Mamdani Fires the People Who Raised Millions for 9/11 Families

Let’s start with the number nobody in the mainstream coverage bothered to put in the headline: $107 million. That’s how much the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City raised for the families of rescue workers killed or injured on September 11, 2001. The fund has existed since 1995, created under Rudy Giuliani, and survived four mayoral administrations without anyone touching its board of advisors. Bill de Blasio didn’t purge it. Eric Adams didn’t purge it. Zohran Mamdani just did.

On Tuesday, Mamdani’s office confirmed it fired every single member of that board, the business and civic leaders who’ve spent three decades channeling private donations into public programs, first responder support, and disaster relief. Not some members. All of them. According to Bloomberg, it’s the first time in at least three mayoral administrations that’s happened. His senior advisor, Dora Pekec, called it “an important next step in reimagining how philanthropy can augment, but not replace, public dollars and public goods.” New members, she said, would be announced “later this year.”

Translation: the people who actually knew how to raise money for widows and orphans of first responders just got replaced by whoever fits Mamdani’s ideological checklist. You don’t need a decoder ring for what “reimagining philanthropy” means from a self-described democratic socialist. It means fewer capitalists in the room and more people who agree with him.

Here’s the part that should make every New Yorker furious regardless of party: this isn’t the first time this year Mamdani has gone after the people who write the checks. He humiliated Citadel’s Ken Griffin with a class-warfare video outside the man’s own home. He’s been needling Wall Street banks over their tax bills. And now this. New York Post columnist Charles Gasparino, who tracks this stuff for a living, put it plainly this week: “Mayor Mamdani to the business community: ‘Drop dead.’ And the business community is falling to the floor and rolling over.” Big banks and asset managers are grumbling about Texas and Florida, sure, but so far they’re mostly staying put and hoping he loses reelection before he does real damage. That’s not a strategy. That’s a hostage situation with good manners.

And while the ink was still wet on the Mayor’s Fund purge, Mamdani’s other big idea landed too: his city-owned grocery store plan. Finance writer Nick Kokonas actually read the city’s request for proposals, and it’s a masterclass in contradiction. The city wants bulk “scale pricing” but refuses to award contracts at scale, doling out one store at a time. It wants a stripped-down, low-cost “limited SKU model” while simultaneously demanding kosher, halal, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free and diabetic sections in every location. Nobody has to prove need to shop there either. Any subsidy goes to whoever happens to live near a Mamdani grocery store, rich or poor, while families across town who actually need the help get nothing.

Then there’s the kicker: 20% of a bidder’s score comes from who promises to need the smallest subsidy. That’s not fiscal discipline. That’s a built-in invitation to lowball the city on day one and hand taxpayers the overrun later. Government contracting 101 says you get exactly the bid you incentivize, and Mamdani just incentivized dishonesty.

None of this is complicated. A mayor who campaigned on “reimagining” everything is now doing exactly that to the institutions that quietly worked for New Yorkers regardless of who sat in Gracie Mansion. The Mayor’s Fund wasn’t broken. The board wasn’t corrupt. It raised $107 million for 9/11 families and nobody complained until a socialist decided loyalty mattered more than competence.