Former US Rep. Jamaal Bowman endorsed democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani in the race for mayor Wednesday – but critics bashed the candidate for embracing the controversial ex-“Squad” member.
Bowman was a two-term Democrat for the Bronx and Westchester County who was run out of office by voters after pleading guilty to falsely pulling a fire alarm in the Capitol to temporarily delay a vote to avert a government shutdown.
But Mamdani welcomed Bowman’s endorsement despite the political baggage, considering him a kindred soul on affordability issues for the working class and needy. Mamdani took aim at former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, the frontrunner in the crowded Democratic Party primary for mayor, with polls showing the democratic socialist trailing at No. 2.
“With Bowman’s help we not only reach more voters in the Bronx, but expose Cuomo’s record of failure and corruption,” Mamdani said in a statement.
Bowman — who represented the 16th Congressional district before he was replaced by moderate Democrat George Latimer — had been aligned with the left-wing “Squad” that includes Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-Bronx, Queens) and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.).
He called Mamdani the candidate of the working people and slammed Cuomo as a corporate Democrat.
“Andrew Cuomo is taking money from the same billionaires who support Donald Trump,” said Bowman, a former Bronx educator before running for public office. “We got people like Donald Trump because of people like Andrew Cuomo.”
Although Bowman was trounced by Latimer in a Democratic primary in 2024, the ex-“Squad” member handily carried the Bronx portion of the 16th district, including heavy black precincts in the massive Co-Op City housing complex. The complex was the setting for a press conference announcing the endorsement.
Mamdani, who is now a Queens assemblyman, called Bowman’s endorsement “historic” and praised him as a “fighter for not only the Bronx but the entirety of New York City.”
But pro-Israel Jewish activists who claim Bowman is antisemitic said the endorsement will discourage voters from supporting Mamdani.
“Antisemites of a feather flock together,” said Brooklyn Assemblyman Kalman Yeger. “It says something about a candidate when every Jew hater who endorses chooses him.”
In a statement on X, former Brooklyn Councilman David Greenfield said Mamdani “found the most anti-Israel FORMER elected official in America, who conveniently blamed the Jews for losing his race, and got him to endorse Zohran for Mayor of NYC.
“Very on brand for Zohran,” he said.
Bowman’s House tenure was brief but rife with controversy.
He was censured by the Republican-led House in December 2023 after the fire alarm fiasco in a Capitol Hill office building Sept. 30.
He later pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of raising a false fire alarm and agreed to pay a $1,000 fine and wrote an apology letter to the chief of the US Capitol Police.
Mamdani’s campaign declined to comment on Bowman’s criminal conviction.
Jewish voters turned on Bowman over his bashing of Israel, which insiders said fueled his landslide primary defeat.
Bowman called Israel an “apartheid state” and claimed at a rally that the rapes and child murders reported during Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack on the Jewish state were a “lie” — remarks he later walked back.
It was also revealed that he had once peddled conspiracy theories related to the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks on his personal blog.
But the ex-congressman is staying politically active.
Earlier this year, he created a “Built to Win” Super PAC aimed at helping elect fellow lefty candidates and defeat pro-Israel candidates.
A Marist Institute College Institute for Public Opinion released Wednesday showed Cuomo with support from 37% of Democrats to 18% for Mamdani.
Mamdani led among voters under the age of 45, but Cuomo was the favorite of older voters and black and Latinos, the poll showed.
