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Lina Khan among veteran names appointed to Zohran Mamdani’s transition team
Fresh off his historic victory in New York City’s mayoral election, Zohran Mamdani on Wednesday announced a slate of seasoned officials to help lead his transition to City Hall, offering an early glimpse at how he intends to turn his ambitious campaign promises into reality.
“In the coming months, I and my team will build a City Hall capable of delivering on the promises of this campaign,” Mamdani, a democratic socialist, said at his first news conference as mayor-elect. “We will form an administration that is equal parts capable and compassionate, driven by integrity and willing to work just as hard as the millions of New Yorkers who call this city home.”
That transition team will include two former deputy mayors, Maria Torres-Springer and Melanie Hartzog; former Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan; and Grace Bonilla, the head of United Way of New York City, a nonprofit focused on low-income residents. Political strategist Elana Leopold will serve as executive director of the team.
Mamdani said the officials would help steer his transition as he adapts from the “poetry of campaigning” to the “beautiful prose of governing,” a winking reference to a phrase used by former Gov. Mario Cuomo, the late father of one of his opponents in the mayoral race, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
The incoming mayor said he had not yet heard from Andrew Cuomo since defeating him on Tuesday night in a race that saw the highest turnout for a New York City mayoral election in more than five decades. He said he had spoken by phone with his Republican opponent, Curtis Sliwa.
Mamdani, who at 34 will be the city’s youngest mayor in more than a century, now faces the task of implementing his sweeping affordability agenda, while taking charge of the largest police department, sanitation department and school system in the country.
Among his campaign’s promises are free child care, free city bus service, city-run grocery stores and a new Department of Community Safety that would expand on an existing city initiative that sends mental health care workers, rather than police, to handle certain emergency calls.
Though he has framed his election as a break from the political mold, his transition team includes familiar faces from the previous two mayoral administrations.
Basil Smikle, a Democratic political strategist and Columbia University professor, said the broad knowledge base of Mamdani’s new hires gives the mayor-elect an “opportunity to assuage the concerns about his governance.”
Mamdani — who came under fire during the race for his past comments criticizing the New York Police Department — on Wednesday also reiterated his intention to keep the city’s current police commissioner, Jessica Tisch. She has declined to say whether she would accept the role.
He has yet to telegraph what other appointments he will make as he takes over a government of more than 300,000 people, but said he was “willing to consider anyone” who shares his goal of making the city more affordable.
On Wednesday, the city’s fire commissioner, Robert Tucker, announced his resignation, effective next month.
And in a sign of the scrutiny that his appointments will face, the Anti-Defamation League on Wednesday announced a new tool “to track and monitor policies and personnel” hired by Mamdani, a fierce critic of Israel who the group has accused of ignoring concerns of Jewish safety.
“I take the issue of antisemitism incredibly seriously,” Mamdani said, denouncing the overnight vandalism of a Brooklyn Jewish school as “disgusting and heartbreaking.”
Mamdani has already faced scrutiny from national Republicans, including President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly threatened to cut federal funding to the city if Mamdani won.
As Mamdani on Wednesday described his goal of “Trump-proofing” the city, he also said he was open to having conversations with Trump about the “ways that we can work together to serve New Yorkers.” That could mean discussing the cost of living or the effect of cuts to the SNAP food aid program amid the federal government shutdown, Mamdani suggested.
“New Yorkers are facing twin crises in this moment: an authoritarian administration and an affordability crisis,” Mamdani said.
At a news conference Wednesday, Trump appeared somewhat open to the idea of working with the incoming mayor.
“We’ll help him,” the president said. “We want New York to be successful. A little bit, maybe.”
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Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Jennifer Peltz contributed to this report.
