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A resurfaced interview by New York City socialist mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani shows him explaining that the family he grew up in made him “open” to being a “radical” and suggesting that socialism needs to be re-branded.
“I think, honestly, growing up in the family that I grew up in, I was quite open to what would be considered being a radical from a very young age,” Mamdani said on The Far Left Show in 2020.
“I mean, from the beginning, my identities are already considered radical by a lot of mainstream American political thought. So being a Muslim, being an immigrant, these are things that already kind of put you in the box of ‘other.’ And so it’s not that far of a jump because whenever you… stand up to speak up for the rights of others who share the same identity as you, then you’re a radical, right? So often people in this country are considered radicals if they stand up for Palestinian human rights.”
Mamdani has faced criticism over some of his positions taken as a young man, including supporting an academic boycott of Israel and starting a Students for Justice in Palestine chapter during his college days, as well as the past writings of his father, Mahmood Mamdani.
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Mamdani explained his ‘radical’ background in a 2020 podcast appearance
Mahmood Mamdani’s social media presence is littered with anti-Israel positions referring to Israelis as “colonial settlers” and celebrating the idea of a “third intifada.” Additionally, Mahmood Mamdani sits on the council of an openly anti-Israel tribunal and once wrote in a book, which he dedicated to his son, that suicide bombers “stigmatized as a mark of barbarism.”
“Zohran Mamdani has built his political brand on the same radical, hate-filled and anti-American ideology his father, Mahmood Mamdani, has spent decades promoting—one that demonizes Jewish people and legitimizes anti-democratic violence,” Brooke Goldstein, a human rights attorney who specializes in antisemitism, told Fox News Digital earlier this month.
“The Jew-hatred the Mamdani family peddles is fundamentally anti-American and violates the core values our country was founded on—tolerance, equality, and liberty. Our nation’s strength lies in its diversity and commitment to protecting minority rights. Antisemitic world views threaten the peace and security of our communities.”
In the interview, the younger Mamdani went on to lament the criticism that Democratic Socialists of America have faced for supporting BDS.
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Democratic socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani, who won the Democratic primary for mayor of New York City, attends an endorsement event from the union DC 37 on July 15, 2025, (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
BDS is described as “an international campaign to delegitimize the State of Israel as the expression of the Jewish people’s right to national self-determination by isolating the country economically through consumer boycotts, business and government withdrawal of investment, and legal sanctions,” according to Influence Watch.
Mamdani also explained in the interview his evolution as a “socialist.”
“I think I’ve been a socialist for quite a while, but I don’t think I understood myself within the terms of that label,” Mamdani said. “And I think that that is something that I not only internalized, but also became comfortable expressing when I became an active member of New York City DSA, which is an organization that I’ve been a member of. I attended my first meeting in early 2017, but I’ve been a much more active member since 2018.”
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New York mayoral candidate, State Rep. Zohran Mamdani (D-NY) stands with his mother Mira Nair, and father Mahmood Mamdani as they celebrate during an election night gathering at The Greats of Craft LIC on June 24, 2025. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
Mamdani added that he hopes to rebrand the word socialism to be more appetizing for the general public.
“I think, for me, a lot of times people try and scare you into never embracing the word, and I think that there’s a lot of work that we have to do to change our branding, because socialism in and of itself, the way I understand it, is a fight for the state to provide all that is necessary to live a dignified life for each and every person in our state,” Mamdani explained.
“That is something that when you explain it in that way, and when you talk about the way in which it is applied, when you’re talking about typically housing, healthcare, education, but I would argue we must expand that beyond and talk about public transit and talk about the internet and talk childcare. People are receptive to that.”
Fox News Digital reached out to the Mamdani campaign for comment.
