A 2016 radio interview in which New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani spoke in what critics call a "fake" Ugandan accent has resurfaced on social media, drawing sharp conservative ridicule over his authenticity.
The clip, recorded on South Africa's Kaya 959 radio station while Mamdani promoted his mother's Disney film Queen of Katwe, spread rapidly across X on Wednesday, with conservative commentators, media outlets, and at least one former mayoral candidate piling on. In the interview, Mamdani discussed Ugandan dance culture in a cadence and accent markedly different from the way he typically speaks as a New York politician.
Mamdani was born in Uganda, raised in South Africa, and moved to New York City at age seven. He holds dual U.S. and Ugandan citizenship. Those biographical facts make the "fake accent" charge more complicated than a simple case of impersonation, but critics argue that is precisely the point. A politician who grew up in New York and built his career there, they contend, does not casually slip into a thick Ugandan accent unless he is performing.
The backlash came fast and from multiple directions. Benny Johnson, host of The Benny Show, posted on X:
"UNEARTHED: Zohran Mamdani does an obviously fake Ugandan accent while promoting a Disney movie based in Africa. How many Democrats have been caught using fake accents at this point? They're all frauds."
Spencer Pratt, the reality TV figure and former Los Angeles mayoral candidate, was blunter. Pratt wrote on X:
"Look at theater kid commie Mamdani running another fake accent and appropriating African culture. Communists are all frauds. EVERY single one. Don't ever trust a communist, or else you'll get Galloway'd and stranded in a gulag."
The Daily Wire kept it short: "Nobody does a fake accent better than a Democrat politician." Conservative Brief, a right-wing political news site, asked, "What is with the Democrats and their fake accents?!" Both posted the clip to their X accounts.
Tara Bull, a conservative social media commentator and Twitter Spaces host, added a jab with a broader target: "Anyone else notice Mamdani's accent change? He must've studied at Obama University."
One of the more pointed critiques came from Sammy Antar, the former Crazy Eddie CFO and convicted fraudster, who framed the clip as a test of Mamdani's own ideological standards. Antar posted on X:
"Has Zohran Mamdani ever explained when adopting another culture's accent is 'cultural appropriation' and when it is 'authenticity'? He had plenty to say about everyone else's privilege at Bowdoin."
That line cuts to the core of the conservative complaint. Mamdani built his political identity on the progressive left, where policing cultural boundaries, who gets to speak for whom, who is "appropriating" what, is a central preoccupation. If the mayor's allies would call out a Republican for the same behavior, critics argue, then the standard ought to apply equally.
Mamdani's broader record in office has given conservatives no shortage of material. His administration has faced scrutiny over a surge in hate crimes across New York City, with Jewish residents bearing a disproportionate share of the violence.
Kevin Smith, host of Loud Majority Live, tied the accent clip to Mamdani's relationship with corporate America: "When did Disney start to suck? When they hired the directors son who had a fake Ugandan accent. He didn't mind 'big corporations' when they were signing his checks."
Mamdani's background is genuinely multinational. He was born in Uganda, spent his early childhood in South Africa, and moved to New York at seven. His mother, Mira Nair, directed Queen of Katwe, a Disney film based on the true story of a Ugandan chess prodigy. Mamdani worked on the film as music supervisor and third assistant director and appeared in a brief on-screen cameo.
Before entering politics, Mamdani was a rapper who performed under the stage names "Young Cardamom" and "Mr. Cardamom." He later ran for office as a progressive Democrat and won the mayoralty.
In the 2016 interview, Mamdani described the cultural gap between New York and Kampala in terms of dancing. "The difference for me is I'm from Uganda, but I also grew up in New York," he said. "In New York, you go out, some guys are very hesitant to dance."
He continued: "You know, if they're not grinding, they're just standing. In Kampala, you will just not find that. People are all dancing. Everybody's dancing, men, women and it's fantastic that way."
The clip had surfaced once before, it made the rounds on social media last year, but gained new traction this week as Mamdani's mayoralty has drawn increasing national attention. His recent push to have city lawyers explore arresting Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu during a UN visit put him at the center of an international firestorm, and that episode drew bipartisan condemnation from Israeli leaders across the political spectrum.
Fox News Digital reached out to the mayor's office for comment on the resurfaced clip. No response was reported.
That silence fits a pattern. Mamdani has faced questions about his flagship childcare program costing billions more than promised, about governance decisions like removing business leaders from a key advisory board, and about rising crime, and his administration has not always been eager to engage with critics on the right.
Whether the accent in the 2016 clip is "fake" or simply a natural code-switch from a man who spent his earliest years in East Africa is, in one sense, a matter of interpretation. The clip does not come with a linguistic analysis. But the political question is simpler: Does a progressive mayor who built his brand on identity politics get to play by different rules than the ones his movement enforces on everyone else?
Nine separate conservative accounts and outlets posted about the clip on X. The volume of the response suggests the answer, at least on the right, is no.
Politicians who lecture the country about authenticity and cultural sensitivity tend to get measured by their own yardstick, and right now, Mamdani's yardstick is shorter than his accent is long.
