As Mayor Zohran Mamdani closed his news conference about child care on Tuesday, he turned to an unrelated but familiar topic.
A day earlier, a well-known conservative radio host, Sid Rosenberg, described him as a “jihadist” and a “Radical Islam cockroach” in a post on X meant to persuade President Trump to end his surprisingly chummy relationship with the mayor.
Mr. Mamdani said the comments were “difficult to hear” but were part of a pattern of Islamophobia that has been a longstanding reality for Muslims in New York City.
Mr. Rosenberg’s remarks led to a volley of criticism, which the host initially met with caustic responses, though by Wednesday morning, he had publicly apologized and deleted the post.
In many ways, the episode reflected the grimy theatrics of city politics. Mr. Rosenberg has little influence over city government, but attracts attention by being provocative. And for Mr. Mamdani, part of the job of mayor involves fielding frequent, often ugly criticism from citizens.
Still, Mr. Rosenberg’s words underlined an unpleasant truth about political discourse around religious groups in New York, where Muslims in particular remain a population that some, even in the top ranks of media and politics, feel emboldened to insult.
Over the last few months, several Republican figures have pounced on Mr. Mamdani and the city’s Muslims with faith-based attacks. Representative Randy Fine of Florida, responding to a post by a Palestinian activist in New York, suggested in February that he preferred dogs to Muslims.
And Councilwoman Vickie Paladino, who represents a Queens district, has claimed on social media that the city is under “foreign occupation” and called for the “expulsion of Muslims from western nations.” She was recently charged by the Council’s ethics committee with violating the Council’s anti-harassment and discrimination policies.
Mr. Rosenberg’s post seemed to signal some discomfort from the president’s base about his public affection for Mr. Mamdani, a democratic socialist whom New York Republicans had been hoping to invoke as a leftist boogeyman in the midterm elections this year. Mr. Trump and Mr. Mamdani have had two unexpectedly friendly meetings in Washington, including one last week in which they discussed building housing in New York.
Mr. Mamdani, the city’s first Muslim mayor, has had to strike a delicate balance between embracing his faith publicly and defending himself against attacks on it. During the news conference on Tuesday, Mr. Mamdani said that Muslims in the city often “have had to deal with those with power and platform dehumanizing us.”
“There is also a reminder that the silence that often greets this kind of bigotry, this kind of Islamophobia, is what allows it to fester,” he later added. “The temptation to treat it as politics as usual.”
Mr. Rosenberg said in an interview that he did not believe his comments were Islamophobic and added that he had apologized to defuse a volatile situation. He said his problems with the mayor related to his policies and “the way he treats certain people, including mine, the Jewish people.” (Mr. Mamdani has angered some Jewish New Yorkers with his belief that Israel should not be structured as an officially Jewish state, and his unwillingness to condemn the phrase “globalize the intifada.”)
“But one thing has nothing to do with the other,” Mr. Rosenberg continued. “I can criticize all of that and make all of those points without going into the gutter and saying the things that I said.”
The comments have unearthed some tensions between supporters of Mr. Mamdani and city officials who have developed relationships with Mr. Rosenberg.
Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch, who reports to Mr. Mamdani, has appeared on Mr. Rosenberg’s show, and the two had dinner in January, posing for a picture that he posted on Instagram. The City Council speaker, Julie Menin, was a guest on the show in February, despite some concerns among her staff about some of his prior comments, according to two people familiar with the matter who were granted anonymity. Both Ms. Tisch and Ms. Menin have objected to Mr. Rosenberg’s remarks about Mr. Mamdani.
The furor comes at a particularly sensitive time for the city’s Muslims, who are currently observing Ramadan, the holiest month of the Muslim calendar. City Hall officials had hoped that Mr. Mamdani’s observance would help showcase Muslim life in the city; he has already hosted and attended events around the holiday and recently attended an iftar dinner with Ms. Tisch.
Asked about Mr. Rosenberg’s apology during an unrelated event on Wednesday, Mr. Mamdani thanked elected officials and everyday New Yorkers who had spoken out against Mr. Rosenberg’s remarks. Those denunciations, the mayor continued, emphasized that such comments should not be acceptable in a city that is “home to all of us, not to any one set or group.”
Sally Goldenberg and Jeffery C. Mays contributed reporting.
Maya King is a Times reporter covering New York politics.
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