On Wednesday night’s The Briefing, MSNBC’s Jen Psaki had on self-proclaimed democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, following his win in New York City’s Democratic Party mayoral primary race. Psaki used words like “joyful,” “inviting,” and “authentic” all words that downplayed Mamdani’s harmful policies and hateful rhetoric towards Jewish people.
Psaki tried to prep the interview by using selective language and false facts to make it seem like Mamdani was a popular candidate among the Jewish people of New York:
They were joyful, they were authentic and funny, and each and every one of them either explained what he would actually do as mayor, or gave voters practical information about how and where to vote. Which is incredibly important when you’re trying to turn people out who don’t always vote.
But Zohran Mamdani’s campaign was also a massive organizing success, it wasn't just online. I mean, the campaign says it recruited over 40,000 volunteers who knocked on more than 1 million doors before Election Day, and he showed up in places where he wasn’t expected. Which is pretty key and a big lesson. Like Crown Heights, which is a historically black and Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn, where Mamdani held one of his final campaign events. Despite Andrew Cuomo's direct appeal to those exact voters, Mamdani won that neighborhood by 26 points.
She made the claim that Mamdani “showed up in places where he wasn’t expected. Which is pretty key and a big lesson. Like Crown Heights, which is a historically black and Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn, where Mamdani held one of his final campaign events. Despite Andrew Cuomo's direct appeal to those exact voters, Mamdani won that neighborhood by 26 points.”
Although Mamdani did win by 26 points in this district, to claim that the Jewish voters voted for him in an attempt to make him look more appealable and less anti-Semitic was false.
This election map clearly showed Cuomo won the most densely populated Jewish areas in Crown Heights in the area south of Eastern Parkway, between New York and Troy Avenue. Polling also showed Cuomo won 51 percent of the black vote compared to 34 percent by Mamdani, so while he could have won the majority in Crown Heights, he obviously didn’t in all of NYC.
Psaki also claimed that Mamdani won by “speaking to the core economic struggles of millions of people in the city.” She said this despite Cuomo winning a 49 percent majority of low income voters, while failing to note Mamdani’s disastrous policies like freezing rent and creating government owned grocery stores.
She then remarked that politics was “about how you make people feel. It’s about inviting people in, it’s about making the voters who you are reaching out to feel that you are a person who hears them, who wants to speak for them when no one else will. And there’s no question that at least at the start, he has a huge gift for that.”
To describe a man who called for, and still refused to denounce the term “globalize the intifada,” as having a ‘gift’ for ‘inviting people in’ can only be described as insane.
The “globalization of the intifada” was known by many in the Jewish community to have significant anti-Semitic rhetoric. It’s used in the pro-Palestine movement as a means to support resistance to Israeli occupation, often through violent terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, groups who openly call for the eradication of Israel and the Jewish people.
After Psaki asked how he planned to overcome this issue, Mamdani delusionally responded with this:
And ultimately, it's through the conversations I’ve had with Jewish New Yorkers that I have developed a proposal for the Department of Community Safety that would include an 800 percent increase in funding for hate crime prevention programs, because ultimately, we cannot simply say that anti-Semitism has no home in this city or no place in this country, we have to do more than talk about it, we have to tackle it.
It’s hard not to speculate as to who will carry out the 800 percent increase in funding to prevent hate crimes because according to Mamdani, “The NYPD is racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety… What we need to do is #DefundTheNYPD.”
Psaki ended her pro-Mamdani segment by lamenting that he had to deal with “tremendous attacks from MAGA Republicans,” and how “they’re already trying to run an Islamophobic campaign against you.”
According to Psaki, not wanting the Mayor of America’s largest city to be someone who openly called for the destruction of the Israeli state through the killing of Jews was Islamophobic.
The full transcript is below. Click "expand" to view:
MSNBC: The Briefing With Jen Psaki
9:04:37 PM EST
June, 25th, 2025JEN PSAKI: Zohran Mamdani ran a campaign that could not have been any more different. I mean, for starters, he showed up on social media with creative videos from the very beginning, like these.
[MAMDANI CAMPAIGN VIDEOS]
(...)
9:05:24 PM
PSAKI: They were joyful, they were authentic and funny, and each and every one of them either explained what he would actually do as mayor, or gave voters practical information about how and where to vote. Which is incredibly important when you’re trying to turn people out who don’t always vote.
But Zohran Mamdani’s campaign was also a massive organizing success, it wasn't just online. I mean, the campaign says it recruited over 40,000 volunteers who knocked on more than 1 million doors before Election Day, and he showed up in places where he wasn’t expected. Which is pretty key and a big lesson. Like Crown Heights, which is a historically black and Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn, where Mamdani held one of his final campaign events. Despite Andrew Cuomo's direct appeal to those exact voters, Mamdani won that neighborhood by 26 points.
He won for a range of reasons, partly by sharing his contagious love for New York City, whether it was eating an egg and cheese at a bodega, or riding the Staten Island ferry. He did it by running a campaign that was optimistic, that was hopeful and aspirational, one where he thought — he said what he thought, not necessarily always what was politically popular, and he did it by speaking to the core economic struggles of millions of people in the city.
(...)
9:08:23 PM
PSAKI: They're also tough questions Mamdani will need to answer as he works to build on the coalition that led to his success last night. That includes expanding his support in New York and finding a way to address the concerns of some voters who disagree with his views on Israel and how he has expressed them.
So, yes, there’s plenty of hard work ahead for Zohran Mamdani, plenty, plenty of hard questions he needs to answer. But, what he accomplished last night is also a reminder that politics is supposed to be — it is about how you make people feel. It’s about inviting people in, it’s about making the voters who you are reaching out to feel that you are a person who hears them, who wants to speak for them when no one else will. And there’s no question that at least at the start, he has a huge gift for that.
(...)
9:12:04 PM
PSAKI: [TO MAMDANI] I mean, you’re running on issues that are very relevant to people in New York City. The cost of housing, free bussing, some have projected, you know, that this is the type of platform that would work in other parts of the country. I mean, you’re a proud democratic socialist. Do you think that is a platform that would work for other candidates running and other parts of the country?
(...)
9:19:46 PM
PSAKI: I know you were working to expand your coalition because you are being very careful what you are running in a general election, and I understand that. So, I want to ask you about one aspect of that, because you’re running to be the mayor of the city with the largest population of Jewish people outside of Israel and the world. And at a time which I know — you know — because you’ve addressed this before, when there’s been a significant uptick in anti-Semitic rhetoric and hate crimes against Jews. It’s very scary to be a Jewish American right now, and you’ve been criticized by a number of Jewish leaders, as well as the U.S. Holocaust Museum, for your defense of the phrase “globalize the intifada.”
Last night in your speech, you alluded, so I know this is on your mind, you alluded to concerns from the Jewish community, even vowing to reach further to understand their perspectives of those whom you disagree.
(...)
9:21:53 PM
ZOHRAN MAMDANI: And ultimately, it's through the conversations I’ve had with Jewish New Yorkers that I have developed a proposal for the Department of Community Safety that would include an 800 percent increase in funding for hate crime prevention programs, because ultimately, we cannot simply say that anti-Semitism has no home in this city or no place in this country, we have to do more than talk about it, we have to tackle it.
(...)
9:23:30 PM
PSAKI: You’re going to be dealing with tremendous attacks from MAGA Republicans, we’ve already seen that over the last 24 hours. Including from Stephen Miller, Elise Stefanik, the NRCC, they’re already trying to run an islamophobic campaign against you.
(...)