NYC Democratic Socialists of America ripped their rich co-chair Gustavo Gordillo as “not working class” this week as they debated making his position a $95,000-per-year gig.
Gordillo — who lives for free in a $1.5 million row house and lied about being a working electrician — and co-chair Grace Mausser approached the DSA last month about making their roles paid, saying their responsibilities had exploded with the chapter tripling in size since it endorsed Mayor Zohran Mamdani in 2024.
About three dozen rank-and-file members debated the proposal at a meeting of the south Brooklyn branch at Rullo’s bar in Park Slope Thursday night.
“I would love to see working class leaders be able to commit full-time to DSA work. But that’s not what this is,” said a 10-year member of the organization. “Gustavo is not working class. Grace is not working class. Most of our co-chairs and most people in the DSA have laptop jobs and are upper middle class.”
Gordillo, 38, who surfaced briefly this week to pose for a photo with “Squad” member Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), didn’t face his comrades, sending Mausser alone to defend him.
“This is not a referendum on the performance of Gustavo,” she insisted before opening up the floor for comments. “I hope the debate focuses not on the mistakes, successes, etcetera, of me or Gustavo…the time for us to have a referendum on that is at our election. That’s coming up in November.”
Mausser, 31, works as senior policy manager at nonprofit B Lab, which audits the performance of for-profit businesses, but it’s unclear if Gordillo does anything to earn a paycheck, since it was revealed the millionaire’s son was booted out of the electrician’s union for failing to pay his dues.
“I currently have a day job that feels sort of like a hobby, I do have to switch back and forth quite a bit and would love not to,” Mausser pleaded, adding she didn’t feel the $95,000 salary was especially “cushy.”
“It’s more than a lot of people make,” she admitted. “It was debated and discussed and 95 felt like a comfortable number.
“We’re kind of the face of DSA in New York, which wasn’t such a big deal in 2024 but now is a much bigger responsibility.”
But many members weren’t comfortable with handing the pair a combined $228,000 — a figure that includes the equivalent of $2,000 a month in benefits — which represents more than 20% of the NYC DSA’s $1 million annual budget.
Especially after Mausser admitted she and Gordillo would essentially answer to no one.
“I’ve gotten a lot of questions about who is supervising the co-chairs. I mean, the answer is no one,” she said laughing. “We’re not a nonprofit with a board. We’re not hiring an executive director. There’s no one that’s going to put me on a performance improvement plan.”
Some members felt they were being taken for a ride.
“This feels very much top-down leadership instead of bottom-up,” said NYC DSA’s Alex Rivera. “I’m not against paid leadership because, if s–t hits the fan, I need our co-chairs, Grace up there on CNN, top politics, like within the hour, right?
Rivera continued: “But the process of it seems very sketch. This process has been a bit of a sham, until the chapter is democratic, it feels icky to pass this.”
“It’s not what I thought I was signing up for….and that bothers me a lot,” said another member.
The NYC chapter gets $27,614 monthly from its share of national dues, plus another $47,000 in local dues it solicits directly from Gotham members. The chapter makes another $7,500 from merch, and gets some $4,166 from an “angel investor,” according to the budget it presented.
