Uninvestable.” That’s how Exxon Mobil CEO Darren Woods on Friday described Venezuela under the current socialist regime. It’s also what Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his comrade Cea Weaver plan to make New York City’s housing market.

As rent restrictions drive thousands of apartment buildings across the city into disrepair and threaten a cascade of foreclosures, Mr. Mamdani has tapped Ms. Weaver to implement his goal of “decommodifying” housing. Their plan: Drive out private investors by making it impossible to turn a profit and keep properties in serviceable condition. Then the government will seize the buildings and hand them over to tenant collectives and nonprofits to manage under communal ownership.

The 37-year-old Ms. Weaver has spent her life since college graduation as a “tenant organizer.” She recently led the groups Housing Justice for All and New York State Tenant Bloc. Their stated goals: “To take back power from the real estate industry over our homes,” “expand rent control to every renter,” and build “social housing” that is “protected from market forces.”

This past fall, she taught an undergraduate course in community organizing at New York University—where the cost of attendance runs $96,988 because government subsidies protect it from market forces. The college ranks as one of the city’s biggest land owners, and it charges students $2,000 a month each to share a dorm room.

As in socialist systems, the higher-ups and insiders at colleges make out by exploiting the masses. Then, if their graduates go to work for nonprofits, much of their debt can be waived under the federal Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.

Ms. Weaver’s crowning achievement is a 2019 state law that restricts New York City landlords’ ability to pay for renovations by raising rent and does away with the ability to deregulate rent-stabilized units

Allysia Finley, Wall Street Journal