Officer’s death tested what Zohran Mamdani police Zohran Mamdani truly believes
While Zohran Mamdani was asleep overseas, his senior campaign staff debated the tone and wording of his statement regarding the tragic shooting in Midtown Manhattan, where an off-duty police officer and three others were killed.
According to individuals involved in the discussions that night, drafts of the statement circulated repeatedly as new details of the incident emerged. Suggestions were made, challenged, and revised in a previously unreported moment described to Newfasttv.
This was a tragic moment, and many were watching for a carefully measured response,
some on the campaign noted. Others pushed back, insisting that their values could not be compromised.
The challenge was especially sharp for their candidate, who had long been navigating how to reconcile past speeches, public statements, and social media posts advocating for defunding or even abolishing the police.
As the hours dragged on, tensions rose within Zohran Mamdani’s small inner circle over how to respond. Aides argued about whether to wake the candidate, while some grew anxious that the campaign wasn’t treating the situation with enough urgency.
Those outside the core group even floated unusual ideas, including asking former Mayor Bill de Blasio to reach out to Mamdani directly.
The July rampage occurred just as Zohran Mamdani was concluding a two-week vacation in Uganda celebrating his wedding, creating a challenge for a campaign still adjusting to its Democratic mayoral primary victory a month earlier. His absence from New York-publicly announced in a social media video that poked fun at potential critics-suddenly appeared to some as a political liability.
The death of Officer Didarul Islam underscored the challenges.
Zohran Mamdani could confront if he wins the November election and assumes leadership of the nation’s largest metropolitan police force, following years of outspoken criticism of law enforcement.
Mamdani’s campaign frames the critiques he wrote, spoke about, and shared online during his five years in the State Assembly as products of a different political moment. Yet, the internal debates during what advisers view as a pivotal leadership test reveal that the mindset driving his long-standing anti-police positions continues to influence the campaign today.
Elizabeth Glazer, a former criminal justice adviser to both Bill de Blasio and current.
Mamdani rival Andrew Cuomo during his time as governor, and now founder of the group Vital City, told CNN that interpreting Mamdani’s positions is like “Kremlinology – watching the reviewing stand and trying to discern where people stand.
As Mamdani moves closer to a potential victory, he will need to reconcile his views with the realities on the ground in order to govern,” said Elizabeth Glazer, who recently joined an hourlong public safety forum with Mamdani, hosted by her group at Columbia University. “That will inevitably require finding common ground.
Jeff Dinowitz, a Bronx assemblyman who has served alongside.
Mamdani and chairs the Codes Committee overseeing police matters, said he is open to understanding why Mamdani’s positions differ now that he is running for mayor. “Some people are wise enough to recognize that what was true in the past may not be true today,” Dinowitz told newsfasttv.
When asked whether Mamdani fits into that category, Dinowitz replied, “There’s no way to know.”
Campaign aides declined to make Mamdani or his team available to explain how his views on policing have evolved or to address whether he still stands by his past statements. Instead, they released an official statement from the candidate.
I will govern based on my clear campaign agenda-one that New Yorkers have endorsed in historic numbers. Leading a city of 8.5 million people means listening to residents’ safety concerns and collaborating with police officers to develop effective solutions,” Mamdani said in the statement.
He added, “What I’ve consistently heard from rank-and-file officers is that we are making it too difficult for them to focus on their core mission: addressing violent crime.
They are overworked and often assigned duties outside traditional policing. I am preparing to confront this challenge directly, advance a whole-of-government approach to public safety, and demonstrate that safety and justice can go hand in hand.”
Long an advocate of police abolition and a critic of reform
Just a few years ago, Mamdani offered a sharp critique of the very image he now seeks to present as a mayoral candidate. In his current run, Mamdani has introduced the idea of creating a Department of Community Safety. While he has provided few specifics on structure or funding, the proposal envisions a department focused on community and mental health initiatives-areas that police are partly responsible for today and which were at the core of what the “defund the police” slogan originally aimed to address.
Five years ago, Mamdani appeared on a Zoom forum hosted by the New York chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, wearing headphones and a light red T-shirt as images of social justice protests rotated on the screen. During the discussion, he argued that body cameras had proven ineffective, pointing to their failure to prevent a Minneapolis officer from killing George Floyd. He also dismissed what he called “half measures,” describing them as superficial reforms in response to a system built on the punishment of Black people.
The solution is not reform, it is replacement. Each time the system is challenged.
it tries to absorb criticism by implementing superficial reforms,” Mamdani said during the session, according to video obtained by newsfasttv
Mamdani went further, urging a “wholesale replacement” of New York City’s political class and insisting that New York State “should not accept anything less than what we are demanding.” Speaking about policing, he argued, ” We do not need reform – we need replacement. We need abolition.”
Highlighting that he had pushed an opponent to return campaign contributions from a city police union,
Mamdani argued that the broader standard should be to reject all such donations. He said, “Law enforcement money comes from unions whose influence is rooted in the systemic killing of Black people across this city and the country.
In his initial 2020 campaign for the State Assembly, Mamdani argued that policing fails to provide safety for many communities in New York. Instead, he contended that law enforcement often escalates violence rather than reducing it. He also criticized the prison system, asserting that the way it is structured does not contribute to public safety and falls short of protecting society.
Mamdani has since clarified that he no longer supports the idea of defunding the police.
Speaking to The New York Times earlier in September, he explained that his past remark labeling police as “racist” was made in what he described as a moment of deep frustration following the killing of George Floyd. He added that he now regrets the statement and would offer an apology.
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Mamdani’s campaign did not clarify to newsfasttv whether his remarks to The New York Times were meant as a formal apology or if he had ever directly apologized for past statements. He also avoided addressing his 2020 position dismissing incremental reforms.
His path toward a mayoral run began in the spring of 2024.
Around that time, he removed earlier policy positions from both his campaign and official websites. By May 2024, his campaign site-once marked by the Democratic Socialists of America’s red-rose symbol-was replaced with a simple photo of him smiling with a cup of tea. Later that year, the site’s content was taken completely private as his messaging strategy evolved.
Despite efforts to overhaul his online presence,
Portions of Mamdani’s earlier website remain accessible through the Internet Archive. Records show that as recently as December 2023, he publicly described the New York Police Department as “racist.” One archived passage reads:
We cannot reform our way out of a police system built on racism, which functions exactly as intended—to exert control over Black and Brown communities in New York. We need to dramatically reduce the power and presence of the NYPD
Mamdani returned to meet with Officer Islam’s family
Mamdani’s final post on X regarding Officer Didarul Islam focused largely on the officer’s personal story-highlighting his pregnant wife, children, and the pride he expressed to his mother about joining the force to build a lasting legacy. Similar to Mamdani, Islam was also a Muslim and an immigrant from South Asia. “He has done that and more,” the carefully crafted message read.I offer my prayers for him and his family, while paying tribute to the remarkable legacy of service and sacrifice he has left behind.
By the time the statement went live shortly after 6 a.m. the morning following the shooting, Mamdani was preparing to board a flight back to New York.
According to two individuals familiar with the internal discussions, some of his aides – motivated partly by genuine concern and partly by a chance to shift attention away from his absence – circulated speculation that Mamdani could face delays at the airport due to possible interference from members of the Trump administration.
Mamdani’s aides took the possibility seriously, reaching out beforehand to both the New York Attorney General ‘s office and the governor’s office to be ready for any scenario. They even devised a code that Mamdani could text immediately if he encountered detention upon arrival.
