The Most Selfish Man in Politics

Here’s a hypothetical: Imagine someone you know and admire has just died, and you’d like to show your respect by attending his funeral. Not only do you think it’s the right thing to do, but it would make you feel better, too. (Less guilty, perhaps.)

Trouble is, his widow, children, family, friends, and loved ones all HATE you. 

You know they hate you. They’ve told you they hate you. They’ve even asked you point-blank NOT to come to the funeral, because it would increase their grief, sorrow, pain, and agony.

Do you go to the funeral anyway?

Of course not. No decent person would. They wouldn’t even consider it, because they’d never be selfish enough to prioritize their desires over everyone else’s.

Not even if they truly believed the deceased’s family and friends were wrong to hate them. Not even if they sincerely hoped to make amends. Not even if their heart was in the right place.

Because right and wrong — and what you want — are beside the point. What matters is comforting the people who are suffering the most.

If that’s not you, then respect their wishes by staying the hell away from the funeral!

Only a monster would make someone else’s death about himself. Only a sociopath would hijack someone else’s memorial. And only an arrogant, egotistical jackass would attend a celebration-of-life when his inclusion would magnify the heartache and suffering of thousands of mourners.

In a related story, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is demanding to be included in the 25th anniversary of 9/11, a high-profile event that will be attended by the families, friends, and survivors of nearly 3,000 murder victims. 

Even though he was told point-blank that his inclusion would increase their grief and sorrow.

"Please do the honorable thing and skip this solemn ceremony."

New York City's Catholic League President Bill Donohue is urging Mayor Zohran Mamdani not to attend this year's 25th anniversary 9/11 commemoration, arguing his presence would be "divisive" and disrespectful to many… pic.twitter.com/BBe87WA6m2

— Fox News (@FoxNews) August 4, 2026

As of this writing, over 78,000 people have signed the Change.org petition requesting Mayor Mamdani not to attend the 9/11 ceremony. Some of the signees’ comments include:

As a 9/11 employee of KBW, which occupied floors 88 and 89 of 2 WTC and lost 67 honored souls, I stand with those that prioritize the memory of those lost.

—Benjamin

As a first responder myself, my heart goes out to all of the families who lost loved ones that day, as well as those thousands of individuals who have lost the battle since. This is an incredibly sacred day and should not be marred by the pretend countenance of a man who is anything but understanding of what took place that day. Stay home, please. And ensure your wife does the same. That in itself would be a service to this city.

—Debra

New York, have you forgotten how it felt that day? Thousands of your fellow citizens died on that day. Your current mayor, a supporter of terrorists, has no business at our National Day of Mourning.

—Kele

Being an apologist for the terrorists disqualifies him from being at the 9/11 rememberance. It's incredible he doesn't realize this. I was there as part of the disaster relief beginning on 9/13.

—Randall

This isn't about politics. It's about respect. The 9/11 Memorial belongs to the families who lost loved ones, the survivors, and the first responders. When so many of those families are asking Mayor Mamdani not to attend, the respectful response isn't to force your presence. It's to listen. Instead, he seems determined to make the day about himself and his political agenda. Leadership means knowing when to step aside so the focus remains on the victims, not on you. The concerns aren't coming out of nowhere. His father, Mahmood Mamdani, wrote extensively after 9/11 arguing there was a moral equivalence between the United States and al Qaeda, blamed American foreign policy for helping produce the attacks, and argued that suicide bombing should be understood as a form of modern political violence rather than simply dismissed as barbarism. Those writings have become part of the broader controversy surrounding the family's views on terrorism and 9/11. Whether or not Mayor Mamdani agrees with every word his father wrote, he has said his father's political thinking influenced him, and many 9/11 families simply don't believe he represents their values or respects their perspective. September 11 should never be about advancing a political message. It should be about honoring the nearly 3,000 innocent Americans who were murdered, remembering the heroes who ran into burning buildings, and standing with the families who still carry that loss every single day. If the families are asking you not to come, the honorable thing to do is respect their wishes. Their voices should matter more than any politician's desire to be seen.

—Steven

Naturally, Mamdani’s supporters blamed — what else — “Islamophobia”:

A 9/11 petition against Zohran Mamdani has sparked a broader conversation about anti-Muslim bias in America. pic.twitter.com/QRBVjBEyE5

— The Recount (@therecount) August 1, 2026

But it’s really not. New Yorkers aren’t outraged over who Mamdani prays to in private or which prayerbook he uses; they’re responding to his public statements, public behavior, and public associations, because he’s a public figure.

Fox Business anchor Elizabeth MacDonald was born in New York, went to college in New York, works in New York, and still lives in New York. Her (excellent) X post is worth reading in its entirety, but here’s a gently edited version:

Why the 9/11 families do not want Zohran Mamdani at the 9/11 25th anniversary events in NYC:

1. When Mamdani declined to condemn the term “globalize the intifada,” 9/11 families say that term is precisely what happened to them. 
2. Mamdani called for defunding the NYPD and police, he called the police “racist” and “a major threat to public safety.” 23 NYPD and 37 Port Authority police officers were murdered on 9/11. At least 251 died later from related illnesses. 
3. Mamdani campaigned with Hasan Piker, who said “America deserved 9/11.” Mamdani would not denounce that for months, only finally admitting it was objectionable in 10/25–2,977 people were murdered on 9/11, and nearly 3,000 children lost their parents. 
4. In 2004, Mamdani’s father wrote suicide bombers should be recognized “first and foremost, as a category of soldier,” and not “stigmatized as a mark of barbarism.” Mamdani has never repudiated that. 
5. When Mamdani’s wife “liked” Instagram posts that downplayed the brutal Hamas’ 10/7 attack on Israel as just a “resistance,” he didn’t denounce this, he said his wife “was a private person.” 
6. When two accused ISIS terrorist supporters threw IEDs on the upper east side of Manhattan near Gracie Mansion, Mamdani didn’t denounce it as Islamist acts of violence. And when a suspect now charged with attempted murder and hate crimes shouted “Allahu Akbar” stabbing a Jewish man and an Asian man in Manhattan, he ignored the Islamism. 
7. Mamdani campaigned for office saying his aunt felt unsafe in NYC around 9/11 going out in her hijab, vilifying NYers—making his aunt the victim, not the 9/11 families who never saw their loved ones again. 
8. During his mayoral campaign, he praised Imam Wahhaj as “one of the nation’s foremost Muslim leaders,” who was listed on a federal report by U.S. prosecutors as a potential co-conspirator in the ‘93 World Trade Center bombing. Wahhaj was never charged, but later testified as a character witness for the Blind Sheikh, who was convicted in a terrorism conspiracy. 
9. Mamdani supported Aber Kawas for the U.S. Senate, who downplayed 9/11 as “a terror attack that a couple of people did,” and the manifestation of “capitalism, colonialism, racism, white supremacy and Islamophobia.” He backed Darializia Chevalier for Congress who called America “a f—king disgrace,” and wants to abolish the police, prisons and borders. 
10. There is a pattern here that 9/11 families recognize: a refusal to begin first with innocent victims, favoring instead to first explain, contextualize, or rationalize away the terrorist and their atrocities — and then condemn those with the moral clarity to see all that, who dare to object, as “racist.” 

All this reflects a troubling erosion of moral clarity — and a demeaning of victims and even one’s own self and self-dignity — when terrorism and crimes against humanity are excused or minimized instead of receiving the universal condemnation they deserve. 

Time and again, 9/11 families feel, when the moment arrives to stand firmly for decency, courage, and innocent victims of terror, Mamdani chooses political avoidance over principle, deflection over conviction, dissembling over accountability, and silence over human dignity. 

All of this is why the 9/11 families don’t want Mamdani there. Ground Zero is a sacred place to mourn, to remember, to honor—and to hope. It’s a place of heroes. The pain and grief born from that day have not gone away. And never will.

Say whatever you want about Mayor Mamdani, but he’s an optics-obsessed politician: He’s always hyper-aware of appearances. For his own political benefit, he has every incentive to “repurpose” the pain and suffering of 9/11 and shoehorn himself (and his spin) into the narrative. (You kiddin’ me? Grieving families are FANTASTIC props! The best!) There’s PR value in attending the 9/11 memorial — and more importantly, there’s a steep PR cost to being considered so unwanted, so divisive, and so controversial, that New York City’s mayor was refused admittance. 

It would be a huge political embarrassment. The media would interpret it as a personal repudiation of Zohran Mamdani — and undeniable proof that he’s incapable of unifying the Big Apple. (Because, y’know, “Islamophobia.”) Either way, he’d squander vast political capital.

So, 25 years after terrorists hijacked planes, New York’s mayor wants to hijack the memorial.

President George W. Bush never stooped so low. In fact, he went out of his way to avoid being the center of attention, preferring to meet with the families of fallen soldiers in private.

From NBC News:

Aides say that Bush does not attend military funerals because the presidential entourage would disrupt solemn events and that the media have been banned from photographing coffins arriving at Dover Air Force Base out of respect.

[…]

Bush prefers to offer comfort in private. He writes letters to families of those killed, visits soldiers at military hospitals and meets with relatives of the dead. Altogether, according to the White House, Bush has met with 1,149 relatives of 336 dead service members. These sessions generate little attention because the White House bars journalists, but some relatives have described them.

"It's absolutely painful for him," said Beth Karlson, 63, a retired school food-service manager whose son died in Iraq and who met with Bush in Wisconsin last month. The president hugged her and held her hand. "He's a genuine person. He wants to reach out to the families and let them know how he feels."

Yet recall how viciously the media torched President Bush when he declined a second meeting with anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, whose son died in Iraq: How dare the president disrespect the wishes of a grieving mother! Who the devil does he think he is?! Why, that’s absolutely monstrous!

The New York Times’ Maureen Dowd actually wrote, “The moral authority of parents who bury children killed in Iraq is absolute.”

Oh, really? 

Then here’s a follow-up question for Ms. Dowd: What about the moral authority of the parents, spouses, and children of the 3,000 New Yorkers whose loved ones were slaughtered on 9/11? 

Is their “moral authority” absolute, too? Or does that only apply to left-wing activists who protest Republicans?

Because if it is, what does it say about a New York City politician who spurns their requests, ignores their cries, and doesn’t give a damn when his actions add to their agony?

Most socialists are content to seize your money, wealth, and property. Not Mamdani: He’s also demanding his “fair share” of New Yorkers’ 9/11 grief. 

Your agony is his to appropriate, too — courtesy of “the warmth of collectivism.” It’s not yours; it’s his.

Which is why he’s the most selfish politician in America today.

Recommended: JD Vance’s Weird Enemies List

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