Exactly a year before officially launching his mayoral campaign, Zohran Mamdani spoke over the phone with me about his frustrations with the state of the world.
The Oct. 7 attacks occurred roughly two weeks before our interview and many democratic officials rushed to champion Israel’s right to self-defense by then. Like his peers, Mamdani unequivocally condemned Hamas’ killing and kidnapping of Israeli civilians. But he could count on two hands how many party holdouts joined him in calling for an initial ceasefire and ostensibly advocated against killing innocent Gazans in the months and years to come.
In Chicago, a landlord murdered six-year-old Palestinian American Wadee Alfayoumi in a hate crime. “A landlord who he ran towards thinking that he [the landlord] was looking to play with him and instead he was met with multiple stab wounds,” said Mamdani.
The hostile climate evoked bad memories for the Queens-based state lawmaker who grew up Muslim in post-9/11 New York City. He distinctly remembered how his aunt feared wearing a hijab in public and stopped taking the subway. “She felt as if she could only be safe within the confines of the four walls of her home,” Mamdani recounted. Yet he believed lip service against domestic Islamophobia without addressing the plight of Gazans would ring hollow.
“What is so concerning to me is that many politicians think that they can, on one side of their mouth, give a message endorsing unrestrained mass murder of Palestinian civilians,” said Mamdani over the phone in 2023. “And on the other side of their mouth, say that there’s no room for Islamophobia seeking in some sense to distinguish between what they believe Muslims over there deserve versus Muslims over here.
“What these politicians do not seem to understand is that if you are someone listening to their rhetoric and you hear in their words that Palestinian life does not deserve the same anguish, the same protection [and] the same dignity as any other person’s life then it means frankly that life can be taken in the name of self defense, or a right to defend oneself.”
Still, protests across the city gave him hope. Mamdani believed public opinion swung in favor of his calls for a ceasefire but felt there remained a “chasm” in political representation.
On the doorstep of Gracie Mansion
On Oct. 23, 2024, Mamdani officially announced his long-shot campaign for mayor at the Connected Chef food pantry in Long Island City. Back then, his name-recognition sat at around 1%.
What he lacked in initial political backing he made up for in community support. While a groundswell of young voter turnout now characterizes Mamdani’s campaign, his day-one endorsers largely boasted older, working-class immigrant members. Advocates from early-adopter trio New York Communities for Change (NYCC), CAAAV Voice, and DRUM Beats packed the cozy venue as he promised a more affordable New York City.
Desis Rising Up & Moving (DRUM) racial justice organizer Simran Thind says sister organization DRUM Beats — which advocates politically for working-class South Asian and Indo-Caribbean New Yorkers — endorsed Mamdani as many members were familiar with his past efforts and felt his mayoral priorities addressed their material needs.
“The overall messaging is around platform, affordability [and] being able to really get to the core issues [in] a really simple and digestible way that a lot of our folks understood and resonated with was really what drew people in,” said Thind.
NYCC director of campaigns Alicé Nascimento recounts meeting Mamdani for endorsement talks back in Aug. 2024. Any initial reservations dissipated after meeting him and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now spin-off took the leap of faith in the millennial assemblymember.
“He was a candidate that wanted to be in partnership with our organizations, in partnership with immigrant communities of color and make them a center of what the New York that he envisioned,” said Nascimento. “And that’s the New York that we envisioned.”
Mamdani’s policy blueprint centering around freezing the rent and providing universal childcare also included a comprehensive plan to form a Department of Community Safety to address public safety beyond the NYPD.
“Fundamentally, New Yorkers want to be in a city that is run well and focuses on their needs [and] deals with affordability,” said Maurice Mitchell, Working Families Party national director. “And wants leadership that is decent [and] bold and could actually function.”
Mamdani’s message resonated with New Yorkers in extraordinary fashion over the next eight months. At 12:17 a.m. on election night last week, the state’s top law enforcement official Letitia James introduced Zohran Mamdani for his victory speech after presumptive front-runner and ex-New York Governor Andrew Cuomo conceded in the democratic primary race just hours after the polls closed.
“You need to understand that Zohran is really a man who respects the humanity of everyone,” said State Attorney General James. “The primary is now over and tonight we celebrate the victory … his critics said that he didn’t have the right name. Well, now all of them know his goddamn name.”
Fighting hate hits home
Throughout his campaign, Mamdani fielded questions on how he would approach combating antisemitism due to his pro-Palestinian beliefs. His consistent response is a public safety one by promising to ramp up hate crime prevention measures by 800%. During a press conference with State Senator John Liu on June 2, he pointed to conversations with Jewish New Yorkers who expressed their concerns.
“What they deserve is safety, and that’s why at the core of my proposal to create a Department of Community Safety is a commitment to not just talk about antisemitism, but to tackle it,” said Mamdani. “Increased funding for proven anti-hate crime programming by 800% … we need a mayor who can understand that innate humanity in each and every New Yorker, and will protect each New Yorker.”
Funding for hate violence prevention would rise from $3 million to roughly $26 million under Mamdani’s Department of Community Safety proposal. Money would go towards expanding programs in anti-hate education, restorative justice, enhanced reporting and victim services.
Hate crime prevention remains personal to Mamdani. After the Oct. 7 attacks, he told the Amsterdam News a man left him a voicemail wishing him and “all Muslims” death, and brain cancer upon his firstborn child (he does not have kids). Earlier this month, the NYPD investigated a car bomb threat from a “repeat caller” against Mamdani (he does not own a car).
Islamophobia against Mamdani escalated nationwide after his democratic primary victory last week. Many attacks came from elected officials across the country. Rep. Andy Ogles called him “little Muhammad” and penned a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate his naturalization. Rep. Nancy Mace alluded to New Yorkers failing to “never forget” 9/11 by electing Mamdani.
NYIC Action president and CEO Murad Awawdeh believes this “Islamophobic meltdown” is dangerous to both Mamdani and the entire Muslim community at large, and stems from fear of his platform for working class and immigrant New Yorkers.
“Zohran Mamdani is a product of our community,” said Awawdeh. “He came to the United States as a child, he was able to live in the New York City we all love. And that’s what he’s fighting for. To be able to continue to be able to have New Yorkers of all stripes to afford to live in the city of New York and to live in a safe city — a city that allows them to thrive and not just barely survive.”
Mamdani looks beyond the blue
But the $1.1 billion Department of Community Safety plan covers more than hate violence. When Mamdani spoke with me this past April about his public safety plan, he envisioned centralizing existing non-police crime prevention strategies into one office and ramping up their funding while the NYPD focused on solving more serious crimes.
The Crisis Management System celebrated for reducing gun violence by squashing beefs and providing jobs would receive a 275% funding boost. The NYPD’s B-Heard pilot would be overhauled and expanded the mental health response program to every neighborhood.
While the programs might not be novel, the approach may be. Alex Vitale, professor of sociology at Brooklyn College and coordinator of the Policing & Social Justice Project, reviewed an earlier draft for the Mamdani campaign and says the proposal will allow the most overpoliced Black and Brown neighborhoods to imagine public safety solutions beyond badges and guns.
“Part of the problem has been that political leaders in the city have told these communities that they can either have more policing or they can have nothing,” said Vitale. “And of course, that has led some of them to lean heavily on policing as the solution to all their problems. What’s exciting about a potential Mamdani administration is the commitment to putting more choices on the table.
“When we put more options on the table for communities, we’re going to learn very quickly that there are a whole list of other things that they would like to have to keep their community safe, other than just intensive and invasive policing.”
Thind believes Mamdani importantly shifted core public safety discussions toward addressing the root causes like housing and away from “surface-level solutions” like forcible hospitalization and incarceration.
She says DRUM overwhelmingly supports Mamdani’s Department of Community Safety plan. But the organization, which includes the family of Win Rozario — a Queens teenager police killed during a mental health response last year — remains concerned over NYPD involvement with B-Heard, which currently does not guarantee a non-police response.
“This is a policy platform that we are more critical of,” said Thind. “We still have some concerns around police still responding to those calls. And that doesn’t necessarily solve the problem of mental health response [with] police.”
Still, she believes a potential Mamdani administration will hear out DRUM’s concerns thanks to their working relationship. Much of the organization’s confidence in the democratic candidate stems from his “backbone” supporting Palestine. “It matters to our members,” Thind said.
Back in 2023, I asked Mamdani if threats against him would impact his advocacy on Gaza. “The intent of these threats is an attempt to silence any views that speak for the universal dignity of people,” he said. “If that universe includes Palestinians, and for me and for many others it does — when I received these threats — it does not make me question for a moment, speaking up on my beliefs.
“These are the beliefs that I ran on to be in this office. These are the beliefs that I hold and there’s no point in being in this office if it is simply to sacrifice those beliefs.”
Well done ! A real insight to the real Mamdani! His youth and optimism give me hope.