New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani skipped Manhattan’s Columbus Day parade on Monday as Italian Americans gather to celebrate the great navigator who landed in the New World in 1492 inaugurating the age of exploration.
Mamdani’s decision to skip the celebration and similar parades throughout the city drew criticism from some Italian Americans who considered his move a slight to their community. The leftist mayor has previously attended parades for other communities including the West Indian Day Parade, Mexican Independence Day Parade, and the Sikh Day Parade.
“It’s very disappointing because we elected him the mayor, and he is supposed to be representing everybody,” retired school teacher Albert Esposito told The New York Post.
“It’s a slap in the face to the Italian American community,” 53-year-old sandwich business owner Paul DeSpirito added.
Organizers of a parade in Brooklyn said over the weekend that they were disappointed Mamdani couldn’t join.
“We welcome Mayor Mamdani at all our events and it’s unfortunate he can’t be here with us celebrating Italian American culture and the community — we look forward to welcoming him at future parades and hope he will join us in 2027,” they said.
Italian Americans have battled New York Democrats for years to keep up monuments to Columbus across the state amid a surge of hatred toward the explorer. Mamdani made his feelings toward Columbus known in a social media post from June 2020.
“Take it down,” Mamdani posted alongside a picture of him raising his middle finger to a monument of Columbus.
The Daily Wire reached out to Mamdani’s office for more information on why he skipped out on the Columbus Day parades. His office said he “plans to host an Italian American heritage reception at Gracie Mansion in the coming weeks” and highlighted a social media video he posted to celebrate Italian American heritage month.
New York’s Italian American community previously attacked Mamdani for leaving Little Italy off of a map promoted by the city as a tribute recognizing various immigrant groups neighborhoods located throughout New York City. The map recognized various newer neighborhoods with less historical presence in the city like Little Palestine and Little Yemen.
Mamdani’s treatment of Columbus Day contrasted greatly with President Donald Trump, who placed a new statue of Columbus outside of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building earlier this year.
“HAPPY COLUMBUS DAY TO ALL, in particular our great Italian American Community which was forced to suffer as the Radical Left Dumocrats, Socialists, and Communists rampaged through our cities and towns ripping down almost all of the beautiful statues of Christopher Columbus,” Trump posted on Truth Social on Sunday.
“Well, those days of plunder are over, and the statues are back, more magnificent than ever,” he continued. “This is a big day for our great Italian American Community, and the Country of Italy itself, maybe the biggest. Congratulations!”
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