most, as the loss of affordable variety, including the small corner stores in New York City colloquially known as ‘bodegas,’ would be a blow to their quality of life. He referenced a famous photo of former Russian leader Boris Yeltsin making an unscheduled stop at a Texas grocery store while in the U.S. and marveling at the selection of products. ‘You have the options on different size, amounts… There’s so many different things. And you’re going to have 15 or 20 kinds of varieties. That makes for a good quality of life,’ Rulli said. Then, directed at Mamdani, he said, ‘You want to limit the amount of things that they could buy at the grocery store? One of the few things that the blue-collar American, the populist American, can actually take comfort in is the variety of [items] at the grocery store.’
Mamdani, a 33-year-old member of the New York State Assembly, has garnered attention for his far-left policies and support from national-level Democrats like Reps. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. His ideas have made him an effective target for Republicans, who see him as a threat to market competition. Several Republicans from the Empire State told Fox News Digital last month that Mamdani winning the race in November could be politically beneficial for the GOP, though they also expressed that they would work against that outcome.
Mamdani is running against Republican Curtis Sliwa and current Mayor Eric Adams, a Democrat who is running as an independent candidate in the race. Cuomo is rumored to be eyeing his own bid as an independent as well. Fox News Digital reached out to Mamdani’s campaign for a response to Rulli.