How does the left justify keeping Walmart out of New York City when it welcomes Mamdani Marts?

That question is at the center of a lawsuit the Multicultural Business Coalition filed in state court Monday.

The group (repping the interests of small, largely minority store owners) also filed a class-action suit alleging civil-rights violations if the city-owned-groceries plan goes forward.

Both cases call out the hypocrisy of the left around Gotham’s small business owners — and the ugly, absurd truth of the whole Mamdani-Mart project. 

Progs have long worked to keep Walmart out by arguing that the little guys couldn’t compete against the massive price discounts the chain has the scale to offer. 

Yet steep price discounts, 30% on “core goods,” are the central justification for Mamdani’s insane plan. 

Funny: The left sees those discounts as not just good but vital to “affordability” — but it’s worked for decades to block them if it means letting a free-market competitor set up shop.

Somehow, it’s OK if it’s not Big Business but Big Brother?

Yes: Progressives viscerally detest private enterprise, especially when it’s run by and caters to the folks — lower-income, minority — the left claims to care for most.

No wonder it’s so brutally difficult to open a small business in this town, a burden made even harsher by endless fines and fees like Gov. Kathy Hochul’s “congestion” tolls.

Decades of progressive rule on housing, taxation, workplace regulation and on and on are the true source of New York’s affordability crisis.

Of course, the injustices flagged by these lawsuits are just the latest contradictions within Mamdani’s still-incoherent scheme.

Ironically enough, the main achievement of the mayor’s “city-owned grocery” initiative turns out to be exposing the idiocy of his entire ideology.