Republican calls for the deportation of New York City mayoral contender Zohran Mamdani are becoming louder, after he vowed to drive U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) off all city properties.
Mamdani recently won the Democratic primary for mayor in a close race against former governor Andrew Cuomo and has since become a target of right-wing attack for his left-wing immigration agenda.
Tom Homan, former acting director of ICE and President Donald Trump’s Border Czar, responded sharply to Mamdani’s agenda. “Good luck with that,” Homan told Fox News, dismissing the idea that a local official could challenge federal authority. “It’s game on,” he added, underscoring what he described as the Biden-era sanctuary city challenges that the Trump administration intends to confront head-on if returned to power.
At 33, Mamdani is a state assemblyman from Queens and a self-identified Democratic socialist. Immigration reform was his campaign's top priority, promising to make New York a more powerful sanctuary city by stopping cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, increasing legal services for undocumented immigrants, and protecting sensitive information from federal agencies.
"Zohran Mamdani will stand up to Trump's efforts to gouge the working class and give a city where everyone can live a dignified life," his campaign website says.
But Homan maintained that federal immigration enforcement cannot be halted by resistance at the city level. "Federal law beats him every day, every hour of every minute," Homan stated. He asserted that in a renewed Trump regime, ICE would further amplify activities in cities such as New York, including measures to greatly enhance worksite enforcement and further deploy agents. "Not only are we going to deploy more agents to the neighborhood, we are going to up worksite enforcement by ten times," he continued.
Comparing states, Homan highlighted a stark contrast with Republican-led Florida, where ICE reportedly enjoys greater cooperation. “We don’t have that problem in Florida, where the sheriffs work with us,” he said. “So we’re going to double up and triple up on New York.”
The row over Mamdani intensified further when Tennessee Republican Congressman Andy Ogles took to social media to call for the candidate's deportation, labeling him "little Muhammad." "He needs to be DEPORTED," Ogles posted on X (formerly Twitter). "Which is why I am calling for him to be subject to denaturalisation proceedings."
In his post, Ogles accused Mamdani of being “an antisemitic, socialist, communist who will destroy the great City of New York.” He followed up with a formal letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, requesting a Department of Justice probe into Mamdani’s citizenship status. Ogles referred to a 2017 rap lyric where Mamdani mentioned the "Holy Land Five" —members of a Muslim charity who were convicted in 2008 for sending money illegally to Hamas—as an excuse for doubting his loyalty.
Despite the backlash, Mamdani’s campaign platform extends beyond immigration. He has proposed sweeping changes including the introduction of city-operated grocery stores, rent freezes in stabilized housing, and free bus service across New York City. His plan to finance these initiatives includes a proposed $10 billion tax on major corporations and the ultra-wealthy.
Since his election in 2021 as an assemblyman from Astoria, Queens, Mamdani has been a champion of progressive causes. His upset of Cuomo in the mayoral primary indicates a sea change in New York's political landscape, as voters increasingly rally around audacious, left-of-center policy ideas.
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