Trump says govt will look at citizenship status of Zohran Mamdani, likely next mayor of New York City

U.S. president Donald Trump is questioning the citizenship status of New York City's (NYC) Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, making claims suggesting he is an illegal immigrant.

This came after self-proclaimed socialist Mamdani officially won NYC's mayoral Democratic primary on Jul. 1, beating former New York governor Andrew Cuomo by 12 percentage points, AP News reported.

He is now the Democratic Party's candidate for the general elections in November, up against other figures like current mayor and independent candidate Eric Adams, and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa.

If he wins the November election, Mamdani will be NYC's first Muslim and Indian-American mayor.

"He's here illegally."

Following Mamdani's win, Trump mentioned at a news conference that others have alleged Mamdani obtained his citizenship "illegally", and called him a "communist".

"A lot of people are saying, he’s here illegally. We’re going to look at everything, but ideally, he’s going to turn out to be much less than a communist. Right now he’s a communist, that’s not a socialist”, Trump told the media.

He also echoed previous threats to cut off funds to New York if Mamdani becomes mayor and "doesn't behave himself".

"We don’t need a communist in this country, but if we have one, I’m going to be watching over him very carefully on behalf of the nation", Trump said on Jul. 1, according to The Guardian.

When asked about Mamdani's promise to prevent Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents from arresting immigrants, Trump simply said, "Well then, we'll have to arrest him."

Mamdani's response

Mamdani has responded to Trump's accusations on social media with counter-attacks.

"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 [terrorise] our city", he wrote in a Facebook post.

He added that Trump's statements "don’t just represent an attack on our democracy but an attempt to send a message to every New Yorker who refuses to hide in the shadows: if you speak up, they will come for you".

"We will not accept this intimidation", he said.

Democratic senator for Connecticut Chris Murphy also rallied behind Mamdani, calling demands to denaturalise Mamdani "racist bullsh*t", according to The Guardian.

"Zohran won because he ran a campaign laser focused on putting power back in the hands of working people. And that's a threat to the Mar-a-Lago crowd," said Murphy, referring to Trump's luxury resort in Florida where friends of the president frequently gather.

Islamophobia and calls for deportation

Mamdani's victory in the primary has been marred by Islamophobic comments and controversy about his citizenship status.

Mamdani, a Uganda-born ethnic Indian, moved to the U.S. at seven years old and became a naturalised U.S. citizen in 2018, according to The New York Times.

He has long been a vocal supporter of Palestinian rights and critic of Israel in the Israel-Palestine conflict, a stance that his opponents in New York, which has a prominent Jewish community, have used against him.

On Jun. 27, Representative Andy Ogles (R-TN) called for Mamdani's citizenship to be revoked in a letter posted on X (formerly Twitter), directed at U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi.

He claimed that Mamdani may have concealed his support for terrorism during the naturalisation process, and asked Bondi to conduct an investigation for "willful misrepresentation or concealment of material support for terrorism".

Referring to Mamdani as Zohran ‘little muhammad’ Mamdani, Ogles also called Mamdani "an antisemitic, socialist, communist".

His allegations were not immediately refuted by White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who said on Jun. 30, "surely if they are true, it’s something that should be investigated".

There is currently no credible evidence to suggest that Mamdani is not a valid U.S. citizen, The New York Times wrote.

Trump's immigration policies

The second Trump Administration has directed attorneys to prioritise the stripping of citizenships of naturalised citizens who are deemed to have committed certain crimes.

In a memo published on Jun. 11, attorneys were instructed to denaturalise individuals who had either "illegally procured" naturalisation, or who were naturalised by “concealment of a material fact or by wilful misrepresentation”.

This comes in light of Trump's recent waves of anti-immigration crackdowns, including his blocking of international students' enrolment at Harvard in May and widespread deportation of alleged illegal immigrants across the country.

Top images via Donald J. Trump/Facebook & Zohran Kwame Mamdani/Facebook