Donald Trump called Zohran Mamdani a "Jew hater" and criticised Jewish voters supporting him. Photo / Getty Images
Donald Trump called Zohran Mamdani a "Jew hater" and criticised Jewish voters supporting him. Photo / Getty Images
As voters cast their ballots for the next mayor of New York, President Donald Trump wrote in a social media post that “any Jewish person” who votes for Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee, “is a stupid person!!!”
Trump has lobbed attacks for months against Mamdani, a 34-year-old State Assembly memberwho describes himself as a democratic socialist. Trump has called him a “communist” and a “total nutjob” and said he might arrest him. In Tuesday’s post on Truth Social, the President called Mamdani “a proven and self professed JEW HATER”.
Mamdani, who would be the first Muslim mayor of a city that has the largest Jewish and Muslim populations in the United States, has been heavily scrutinised over his views on Israel. He says Israel should not exist as a Jewish state and has been criticised for not immediately condemning the phrase “globalise the intifada”, though he has said he would discourage its use.
At the same time, Mamdani has been embraced by Jewish liberals supporting the cause of Palestinian rights.
Mamdani, an Indian American born in Uganda, has also faced a slew of political attacks repeating Islamophobic and xenophobic tropes during his campaign.
Trump has mostly stayed away from publicly campaigning for Republicans during the 2025 election season. But he’s made Mamdani – the front-runner to be mayor of his hometown – the largest target of his campaign against Democrats this cycle, saying he’s “one of the best things to ever happen to our great Republican Party”.
The President has threatened to withhold federal funds to New York.
Trump took the unusual step on Monday of endorsing independent mayoral candidate Andrew M. Cuomo – who was the Democratic Governor of the state during Trump’s first presidential term – instead of the Republican mayoral nominee, Curtis Sliwa, arguing that a vote for Sliwa would effectively be a vote for Mamdani.
Trump endorsed Andrew Cuomo over Republican Curtis Sliwa, warning against Mamdani's potential election as mayor. Photo / Getty Images
Mamdani, meanwhile, has vowed to resist the President, declaring himself “Donald Trump’s worst nightmare” and someone who would fight Trump “every step of the way”.
Trump has for years said that Jews who vote for Democrats are voting against their self-interests. In 2019, critics accused Trump of anti-Semitismfor saying Jewish Americans “don’t love Israel enough”. He accused Jewish Americans who vote for Democrats of being “disloyal” to Israel, perpetuating the trope that American Jews have a dual loyalty to Israel.
In 2021, Trump said in a podcast interview that Jewish people in the United States “don’t like Israel or don’t care about Israel” and that the New York Times “hates Israel” even though “there are Jewish people that run the New York Times”.
“People in this country that are Jewish no longer love Israel,” Trump said at the time. “I’ll tell you the evangelical Christians love Israel more than the Jews in this country.”
On the final day of the Jewish holiday Rosh Hashanah in 2023, Trump claimed that “liberal Jews” who didn’t support him were voting “to destroy America & Israel”. And on the campaign trail in the following year, he said the Democratic Party “hates Israel” and that “any Jewish person that votes for Democrats hates their religion”.
Then, two months before the November 2024 election, Trump said in a pair of speeches that he would hold Jewish voters accountable if he lost.
“The Jewish people would have a lot to do with a loss,” Trump said at a summit on fighting anti-Semitism in America. “It’s only because of the Democrat hold, or curse, on you.”
Sarah Ellison contributed to this report.
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