DNC chair dismisses NYC Mayoral hopeful Zohran Mamdani’s refusal to condemn ‘intifada’ chants

Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin brushed off concerns from Jewish Democrats on Wednesday about New York City mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani’s refusal to condemn the slogan “globalize the intifada.”

Martin, elected to lead the DNC in February, suggested that his party welcomes users of the chant associated with violent uprisings against Israel, in an interview with PBS. 

“You know, there’s no candidate in this party that I agree 100% of the time with, to be honest with you,” Martin said, when asked by “PBS NewsHour” host Amna Nawaz about Mamdani’s repeated defense of the rallying cry for anti-Israel protesters. 

“There’s things that I don’t agree with Mamdani that he said, but at the end of the day, I always believe, as a Democratic Party chair in Minnesota for the last 14 years and now the chair of the DNC, that you win through addition, you win by bringing people into your coalition,” he continued. “We have conservative Democrats, we have centrist Democrats, we have labor progressives like me and we have this new brand of Democrat, which is the leftists, and we win by bringing people into that coalition.” 

“At the end of the day, for me, that’s the type of party we’re going to lead. We are a big tent party.”

Mamdani, an outspoken critic of Israel, has both awkwardly defended activists’ use of “globalize the intifada” and has flat-out refused to condemn it on several occasions. 

The Queens assemblyman described the chant as an adage that reflects the “desperate desire for equality and equal rights in standing up for Palestinian human rights,” in an interview with the Bulwark last month that went viral. 

Mamdani later repeatedly refused to condemn the slogan, viewed by some as a call for violence against Jews, in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

“That’s not language that I use. The language that I use and the language that I will continue to use to lead this city is that which speaks clearly to my intent, which is an intent grounded in a belief in universal human rights,” he told host Kristen Welker on June 29. 

“I don’t believe that the role of the mayor is to police speech in that manner.”

Some Democrats, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), have called on the socialist Democratic nominee to clarify his position on the slogan. 

If elected, Mamdani would become the first Muslim mayor of New York City.