New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani turned up at a Bronx Eid celebration Wednesday afternoon wearing a custom kurta fashioned from Arsenal's dark blue away jersey, complete with the club's zig-zag pattern and red sleeve lines, while Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez appeared at the same event in a hijab, setting off a wave of conservative criticism online.
A short video clip of Ocasio-Cortez speaking at the celebration, with Mamdani standing motionlessly behind her, has racked up hundreds of thousands of views and thousands of comments across social media platforms, the Daily Mail reported. Conservative observers called the congresswoman's choice to wear a hijab hypocritical, given her progressive stances on other cultural and religious issues.
One user on X captured the mood bluntly:
"AOC wearing a hijab exposes the total moral bankruptcy of the radical left."
That post was one of thousands. The specifics of the backlash centered on a familiar complaint: progressive politicians who champion secular feminism and LGBTQ causes selectively embrace the symbols of a faith tradition that holds very different views on those same questions. No statement from Ocasio-Cortez explaining her decision to wear the hijab appeared in the Daily Mail's reporting.
For his part, Mamdani, New York City's first Muslim mayor, seemed more interested in celebrating his soccer club than navigating the cultural minefield. Arsenal recently ended a 22-year drought to lift the Premier League title, and the mayor has not been shy about his fandom.
In a 2025 interview with Vulture, Mamdani traced his loyalty to the English club back to his childhood in East Africa. He was born in Kampala, Uganda, and his family roots run deep in the region.
"I came up as a fan in the early 2000s, and it was my uncle who introduced me to the team."
Mamdani went on to explain the connection in personal terms, pointing to Arsenal's roster of African players during that era, Lauren, Kolo Toure, Nwankwo Kanu, Emmanuel Eboue, and Alex Song, as figures who drew East African fans to the club. He credited longtime manager Arsene Wenger with changing the face of English soccer.
The custom kurta he wore at the Eid celebration was no off-the-rack novelty. It modified Arsenal's away kit into a traditional robe form, blending the club's colors and design into the garment. The specific designer or maker of the robe was not identified.
Mamdani was also recently spotted at a Brooklyn bar with filmmaker Spike Lee and actor Jason Sudeikis, the star of the soccer comedy "Ted Lasso", celebrating Arsenal's title victory. The mayor, it seems, is not a casual supporter.
The Eid event was a relatively lighthearted moment for a mayor who has generated far more heat on fiscal and economic policy. Mamdani's tenure has been marked by aggressive tax proposals that have drawn sharp rebukes from business leaders and investors.
Earlier this year, Jeff Bezos publicly rebuked Mamdani after the mayor singled out hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin in a viral video pushing a pied-à-terre tax.
That video triggered a fierce backlash from Wall Street and the business community. Griffin, who had been weighing major investments in the city, was reportedly furious. Mamdani later sought a meeting with Griffin after the fallout threatened billions in potential investment.
The pattern has repeated. Mamdani floated a property tax hike that met such fierce resistance from homeowners and taxpayers that he was forced to retreat. The reversal underscored a recurring problem: the mayor rolls out ideologically driven proposals, faces blowback from the people who would actually pay the bill, and then scrambles to walk things back.
Investor Kevin O'Leary went further, publicly dismantling Mamdani's broader tax vision and warning that wealth was already fleeing New York under the mayor's approach.
Even commentators outside the conservative mainstream have raised eyebrows. Bill Maher made the case on his show that Mamdani's political ideology amounts to communism, and his guest couldn't answer the charge.
The video of Ocasio-Cortez drew more attention than Mamdani's robe, and for different reasons. Conservative critics have long argued that progressive politicians adopt religious and cultural symbols selectively, embracing Islam's outward markers while attacking Christian institutions, or championing feminist causes while donning the hijab at events celebrating a faith with traditional views on gender roles.
The Daily Mail noted that conservative observers called the congresswoman hypocritical. The criticism is not new. Politicians of all stripes attend religious celebrations and adopt local customs. But the scale of the online reaction, hundreds of thousands of views and thousands of comments, suggests this particular image hit a nerve.
Ocasio-Cortez offered no public explanation for wearing the hijab, at least none that appeared in available reporting. That silence left the field open to her critics, who filled it with their own interpretations.
The Eid celebration itself was, by all appearances, a community event. Muslim worshippers gathered in the Bronx to mark the holiday. The mayor attended in his capacity as the city's leader, and, apparently, as Arsenal's most prominent American fan.
The specific venue was not identified. The exact date, described only as "Wednesday afternoon", was not pinned down in the Daily Mail's coverage. What was clear: the event became a flashpoint not because of what the worshippers did, but because of what two politicians wore.
Mamdani's Arsenal kurta was a personal indulgence. Ocasio-Cortez's hijab was a political statement, whether she intended it that way or not. In New York City politics, the two are rarely distinguishable.
Mamdani has already shown a pattern of retreating when his gestures, fiscal or cultural, provoke more heat than he bargained for. Whether this one merits a walk-back remains to be seen.
In the end, the mayor got to celebrate his soccer club. The congresswoman got a viral moment she may not have wanted. And New Yorkers got another reminder that their leaders seem far more comfortable performing for cameras than answering for results.
