Buffalo mayor-elect India Walton will be the “first socialist mayor of a big city in 60 years,” reports the New York Times, in a headline that is correct on all but two points: Buffalo isn’t a big city, and Walton isn’t a socialist.
Buffalo was a big city, once. In 1950, it had more than half a million residents and was the 15th-largest city in these United States. Today, the city’s population is less than half what it was at its peak, and it has almost fallen off the list of the 100 largest U.S. cities — it is No. 89, behind Lubbock, Texas, and half the size of Fresno, Calif. It is smaller than two of Las Vegas’s suburbs (Henderson and North Las Vegas) and less populous than several of the suburbs of Dallas and Phoenix (Plano, Arlington, Gilbert, Glendale, Scottsdale, etc.). The Buffalo metro area is much larger, of course, but that illuminates the point: The part of metropolitan Buffalo that Mayor Walton will try to govern includes only a small minority of the people.
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