A leftist New York City leader who has campaigned to tax the rich lives in a seven-figure Brooklyn home purchased by his parents that was named on his boss’s controversial ‘shame the rich’ list.
Gustavo Gordillo, the co-chair of the NYC chapter of Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), resides in a $1.5 million two-story pad in Brooklyn’s Bedford Stuyvesant neighborhood, property records showed.
Despite his privileged position, the 38-year-old has called for lawmakers to ‘tax the rich’ and insisted on the redistribution of land ‘from landowners to the landless.’
He has also called for a rent freeze and last month argued that landlords do not have the constitutional right to make double digit returns on investments.
However he failed to share that his recently-renovated home was purchased by his parents through their company Chucuito LLC, an embarrassing detail which emerged when the property was included in Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s so-called ‘shame the rich’ list of second homes owned by the wealthy.
The recently-renovated home was flagged by the NYC Department of Finance along with thousands of other properties as potentially falling foul of Mamdani’s controversial tax on luxury second homes.
The list, which was reviewed by the Daily Mail, indicates that Gordillo’s Decatur Street home was purchased by Chucuito LLC in April 2019 for $935,000 and has only grown in value since then.
Chucuito LLC is owned by Gordillo’s father, Gustavo Gordillo Snr, and his wife, Elizabeth. Gordillo Snr confirmed to the New York Post on Tuesday that the corporation had purchased the home and ‘then we did the renovations.’
Gustavo Gordillo, the 38-year-old co-chair of the New York City chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, has reportedly been living in a seven-figure Brooklyn home
The home in the Bed-Stuy neighborhood of Brooklyn is valued at approximately $1.5 million and pictured before its renovations
That included work to the home’s facade, interior, roof and front door, and seemingly other ongoing construction.
‘My son and my other son both live there,’ Gordillo’s father told the outlet.
Gordillo’s father added that he had rented a property on the Lower East Side for the local leftist leader in 2016 and 2019, according to the Post.
The rental, which went through the same LLC, cost $2,600 a month for those years, per the outlet.
Gordillo’s parents own two $3 million homes in Florida, according to the outlet. His father became wealthy as the founder of engineering and construction firm Draftpros Inc.
On his public X profile, Gordillo lists himself as a ‘union electrician.’ He has not publicly commented on the attention that his family’s Brooklyn home has received.
Gordillo has frequently spoken out in support of the working class and against the rising cost of living.
The same post also showed a hand fan that said ‘Vote for Zohran,’ in reference to the incumbent NYC mayor Zohran Mamdani, an avowed Democratic Socialist.
Gordillo appeared on Fox News last month and said that landlords did not have the constitutional right to make double digit returns on investments
A screenshot of the document released by the New York City Department of Finance that showed Chucuito LLC as the owner of the Gordillo family’s Decatur Street property
Gordillo’s home is valued at seven figures, but it will not be subjected to the city’s new pied-à-terre tax, which taxes high-value residences not used as primary homes.
That is because the surcharge applies to one-, two- and three-family homes valued by the Department of Finance at more than $5 million.
‘The vast majority of properties and units listed in the roll will NOT be subject to the surcharge,’ the Department of Finance wrote of the ‘shame the rich’ list. ‘Only the roughly 17,000 property owners to whom DOF sent a letter are potentially subject to the surcharge.’
Gordillo graduated from Yale University with a bachelor’s degree in 2010, according to The New York Times.
He subsequently enrolled in the Ivy League school’s fine arts master program, according to the outlet.
Gordillo’s parents are Peruvian immigrants who arrived in South Florida with ‘nothing’ when he was just three years old.
‘Their first jobs were in fast food and cleaning houses,’ Gordillo told the Times. ‘They built success in this country. And they’re absolutely the exception.’
Gordillo said that his views moved further to the left once he moved to New York City after graduate school.
Gordillo also used his appearance on Fox News to advocate for a rent freeze in New York City, as he predicted that landlords would react by ‘crying’
He joined the NYC DSA chapter after Donald Trump’s first presidential election in 2016.
Around that time, Gordillo also became an electrician and joined the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, according to the outlet.
Gordillo appeared on Fox News last month to discuss his leftist views.
He said that no one, including landlords, had the ‘constitutional right to double digit returns on their investment.’
During his appearance, Gordillo also advocated for a rent freeze, which he suggested landlords would react to by ‘crying.’
New York City councilwoman Vickie Paladino blasted DSA in wake of the news about Gordillo’s home, calling the organization ‘a bunch of lazy, entitled, spoiled rich kids completely unable to fend for themselves, dependent on their parents money and mad at the world because they’re not capable of the same success.’
‘This is the guy who pretends to be a “union electrician” and smugly sat on Fox News and told us that grocery stores deserved to close and nobody was “entitled” to real estate profits,’ Paladino wrote on X.
‘All the while he owned a multimillion-dollar townhouse that his daddy bought him and renovated so he can live in gentrified luxury while demanding socialist revolution for the rest of us.’
The Daily Mail has reached out to Gordillo and NYC DSA after-hours for comment.
