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The New York Police Department (NYPD) will not provide a security detail to Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s wife during her upcoming vacation to two terror hotspots in the Middle East, despite the mayor’s office claiming otherwise.
“The NYPD does not send officers to countries with level 4 travel advisories for discretionary reasons such as personal travel,” a spokesperson for the law enforcement agency told .
Mamdani’s wife, Rama Duwaji, is planning to travel to Syria and Lebanon to visit family in September, according to the New York Post. Both of those countries are on the State Department’s “Do Not Travel” list due to terrorism concerns.
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his wife, Rama Duwaji, smile as confetti falls after his ceremonial inauguration as mayor at City Hall on Jan. 1, 2026, in New York. (David Dee Delgado/Getty Images)
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The mayor’s office had previously confirmed that Duwaji would have an NYPD security detail on the trip.
“Upon the strong recommendation of the NYPD, the first lady’s security detail will be joining her when she travels to visit family in Syria and Lebanon,” Mamdani’s spokeswoman Dora Pekec reportedly said.
But later, as it became clear that the NYPD would not be making the overseas trek, the mayor chalked the confusion up to a staff “miscommunication” when asked about it by news outlet PIX11 on Tuesday.
NYPD Detectives’ Endowment Association (DEA) President Scott Munro furiously slammed the implication that NYPD detectives would accompany the city’s First Lady to the Middle East.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch speak at a Sunday morning news conference after a spate of weekend shootings in Brooklyn. (Kyle Mazza/Anadolu)
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“Our detectives put themselves in harm’s way every day protecting New Yorkers,” said Munro. “The DEA would never remain silent if our members were asked to travel to a dangerous, off-limits foreign country for anything other than a legitimate law-enforcement or intelligence operation.”
“Our detectives are needed here in New York City protecting residents and fighting crime,” he added.
Mamdani has a long history of trashing the very police department he thought would accompany and provide security for his wife to the dangerous Middle Eastern countries on New York City taxpayer’s dime.
“There is no negotiating with an institution this wicked & corrupt. Defund it. Dismantle it. End the cycle of violence,” Mamdani said in reference to the NYPD in a viral 2020 post on X.
Zohran Mamdani, mayor of New York, holds up bananas labeled with a 30% off sticker during an announcement on municipal grocery stores at a Campaign for Hunger community food distribution center in Brooklyn, N.Y., on Monday, July 27, 2026. (Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“We don’t need an investigation to know that the NYPD is racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety,” he said in another 2020 post, adding in a follow-up: “What we need is to #DefundTheNYPD.”
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“Queer liberation means defund the police,” he said in yet another post.
The mayor, who has also faced scrutiny for his anti-Israel views and recently called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “war criminal” while calling for his arrest, derogatorily linked the NYPD to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).
“We have to make clear that when the boot of the NYPD is on your neck, it’s been laced by the IDF,” Mamdani, who was a keynote speaker, said during a panel discussion at the Democratic Socialists of America’s 2023 national convention.
Jessica Tisch speaks after being sworn in as the next Commissioner of the New York Police Department (NYPD) during a ceremony at One Police Plaza on November 25, 2024, in New York City. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
During his campaign for mayor of the most populated U.S. city, Mamdani said the exact opposite, explicitly stating that he did not want to defund the police.
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Still, it appears there is no love lost between Mamdani and the NYPD.
Just last week, he was booed offstage when he tried to speak at a pro-police event in Staten Island.
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Digital reached out to Mamdani’s office for comment.
