New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani wants to erase former Mayor Ed Koch's name from the 59th Street Bridge, a span Koch proudly called "my bridge", because an LGBT activist group says Koch bears responsibility for AIDS deaths in the 1980s. The New York Post reported that Mamdani declared his support on a candidate questionnaire from the Jim Owles Liberal LGBT Democratic Club, writing simply: "Yes, I support renaming."
He is not alone. Sixteen other council members either backed or said they would "strongly consider" legislation to strip Koch's name from the bridge, the Post found after reviewing the club's questionnaires. Only one council member, Virginia Maloney, gave a flat "No."
The push tells you everything about the priorities of New York's progressive political class. The city faces a budget crisis its own mayor has called "historic." Subway riders dodge rats and disorder. And yet a growing roster of elected Democrats has chosen to spend political energy relitigating a three-term mayor who has been dead for more than a decade, because an activist club decided his legacy must be canceled.
The Jim Owles Liberal LGBT Democratic Club, led by president Allen Roskoff, uses candidate questionnaires as a litmus test before issuing endorsements. One question put to candidates asks whether they would support renaming the bridge and sponsor legislation to do it. The club's framing is blunt: the question states that "Ed Koch has been documented to have caused the deaths of scores of people with AIDS, excused city council members who voted against the gay rights bill and was blatantly racist."
That language, treating contested historical claims as settled fact, is baked into the question itself. Candidates who want the club's endorsement know what answer is expected.
Mamdani gave the expected answer on the campaign trail last year. City Council Speaker Julie Menin went further in her own questionnaire, telling the club she favored renaming the bridge simply "the 59th Street Bridge." But when the Post contacted Menin on Sunday, her spokesperson reversed course hard.
"Speaker Menin does not support efforts to rename the Ed Koch Bridge, and would not support any legislation to do so. She was approached in 2025 to add her name as a co-sponsor to such a bill and declined to do so."
So Menin told the activist group one thing and the public another. That gap between the questionnaire answer and the official statement is worth noting. It suggests at least one senior Democrat knows the renaming push is politically toxic, but was willing to play along when only the club was listening.
The Post identified a broad roster of New York Democrats who have lined up behind the effort or signaled openness to it. City Comptroller Mark Levine, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, former City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, now running for lieutenant governor alongside Gov. Kathy Hochul, Rep. Dan Goldman, Brad Lander, City Councilwoman Julie Won, and House candidates Alex Bores and Jack Schlossberg all appear on the list.
Williams said he voted against the Koch bridge renaming when he served on the City Council. Won represents the Queens neighborhood on that borough's side of the bridge. Their positions carry weight in any future council vote.
Even Brooklyn Councilwoman Sandy Nurse, who called the issue a low priority, left the door open. "It's not my hill to die on, but if people want support, I am OK with that," Nurse told the club.
For a mayor whose first 100 days have already drawn scrutiny for broken promises on housing and homelessness, the bridge-renaming stance fits a pattern: grand ideological gestures that cost nothing in budget terms but inflame the public and distract from governance.
Ed Koch served three terms as mayor from 1978 to 1989. He was a World War II veteran and the second Jewish mayor of New York. The City Council and then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg renamed the Queensboro Bridge in Koch's honor in 2011. Koch died at age 88 two years later.
Roskoff's case against Koch centers on the AIDS crisis. He claims Koch "did little" while thousands of gay New Yorkers died, including Roskoff's partner and the club's namesake, Jim Owles. Roskoff called the bridge's current name "disrespectful to thousands of people who died of AIDS at the hands of Ed Koch."
"Of course I want the bridge renaming to happen."
That is Roskoff's prerogative. But the framing collapses a complicated public-health catastrophe, a disease spread through intimate sexual contact and contaminated needles, at a time when the federal government, medical establishment, and city agencies were all scrambling to understand it, into a single villain. Koch's response can be debated. Declaring that he "caused" the deaths is an activist claim, not a historical verdict.
Veteran political consultant Hank Sheinkopf did not mince words about the campaign. "This is insane. It's nuts. Koch is dead. Leave him alone!" Sheinkopf told the Post, adding that Roskoff "doesn't like Koch and won't let go."
The Post interviewed residents near the bridge, and their reactions cut against the political class. Margarita Thomas, a 40-year-old native of Romania living near the span, called the idea a disgrace.
"It would be a crime! They should repair the subway, they should clean the city. They should get rid of the rats, not rename bridges. That's absolutely imbecilic."
Thomas's complaint mirrors what taxpayers across the five boroughs have been saying for months. Mamdani's administration has already retreated on a property tax hike after fierce backlash, and the city's fiscal outlook remains grim.
Wilson Crow, a New Yorker who grew up under Koch's leadership, was equally dismissive. "They shouldn't rename it. It's no big deal. I don't know why they are making a big deal about it. It doesn't bother anybody," Crow said, adding that AIDS was "nobody's power and control" and that Koch "couldn't stop" it.
Mike Herlihy, a 38-year-old resident, captured the mood most plainly: "There's a lot bigger fish to fry in New York or the world. It's wild that people have all this energy on things like that."
That energy, of course, is the point. The renaming push costs elected officials nothing. It requires no budget line, no enforcement mechanism, no measurable outcome. It is pure symbolism, a loyalty test administered by an activist club and embraced by politicians eager to check a progressive box without delivering anything tangible to the people they represent.
Mamdani's support for erasing Koch's name sits alongside a mayoral record that has already generated significant public resistance. Jews, Muslims, and Christians rallied outside Gracie Mansion to condemn the mayor over earlier controversies. His administration has lurched from one policy fight to the next, often backing down under pressure.
The budget crisis alone should consume every available hour at City Hall. Mamdani himself has called the fiscal situation "historic" and turned to Albany for a rescue. Yet here he is, lending his name to a campaign to sandblast a dead mayor's legacy off a bridge.
Menin's flip, telling the club she supported renaming, then telling the press she opposes it, reveals the political calculus at work. These questionnaires function as private loyalty oaths. Candidates say what the club wants to hear, collect the endorsement, and hope the public never reads the fine print. The Post read the fine print.
The 2011 renaming was approved by the full City Council and signed by Bloomberg. It was a bipartisan civic honor for a mayor who, whatever his flaws, governed New York through some of its hardest years. Stripping Koch's name now would not undo the AIDS crisis. It would not help a single New Yorker struggling with rent, crime, or crumbling infrastructure.
It would, however, confirm that New York's progressive leadership class has fully embraced the logic of retroactive cancellation, judging historical figures solely by the standards of today's activist groups, erasing honors that were granted in good faith, and calling it justice.
Koch used to greet New Yorkers with a simple question: "How'm I doing?" If Mamdani asked the same question today, the answer from the people who actually live near his bridge would be clear enough.
When your city can't balance its books or keep its subways clean, maybe leave the dead mayor's bridge alone and do your own job first.
