Debunking the Myths: Zohran Mamdani and the Fog of New York
Setting the record straight on NYC's new mayor
Photo by Bingjiefu He – CC BY-SA 4.0
On November 4, 2025, New York City made history. Zohran Kwame Mamdani—a 34-year-old democratic socialist, state assemblyman, and the son of Ugandan and Indian parents—was elected as the 111th mayor of the nation's largest city. He is its first Muslim, first South Asian, and youngest mayor in over a century. His campaign, powered by a grassroots movement and a platform focused on radical affordability, successfully toppled the political establishment, first in the Democratic primary against former Governor Andrew Cuomo, and then in the general election.
Naturally, such a seismic shift was met not with sober analysis, but with a tidal wave of bad-faith attacks, Islamophobic conspiracy theories, and outright lies. The fog of misinformation has been so thick that even prominent Democrats have stumbled through it, condemning statements that were never made and positions never held.
It’s time to clear the air. Below, we dissect and debunk the most pervasive myths about the new mayor of New York City.
LIVE: Zohran Mamdani's Victory Speech in New York City (November 4, 2025)
Myth #1: Mamdani is "Illegal" or an Un-American "Foreigner"
The Claim: From the highest offices in the land came the basest of lies. President Donald Trump openly speculated that Mamdani was "here illegally" and threatened to have him investigated, stripped of his citizenship, and deported. This sentiment was echoed by MAGA commentators who labeled him an "un-American buffoon."
The Reality: This is a flagrantly false and racist trope. Zohran Mamdani was born in Kampala, Uganda, and moved to New York City with his family at the age of seven. He was naturalized as a U.S. citizen in 2018. He is a legal U.S. citizen, plain and simple. The attacks are a cynical attempt to otherize a man who has called New York home for most of his life and to intimidate immigrants who dare to speak up. As Mamdani stated, Trump's threat was "an attack on democracy" that menaced all New Yorkers.
Myth #2: Mamdani is an Antisemite or "Jihadist Sympathizer"
The Claim: Perhaps the most weaponized smear has been the charge of antisemitism. Critics, including Cuomo, have attempted to paint Mamdani's criticism of the Israeli government as hatred for Jewish people. Right-wing figures like Rep. Elise Stefanik have condemned him as a "jihadist candidate," and others have invoked the specter of 9/11, suggesting his election would be "no less catastrophic" than the terrorist attacks.
The Reality: This is a deliberate conflation of policy criticism with bigotry. Mamdani has been unequivocal, stating, "There is no room for antisemitism in this city or country." His critique is directed at the policies of the Israeli government, which he has described as "apartheid" and "genocide," not at Jewish people as a whole.
Furthermore, the claims are belied by facts on the ground:
- He has received endorsements from Jewish-led organizations like Jewish Voice for Peace Action and The Jewish Vote.
- New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, the city's highest-ranking Jewish politician, endorsed him and condemned Cuomo for the "weaponization of antisemitism."
- Mamdani has used his platform to speak about the threat of rising antisemitism and pledged to increase city funding to combat hate crimes.
Myth #3: He's a "100% Communist Lunatic"
The Claim: President Trump has trashed Mamdani as a "100% Communist Lunatic," a line eagerly repeated by conservatives to paint his platform as a Stalinist dystopia.
The Reality: This is a classic scare tactic, older than Trump himself. Mamdani is a self-described democratic socialist. His platform—which includes freezing rent, creating city-owned grocery stores, and making buses free—is a form of social democracy focused on expanding public services through taxation, not the abolition of private property.
In fact, since his primary win, Mamdani has shown a willingness to moderate, vowing to keep NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and expressing flexibility on funding his proposals without raising income taxes on the rich—stances that have created some distance between him and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). As he has stated, "My platform is not the same as national DSA."
Myth #4: He Called to "Globalize the Intifada"
The Claim: A persistent falsehood is that Mamdani personally used the slogan "globalize the intifada," which some interpret as a call for global violent uprising.
The Reality: This is a case of the media and his opponents twisting his words. Mamdani has never used the phrase. When asked about it, he reframed the discussion around intent, stating, "As a Muslim man who grew up post‑9/11, I’m all too familiar with the way in which Arabic words can be twisted, can be distorted, can be used to justify any kind of meaning." He clarified that the language he uses and will use as mayor is "grounded in a belief in universal human rights." The entire controversy is a manufactured outrage based on a statement he did not make.
“The president of the United States just threatened to have me arrested, stripped of my citizenship, put in a detention camp and deported. Not because I have broken any law but because I will refuse to let ICE terrorize our city.”
— Zohran Mamdani
The Real Zohran Mamdani: A Platform for Affordability
Beyond the smears, what does Mamdani actually stand for? His platform is a direct response to New York City's crippling cost-of-living crisis. His key proposals aim to use the city's resources to lower costs for the working class:
- Housing: Freeze rents on stabilized apartments and build 200,000 new units of permanently affordable, city-owned social housing.
- Transit: Permanently eliminate fares on all city buses, a policy he successfully piloted as an assemblyman.
- Childcare & Food: Implement universal, no-cost childcare and create a network of city-owned grocery stores to drive down food prices.
- Public Safety: Create a new Department of Community Safety to deploy mental health professionals and crisis responders, freeing police to focus on violent crime.
- Funding: Pay for this agenda by raising taxes on corporations and the top 1% of earners (those making over $1 million annually).
The Silence That Empowers Lies
The real story is not the existence of these myths, but the silence—and sometimes the amplification—they receive from political opponents and media figures. When a sitting president threatens to denaturalize a legally elected mayor, and when major political figures imply support for fabricated claims of "global jihad," they aren't engaging in honest debate. They are endorsing a performance in which racist and Islamophobic fearmongering is a valid political strategy.
The election is over. Zohran Mamdani is the mayor of New York. The question now is whether the city, and the country, will allow governance to be drowned out by a fog of lies, or if we will finally insist on a politics grounded in reality.
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