Zohran Mamdani rebukes Trumpism with pro-immigrant speech for US’s 250th birthday | New York

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani extolled the city’s immigrant legacy on Friday in a historically charged, ideological counter to the United States’ semicentennial address expected later in the day from Donald Trump, who has sought to deport immigrants en masse throughout his second presidency.

Speaking from behind a desk at New York City Hall, which belonged to the first U.S. president, George Washington, and is a century older than the Resolute desk in the White House, Mamdani was surrounded by naturalized citizens like himself as he listed the waves of immigrants who shaped the city.

“Hundreds of thousands of Irish immigrants arrived with stomach aches from famine caused by imperial oppression,” Mamdani said. “Chinese sailors settled in today’s Chinatown. Millions passed under the Statue of Liberty and through Ellis Island. Jews are fleeing pogroms, Italians are fleeing poverty. Syrians are seeking economic opportunity.

“Despite federal government laws banning their entry” and other challenges, “immigrants made their home here in New York City and helped create New York City.”

Days after the US supreme court rejected Mamdani’s fellow New Yorker Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship and confirmed that nearly all people born on US soil are US citizens, Mamdani said on Friday: “The legacy of every generation of Americans who have insisted that the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness extends to them is not a relic from the past.”

Mamdani’s speech had been heralded by the mayor’s press officials as an opportunity to reflect on New York City’s “role in our national history” and its “place as the symbolic gateway to the nation.”

Born in Uganda, he moved to New York with his family when he was seven and US citizenship In 2018, Mamdani offered a history lesson on how Philadelphia could become the crucible of American democracy, but New York City was where British rule “boiled under the yoke of oppression” from which the United States would successfully liberate itself in 1776.

He said newcomers to the United States will see “the land fertile and full of life.”

“They saw a towering monument of freedom, its torch shining [a] Welcome worldwide. They saw New York City. They saw America.”

He made a point of saying: “The city I see today looks very different from the city that greeted George Washington in July 1776.”

And in the address to recently naturalized citizens, Mamdani said: “Each of you has a special power; the power to define what America means.”

But he sought to draw a contrast with the powers gathered in Trump’s America: “The powerful always knew the answer. To them, America is an arena of supremacy where only a select few are allowed freedom, not all are created equal.”

“If you ask them, the more people America accepts, the less it accepts. They’ll tell you that America belongs only to those with the right accent or the right skin color. The rest of us, they insist, should be grateful just for being allowed to visit.”

At the beginning of his speech, Mamdani paid tribute to explorers Giovanni da Verrazzano and Henry Hudson, but specifically left out Christopher Columbus, who was seen as a colonist rather than an explorer.

His speech came just days after three congressional candidates backed by the democratic socialist mayor won their races in the city, and others flying under the same political banner outperformed centrist Democrats in other solidly liberal urban districts, including Philadelphia, Denver and Washington, D.C.

On Friday, Mamdani called for resistance against those who seek to divide the people: “Those who pioneered exclusion and isolation tried to gain power and enrich themselves by pitting us against each other. Division is the oldest and cheapest trick in politics.”

He also appealed to patriotism; but it’s a very different kind of what Trump will offer later Friday.

“Patriotism has never been about claiming that our nation is perfect,” the New York mayor said. “Patriotism is every act of justified opposition. It is every march conducted under the fierce sun. It is every protest ten years ahead of its time. It is precisely because we love this nation that we will not abandon it.”

Trump later Friday set to deliver an address At Mount Rushmore, where the United States will commemorate its 250th anniversary.

The celebration is expected to include fireworks displays, military bands, aviation flyovers and salutes to the six branches of the armed forces.