It seems like a straightforward question: Where does Gustavo Gordillo, one of New York’s leading socialist organizers, live?

The question has turned into something quite mysterious — and revealing about the new left’s struggles around issues of wealth and class.

When The New York Times this month profiled Mr. Gordillo, who studied fine arts at Yale, the reporter, as is standard practice, asked the subject where he lived.

The question was relevant, in part, because many of the high-profile activists are the offspring of affluent parents who have not experienced working class life and basic financial pressures, like paying rent.

Mr. Gordillo and other leaders have been eager to dispel the notion that they are privileged socialists.

The reporter who profiled Mr. Gordillo, 38, noticed that his father, also named Gustavo Gordillo, had purchased a rowhouse in the quickly gentrifying Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn and that public records listed that as the younger Mr. Gordillo’s address. The reporter asked the younger Mr. Gordillo if living there contradicted his socialist beliefs.

No, Mr. Gordillo responded, saying he actually rents an apartment in Crown Heights, a nearby Brooklyn neighborhood.

The reporter was skeptical and asked for proof. Mr. Gordillo, a co-chair of the New York chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, provided some mail and a union membership card that had a Crown Heights address on it.

Then things got complicated. On Wednesday, The New York Post splashed its cover with an article quoting Mr. Gordillo’s father, saying that his son does live in the Bed-Stuy rowhouse.

The tabloid said the younger Mr. Gordillo was pursuing “his anti-capitalist lefty agenda while enjoying the life in the two-story, nearly 2,000-square-foot row home on a gentrifying tree-lined block in Bed-Stuy.”

The Times reporter reached back out to the younger Mr. Gordillo asking him to explain the discrepancy. That’s when Mr. Gordillo stopped responding to the reporter.

You may ask why the address of an ascendant socialist leader matters. But the question gets at the heart of an issue that has loomed over the increasingly powerful movement: Are the leaders genuinely tapped into New Yorkers’ economic anxieties and connected to the working class?

The issue is acutely sensitive for the New York chapter of the D.S.A., and as their movement becomes more prominent, it is drawing more scrutiny. Rising home prices have driven an affordability crisis all over the city, including in neighborhoods like Bed-Stuy, which for decades were home to working-class Black families. Reducing income inequality and high living costs have been two of the most animating issues for the D.S.A.

The D.S.A. is not eager to discuss the wealth or comforts of its leaders. On Friday, a spokesperson for the New York chapter of the D.S.A. said that the group’s policy would not allow them to comment on any member’s “personal details.”

The controversy demonstrates how glaring the spotlight can be for newcomers to the world of New York politics.

Mr. Gordillo and the D.S.A. have often vilified the wealthy. Now, his address — and whether he really lives in a rowhouse valued between $1 million and $2 million — has become a distraction for the growing left-wing movement.

Mr. Gordillo has listed the Bed-Stuy rowhouse as his permanent address in public records going back to 2020. His father bought the two-story rowhouse in 2019 through a limited liability corporation, tax records show. The sale price, according to public records, was $935,000. And documents filed with the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission in 2023 show plans for a gut renovation estimated to cost at least $1 million, with an addition and a roof garden. Renovations appear to be ongoing.

The Times visited both the rowhouse and the Crown Heights apartment this week. In Crown Heights, tenants said they had seen Mr. Gordillo in the building months ago. They recalled seeing two items posted on his apartment door: a campaign sign for Mr. Mamdani and an eviction notice.

Court records confirm that the landlord of the property in March filed to evict Mr. Gordillo for failure to pay rent. The D.S.A. spokesperson said Mr. Gordillo had “never been evicted.”

“Of all the neighbors who come and go,” said one longtime resident who declined to give his name, “he was the quickest to come and go.”

Questions about Mr. Gordillo’s housing surfaced as other aspects of his biography have become murkier. He moved to the city in 2013, after studying sculpture and video at Yale and worked in a high-end art gallery in Chelsea. He quit, he told The Times, because selling art to wealthy people conflicted with his values, and he decided to become an electrician.

In interviews, he has described himself as a union electrician. The Times confirmed earlier this month that he was a member of the local IBEW chapter, which represents electricians in the city, though the union said he was more than $300 behind in dues.

But the union also said that Mr. Gordillo’s enrollment in an apprenticeship program was terminated in March of this year after he failed to complete the required work.

So, is he really a union electrician? It is unclear.

The D.S.A. urged The Times to get back to more important issues.

“Do let us know if you or any of your colleagues at the NYT would like to report on our active campaigns,” the spokesperson said in an email.

Andrea Zarate contributed reporting.