Republican gubernatorial candidate Elise Stefanik ripped into Gov. Kathy Hochul Sunday night for endorsing “raging antisemite” Zohran Mamdani for mayor as she accepted an award from a prominent Jewish group.
“We know we are at a tipping point when the most important city in the world elects a raging antisemite, defund the police, tax-hiking Communist as mayor,” Stefanik said during the annual gala of the Zionist Organization of America.
She alleged that Mamdani vowed to arrest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and said his “family history and political ideology is steeped in sympathy for suicide bombers and terrorists.”
“A mayor who said Hamas should not lay down their arms. A mayor who campaigned with the unindicted co-conspirator of the 1993 World Trade Center Bombing that killed New Yorkers. This, from the person who will lead a city with over 1 million Jewish people. And this mayor was endorsed by none other than the weakest and Worst Governor in America, Kathy Hochul,” Stefanik raged.
Rep. Stefanik, the House Republican Conference chairperson, was also endorsed at the event by billionaire Miriam Adelson, whose late husband, Sheldon, founded the Las Vegas Sands casino and resort company.
She vowed not to stand silent while the mayor-elect and members of the Democratic Socialists of America “spew hatred” toward Jews.
“At the very moment that New Yorkers were looking for strength and moral clarity, our weak Governor Kathy Hochul, the Worst Governor in America, showed weakness and endorsed the jihadist for Mayor. She propelled him to this office, putting every Jewish New Yorker at risk,” Stefanik said.
“The truth is she threw New Yorkers of this great city under the bus all because of her abysmal polling,” she added.
Stefanik said she is waging a moral fight in her bid for governor, not just an economic one against New York’s high taxes and spending. Tackling antisemitism, she said, is a core element of her campaign, pointing out that New York is home to more Jews than anywhere outside Israel, and reported acts of antisemitism are at record highs.
The congresswoman — who announced her bid for governor last week claimed it was “no coincidence” that the morning after Mamdani was elected, a swastika was painted outside the Magen David yeshiva in Brooklyn. Hochul and Mamdani both condemned the incident.
“That is what Kathy Hochul’s New York looks like. New Yorkers deserve a leader who will stand up unequivocally and say: NOT ON MY WATCH.”
She claimed that Hochul, a Democrat, has allowed dangerous antisemitism to flourish.
“Kathy Hochul hasn’t just allowed this downward spiral into dangerous antisemitism — she has blessed it, signed it, embraced it, and endorsed it,” Stefanik said.
“When Jewish New Yorkers needed Kathy Hochul’s leadership the most, she bent the knee to Commie Mamdani and allowed the full-blown takeover of the Democrat Party by the Antisemitic Socialists.”
“That is not leadership,” she said. “It is weakness. It is surrender.”
Stefanik received the ZOA’s Maccabee Warrior Award for combating antisemitism. The Jewish holiday of Hanukkah honors the Maccabees’ successful rebellion against the Seleucid Empire and rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem.
Her questioning during House hearings on campus antisemitism triggered the ouster or forced resignations of several Ivy League presidents, including at the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard.
She also took a moment to honor New York natives Omer Neutra and Itay Chen, who were murdered during Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 invasion of Israel, with their bodies taken hostage in Gaza.
The Post reached out to Hochul and Mamdani for comment.
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