Copyright independent
A conservative pundit has faced backlash after posting a cartoon targeted at Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee for New York City mayor, riffing on the tragic 9/11 attacks. Mamdani, a Muslim democratic socialist, has run his campaign on the promise of affordability, pledging to freeze the rent on more than two million rent-stabilized tenants and make city buses free to ride if he’s elected on November 4. On Tuesday morning, Larry Elder, who hosts We’ve Got a Country to Save and ran for president in the 2024 election before endorsing President Donald Trump, shared on X a cartoon depicting a red plane with the word “Mamdani” written on the side with the Communist hammer and sickle symbol headed into a building that is reminiscent of one of the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers that has the words “NY CITY” on it. Elder captioned the post, which has garnered 2.1 million views: “#Socialism.” His post was harshly criticized by those who found it insensitive to the nearly 3,000 lives lost and thousands injured in the 2001 terrorist attacks. “Jesus Christ, this is sick. I lost my friend in the North Tower on 9/11. His daughter, my goddaughter, lost her dad who worked for Marsh&McLennan. How dare you find political comedy, gain depicting this is Zorhan. I don’t even like Zorhan. This is disgraceful, disgusting of you,” one X user commented on Elder’s post. Sports broadcaster and writer Roberto Abramowitz said, “Really disgusting. I had friends who died there. But sure, go try and score cheap political points by rekindling New Yorker’s nightmares.” “Depicting 9/11 imagery to attack a political candidate is beyond tasteless. Do better,” another X user wrote. The Independent has reached out to Elder’s show and Mamdani’s campaign for comment. There was one prominent far-right figure, Laura Loomer, who agreed with Elder’s post, writing, “100%.” Loomer, who has called herself a “proud Islamophobe,” wrote on X following Mamdani’s defeat of former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo in the democratic primary in June, “Muslims destroyed NYC on 9/11 and now a Muslim Communist is about to destroy the entire city for eternity.” Loomer is an ally of Trump, who has repeatedly called Mamdani a “communist.” Mamdani has explicitly said he is not a communist but rather a democratic socialist. The New York Times described democratic socialism in a June article as “an ideology rooted in its opposition to capitalism and wanting to shift power to workers from corporations.” Mamdani is leading in the polls against Cuomo, who is now running as an independent, and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa. In a Patriot Polling survey following last week’s mayoral debate, Mamdani stood with 43 percent of support from the city’s registered voters while Cuomo and Sliwa trailed with 32 and 19 percent, respectively.
