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TRUMP ADMINISTRATION RAISES POSSIBILITY OF STRIPPING MAMDANI OF US
CITIZENSHIP  
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Robert Tait
July 1, 2025
The Guardian
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_ Move comes after rightwing Republican accuses New York City mayoral
candidate of concealing support for ‘terrorism’ _

Zohran Mamdani, Photo: Madison Swart

 

The Trump administration
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the possibility of stripping Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic mayoral
candidate for New York City, of his US citizenship as part of a
crackdown against foreign-born citizens convicted of certain offences.

Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, appeared to pave
the way for an investigation into Mamdani’s status after Andy Ogles,
a rightwing Republican representative for Tennessee, called for his
citizenship to be revoked on the grounds that he may have concealed
his support for “terrorism” during the naturalization process.

Mamdani, 33, who was born in Uganda to ethnic Indian parents, became a
US citizen in 2018 and has attracted widespread media attention –
and controversy – over his vocal support for Palestinian rights.

Donald Trump was asked on Tuesday about Mamdani’s pledge to “stop
masked” Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents “from
deporting our neighbors”. The US president responded: “Well, then,
we’ll have to arrest him,” Axios reported
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Mamdani posted
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on X in response. “The President of the United States just
threatened to have me arrested, stripped of my citizenship, put in a
detention camp and deported. Not because I have broken any law but
because I will refuse to let Ice terrorize our city,” he wrote.

He continued: “His statements don’t just represent an attack on
our democracy but an attempt to send a message to every New Yorker who
refuses to hide in the shadows: if you speak up, they will come for
you. We will not accept this intimidation.”

Controversy over his immigration status follows a chorus of
Islamophobic attacks on his Muslim faith following his victory in last
week’s New York mayoral primary, when he finished first in a field
that included Andrew Cuomo, the former New York state governor and
favored candidate of the Democratic establishment.

It also comes after the Trump administration instructed attorneys to
prioritize denaturalizing foreign-born US citizens
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had committed specified crimes. A justice department memo instructs
lawyers to institute proceedings against naturalized citizens who are
suspected of having “illegally procured” naturalization or having
done so by “concealment of a material fact or by willful
misrepresentation”.

Ogles wrote [[link removed]] to
Pam Bondi, the attorney general, calling for an investigation into
Mamdani after his Democratic mayoral primary victory on the grounds
that “he may have procured US citizenship through willful
misrepresentation or concealment of material support for terrorism”.

As evidence, he cited a rap song by Mamdani, entitled my love to the
Holy Land five, in which he called members of a foundation convicted
of supporting Hamas “my guys”. He also referred to Mamdani’s
refusal to condemn the phrase “globalize the intifada”.

In an accompanying post on X, Ogles wrote: “Zohran ‘little
muhammad’ Mamdani is an antisemitic, socialist, communist who will
destroy the great City of New York. He needs to be deported.”

Asked about Ogles’s call, Leavitt said
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“I have not seen those claims, but surely if they are true, it’s
something that should be investigated.”

The justice department has confirmed receiving Ogles’s letter but
has not commented further.

Chris Murphy, a Democratic senator for Connecticut who has become one
of the Trump administration’s most effective critics, called the
demand to denaturalize Mamdani “racist bullshit”.

“Trump will stop at nothing to protect billionaires and price
gouging corporations, even racist bullshit like this,” he wrote
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“Zohran won because he ran a campaign laser focused on putting power
back in the hands of working people. And that’s a threat to the
Mar-a-Lago crowd.”

Mamdani, a self-proclaimed democratic socialist, has had his social
media posts and previous political activism fiercely scrutinized since
last week’s election victory, which was accompanied by promises of
leftwing populist policies for New York if he is eventually elected
mayor.

Amid a chorus of rightwing vitriol, Donald Trump has called him “a
pure communist”
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has threatened to cut off funds to New York if Mamdani becomes mayor
and “doesn’t behave himself”.

At a news conference at the official unveiling of a new detention
centre for immigrants in Florida’s Everglades, Trump reiterated his
communist remark and referred to allegations that Mamdani had obtained
his citizenship “illegally”.

“We don’t need a communist in this country, but if we have one,
I’m going to be watching over him very carefully on behalf of the
nation. We send him money, we send him all the things that he needs to
run a government,” Trump said.

“We’re going to be watching that very carefully. A lot of people
are saying, he’s here illegally. We’re going to look at
everything, but ideally, he’s going to turn out to be much less than
a communist. Right now he’s a communist, that’s not a
socialist.”

Mamdani also commented on the fact that Trump praised Eric Adams
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City mayor who is struggling in his re-election campaign and switched
from representing the Democratic party to running again as an
independent. Trump said Adams was a “good person” whom he had
“helped out a little bit”, referring to the US justice department
in April dismissing
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federal corruption case against Adams.

Mamdani said in his post: “That Trump included praise for Adams in
his authoritarian threats is unsurprising.”

_Robert Tait is political correspondent for Guardian US, based in
Washington DC. He was previously the Guardian's correspondent in the
Czech Republic, Iran and Turkey_

_Joanna Walters contributed reporting_

* Zohran Mamdani
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* Trump
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* Denaturalization
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