{"id":120162,"date":"2025-08-05T06:17:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T06:17:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/120162\/"},"modified":"2025-08-05T06:17:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T06:17:10","slug":"cory-booker-refuses-to-endorse-zohran-mamdani-for-nyc-mayor-while-blasting-defund-the-police-movement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/120162\/","title":{"rendered":"Cory Booker refuses to endorse Zohran Mamdani for NYC mayor\u2014 while blasting ‘defund the police’ movement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ)<\/a> refused to say whether he supports New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani in a recent interview and argued that supporters of the \u201cdefund the police\u201d movement are \u201cwrong.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cDemocratic leaders are not supporting [Mamdani]. Is that a problem? Do you support him?\u201d the Garden State senator was asked by CNN\u2019s Manu Raju<\/a>, in an interview that aired Sunday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Booker avoided directly answering Raju\u2019s question, instead arguing that \u201cthe lines that divide us in America are not nearly as strong as the ties that bind us.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) joins civil rights and voting rights advocates for a rally to reintroduce the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act outside the US Capitol on July 29, 2025. Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cBig corporations, people want to keep our eyes on the screen, want to pit us against each other and tell us how much we should hate each other. I am sorry. The left-right lens is not the right lens to look at this right now,\u201d he continued. \u201cRight now it is: Can we get back to the pragmatic work of governing?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Raju tried to pin Booker down and again asked: \u201cMamdani, are you going to support him?\u201d<\/p>\n

The senator declined to endorse the democratic socialist candidate.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI have learned a long time ago: Let New York politics be New York politics,\u201d Booker responded. \u201cWe\u2019ve got enough challenges in Jersey. I got a governor\u2019s race. I\u2019m supporting Mikie Sherrill. I got legislative races. That\u2019s where my energy is going to go going into November.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNew York City, I love you. You\u2019re my neighbor. You\u2019re about 10 miles from where I live. You guys figure out your elections. I\u2019m going to focus on mine,\u201d he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

NYC Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani receives the backing of Senator Elizabeth Warren during a press conference held at District Council 37, as he talks of his plans for free childcare for all New York parents. Matthew McDermott<\/p>\n

Mamdani, an outspoken critic of Israel<\/a> who has refused to condemn antisemitic slogans<\/a>, shocked the country last month when he handily defeated former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and others in New York City\u2019s June Democratic mayoral primary.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The 33-year-old Empire State assemblyman, however, has failed to secure endorsements from key Democratic state leaders, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY)<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Critics of Mamdani also point to his past support of defunding the police, which Raju raised during his conversation with Booker.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Booker avoided directly answering Raju\u2019s question, instead arguing that \u201cthe lines that divide us in America are not nearly as strong as the ties that bind us.\u201d\u00a0 Bonnie Cash\/UP\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we need is to #DefundTheNYPD,\u201d Mamdani tweeted in June 2020, charging that the NYPD is \u201cracist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Days later, Mamdani posted that New York needs \u201ca socialist city council to defund the police.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAre statements like that still problematic for your party?\u201d Raju asked Booker.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI think, again, I\u2019m going to speak for Jersey. Newark, New Jersey, a majority black city, five days after the George Floyd incident, if you had polled my city and said, \u2018Do you want more police, less police, or the same amount of police?\u2019 Newark would have overwhelmingly voted for more police,\u201d Booker said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mamdani, an outspoken critic of Israel who has refused to condemn antisemitic slogans, shocked the country last month when he handily defeated former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and others in New York City\u2019s June Democratic mayoral primary.\u00a0 Matthew McDermott<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want police violating our rights. We don\u2019t want police endangering our lives, but we want safety and security as the fundamental foundation of Maslow\u2019s pyramid. We want to have security in our community, and the police are part of that. An essential part of that equation,\u201d the senator continued.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cSo anybody who\u2019s saying \u2018defund the police\u2019 is wrong, and within the Democratic Party or within the nation, I will always fight that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mamdani walked back his past support for defunding the police<\/a> last week in the wake of a mass shooting<\/a> in Manhattan that left four dead, including an NYPD officer.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am not running to defund the police,\u201d he told reporters.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMy statements in 2020 were made amidst a frustration that many New Yorkers held at the murder of George Floyd,\u201d Mamdani added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) refused to say whether he supports New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":120163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,10755,327,74792,2936,5248,401,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,5257,80,16854,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969,5301],"class_list":{"0":"post-120162","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-cnn","10":"tag-congress","11":"tag-cory-booker","12":"tag-law-enforcement","13":"tag-metro","14":"tag-new-jersey","15":"tag-new-york","16":"tag-new-york-city","17":"tag-newyork","18":"tag-newyorkcity","19":"tag-ny","20":"tag-nyc","21":"tag-nypd","22":"tag-politics","23":"tag-senate","24":"tag-united-states","25":"tag-united-states-of-america","26":"tag-unitedstates","27":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","28":"tag-us","29":"tag-us-news","30":"tag-usa","31":"tag-zohran-mamdani"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}