Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic Party nominee for New York City mayor, has clarified that the "aunt" he said was too afraid to wear her hijab on the city subway after 9/11 is his father's cousin.
Mamdani, a self-proclaimed democratic socialist, acknowledged the family faux pas at a press conference on Monday when confronted with photos of a woman identified as his actual aunt who was pictured not wearing a hijab.
"I was speaking about Zehra Fuhi, my father's cousin, who passed away a few years ago," Mamdani said about the woman, whom he said he affectionately called his aunt.
On Friday, Mamdani gave a speech lashing out against hatred of Muslims, after former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who is running an independent campaign for mayor, joked about Mamdani laughing about a terrorist attack and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa claimed that Mamdani supported global jihad.
"In an era of ever-diminishing bipartisanship, it seems that Islamophobia has emerged as one of the few areas of agreement," Mamdani said Friday. "I want to speak to the memory of my aunt, who stopped taking the subway after September 11th because she did not feel safe in her hijab."
If elected, Mamdani would be the city's first Muslim mayor.
Mamdani's biological aunt, Masuma Mamdani, was in Tanzania on 9/11, the New York Post reported.
"For the takeaway from my more than 10-minute address about Islamophobia in this race and in this city, to be the question of my aunt, tells you everything you need to know about Cuomo and his inability to reckon with a crisis of his own making," Mamdani said Monday.
Vice President JD Vance was one of many conservatives critical of Mamdani's speech.
"According to Zohran the real victim of 9/11 was his auntie who got some (allegedly) bad looks," Vance wrote on social media.
Sam Barron ✉
Sam Barron has almost two decades of experience covering a wide range of topics including politics, crime and business.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.