On June 25, 33-year-old Democrat Zohran Mamdani became a new socialist sensation in the media when he won the Democratic primary for mayor of New York City. But when Republicans pounced on his radicalism, their journalistic instinct was to back away from the story.
In the seven days after his victory, ABC, CBS, NBC and PBS combined for 56 minutes and 26 seconds of airtime discussing Mamdani -- but only 85 seconds on any of his woke policy prescriptions. NBC spent 85 seconds on just one idea, taxing "whiter" neighborhoods. Instead, they presented him as a "charming" political upstart with fresh economic ideas about "affordability," as if there's anything fresh about socialism.
The surprise within the liberal media came on July 3, when The New York Times published a story revealing that when Mamdani was a high school senior in 2009, he applied to Columbia University and checked identity boxes for "Asian" -- true, since his family is from India -- and "Black," which is a lie. Just like that Cherokee, Elizabeth Warren. When the Times asked him about it, Mamdani said he didn't consider himself either Black or African American, but rather "an American who was born in Africa."
People have made this joke about South African-born Elon Musk, and in 2004, about John Kerry's wife Teresa, born in Mozambique. But that's not "black." The Times even soft-pedaled the lie in their online subhead: "He doesn't consider himself Black but said the application didn't allow for the complexity of his background." Hiding behind "complexity" is not something "fact-based" outlets should admire.
Reporters Benjamin Ryan, Nicholas Fandos and Dana Rubinstein played up the "complexity" argument: "Mr. Mamdani's self-identification as both Black or African American and Asian on his application points to the heterogeneity of his background and upbringing as the child of Indian Ugandan and Indian American parents who brought him up in Uganda, South Africa and New York City." Lying is excused by "heterogeneity."
Even the Times delayed putting this scoop in the paper until Sunday, July 6, and then put it on page A-24 under the bland headline "Mamdani Faces Scrutiny Over College Application." To date, ABC, CBS, NBC and PBS haven't found a minute for this story, or even half a minute.
NPR didn't have it, but on "All Things Considered" on July 3 -- the day of the Times scoop -- anchor Juana Summers had an interview with Democrat Party chairman Ken Martin, suggesting the party elites got something wrong: "We just saw Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist, win the New York mayoral primary over the establishment candidate, Andrew Cuomo. I'll just note that Mamdani did not have the Democratic Party's support. Does that win make you reconsider your strategy when it comes to backing establishment Democrats in the midterms?"
Martin said, no, "My strategy has always been to support whoever our Democratic nominee is, right? And Mamdani is our Democratic nominee, and we will support him." Martin proclaimed admiration for Mamdani staying "on message" about affordability, and insisted any Democrat is better than a Republican. Whether those Democrats lie to get ahead on college admission forms isn't an issue, according to taxpayer-funded "public" radio.
The Times took so much heat from their leftist base that their "standards" editor Patrick Healy published a Twitter thread explaining how and why they reported what the Left called a "hit piece." It underlined what the Left expects of their media outlets: blind partisan loyalty.
Inconvenient truths about Democrats should be buried. Facts that help Republicans should be dismissed. Lies about race aren't really lies, they're just "complexity."