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New York Knicks Make It Clear They Don’t Endorse Socialist

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Zohran Mamdani
Photo Credit: Bingjiefu He, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

The New York Knicks slapped New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani with a cease-and-desist letter after the posted a campaign ad using a logo almost identical to the team’s own.

The Knicks made it absolutely clear that they do not support the far-left socialist in the race.

“The NY Knicks have sent NYC Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani a cease-and-desist letter for using the NY Knicks logo to promote his candidacy,” the statement read.

“The Knicks want to make it clear that we do not endorse Mr. Mamdani for Mayor, and we object to his use of our copyrighted logo. We will pursue all legal remedies to enforce our rights.”

Mamdani had shared the logo on Instagram, captioned, “This is our year. This is our time. #NewYorkForever.”

He even tagged Madison Square Garden as the location. The post was later deleted.

Ironically, Mamdani recently criticized his opponent, former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, for turning up courtside with current Mayor Eric Adams during the Knicks’ game Wednesday night, only hours after the final mayoral debate.

Mamdani took to X to post, “Corruption goes courtside,” in response to a photo Cuomo posted of himself alongside Adams.

The former governor showed up at the game just after the debate against Mamdani and Republican Curtis Sliwa.

Both Cuomo and Adams had entered the race as third-party candidates, facing off against Democratic nominee Mamdani, a state legislator.

But Adams dropped out last month, releasing a lengthy video on X to explain he saw no “path to victory in this race.”

Adams had repeated disagreements with both Mamdani and Cuomo throughout the marathon campaign.

On “The Reset Talk Show,” Adams confirmed he’d been speaking with Cuomo but had not made a final endorsement decision.

He pointed out having serious disagreements with Mamdani’s proposals and, when pressed, had called Cuomo “a snake and a liar” in a September 5 announcement, vowing to remain in the race at that time.

But after the Knicks game, Adams switched gears and endorsed Cuomo.

Todd Shapiro, a spokesperson for Adams, confirmed the news in a statement on Thursday.

“As spokesman for Mayor Eric Adams, I can confirm that the Mayor will endorse former Governor Andrew M. Cuomo for mayor and intends to campaign alongside him,” he commented.

“The time and locations for their joint appearances are currently being finalized,’ he commented.”

Mamdani didn’t take this lightly, and fired off a response to The New York Times’ coverage: “The Art of the Deal.”

November’s election is less than two weeks away, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries finally weighed in on Friday, after months of dodging the question.

Just hours before early voting kicked off, Jeffries threw his weight behind Mamdani, though he didn’t shy away from their differences.

“Zohran Mamdani has relentlessly focused on addressing the affordability crisis and explicitly committed to being a mayor for all New Yorkers, including those who do not support his candidacy,” he remarked.

“In that spirit, I support him and the entire citywide Democratic ticket in the general election.”

For his part, Mamdani said, “This campaign has always been about bringing people together to improve the quality of life for every New Yorker.”

“I welcome Leader Jeffries’ support and look forward to delivering a city government, and building a Democratic Party, relentlessly committed to our affordability agenda — and to fighting Trump’s authoritarianism.”

During Wednesday’s debate, Cuomo sought to distance himself from Mamdani, painting the legislator as unqualified and inexperienced.

“I did things. You’ve never had a job. You’ve never accomplished anything. There’s no reason to believe you merit or qualification for eight and a half million lives,” Cuomo said.

“You never showed up for work, and you missed eighty percent of the votes. Shame on you.”

Mamdani returned fire, describing Cuomo as “a desperate man” who is lashing out due to fear of losing power.

The contest turned to who was best equipped to stand up to President Trump, with both claiming they would be the toughest opponent.

Cuomo reminded audiences of his previous clashes with Trump during the pandemic, arguing that a Mamdani win would be “a dream” for Trump.

“He has said he’ll take over New York if Mamdani wins, and he will! Because, he has no respect for him. He thinks he’s a kid and he’s going to kick him on his tuchus,” Cuomo claimed.

Mamdani countered by accusing Cuomo of being “Trump’s puppet.”

“He wants Andrew Cuomo to be the mayor not because it will be good for New Yorkers, but because it will be good for him,” he fired back.

On Friday, Mamdani called out what he described as “racist, baseless” attacks against himself, describing them as yet another example of islamophobia in New York.

He told a group of reporters outside a mosque in the Bronx: “I have sought to be the candidate fighting for every single New Yorker, not simply the Muslim candidate. I thought that if I could build a campaign of universality, I could define myself as the leader I aspire to be, one representing every New Yorker, no matter their skin color or religion, no matter where they were born.”

“And I thought that if I behaved well enough or bit my tongue enough in the face of racist, baseless attacks, all while returning back to my central message, it would allow me to be more than just my faith,” he added. “I was wrong. No amount of redirection is ever enough.”

On Thursday, controversy ratcheted up again when Cuomo appeared to agree with a conservative radio host who suggested that Mamdani would celebrate a terror attack as mayor.

A spokesman later told NBC News that this was not an endorsement of the statement. Still, Cuomo faced tough questions the next day.

During a press conference on Friday, Cuomo pushed back, saying, “I didn’t take the remark serious at the time, of course I think it’s an offensive comment, period. But it did not come out of my mouth, that’s the point.”

He instead accused Mamdani of “playing the ‘victim’ while ‘in reality, he is the offender.’”

According to Cuomo, “Zohran himself is the person who has created the tension with the Jewish community and the LGBT community and the Italian community and the Black community, etc. He is not the victim, he is the offender, and it’s a political tactic.”

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