New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani threw his weight behind a congressional candidate whose since-deleted social media posts called for the total abolition of police, branded Joe Biden a "war criminal," used vulgar language against Kamala Harris, and mocked interracial relationships, a record that raises sharp questions about the judgment of the city's chief executive and the direction of the Democratic left.
Darializa Avila Chevalier, a 32-year-old Democratic Socialists of America organizer, is challenging five-term incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-NY) in a New York congressional primary. Mamdani's endorsement, delivered Thursday night, broke a prior pledge to back Espaillat's reelection and immediately rattled Democratic political circles.
The reason for the rattling goes well beyond intra-party maneuvering. Avila Chevalier's archived social media posts, reported by the New York Post, paint a portrait of a candidate whose public statements go far beyond progressive orthodoxy, into open contempt for the country, its institutions, and its people.
Start with law enforcement. Avila Chevalier posted "No more police at all ever," punctuating each word with a clapping-hands emoji. In June 2020, she wrote: "Thought we had leveled up the convo from 'Kamala is a cop' to 'All cops are b******s' but I see some major points need to be revisited."
That was not a stray remark. It was a position statement, one that sits comfortably alongside her formal policy commitments, which include abolishing prisons, legalizing prostitution, legalizing private use of all drugs, scrapping ICE, and ending all military support to Israel.
Then there is the matter of the flag. In 2019, Avila Chevalier posted: "I forgot to get napkins so I just wiped my hand on the American flag behind me," followed by a smiling-face emoji. In another post, she declared: "This country is a f---ing disgrace."
These are not the words of someone who disagrees with a particular policy. They reflect a posture of open hostility toward the nation she now seeks to represent in Congress.
Her contempt extended to fellow Democrats. She posted "f--- Kamala Harris" and, in a separate message, wrote: "I have no nuance to add. F--k Kamala Harris." During the 2020 Democratic primary, she wrote: "Y'all really sitting here talking about how we HAVE to vote for one rapist over the other rapist", a reference to sexual misconduct accusations against both Biden and Donald Trump. That post was first reported by Politico.
In 2020, she posted via a since-deleted X account: "I've voted in every election since I turned 18 but you out of your mind if you think I'm voting for a war criminal." She also mocked Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the last of whom she apparently considered insufficiently radical.
She criticized Sanders specifically over what she called "liberal Zionism." Even the progressive left's own icons were not left-wing enough for Avila Chevalier.
Perhaps the most jarring entry in her social media record appeared in February 2019. Avila Chevalier posted: "Black men [handshake emoji] Arab men fetishizing ugly colonizer women." The New York Post had previously reported on this post.
Read that again. A candidate for the United States Congress publicly disparaged interracial relationships using racialized, dehumanizing language, calling certain women "ugly colonizer women" and accusing men of color of "fetishizing" them. This is the person Mayor Mamdani chose to elevate with his endorsement.
The candidate's trail of racially charged posts and far-left commitments is not an isolated blemish. It is a pattern, one that stretches across years and platforms, much of it now scrubbed from public view through account deletions.
Mayor Mamdani has not publicly explained why he chose to endorse Avila Chevalier over Espaillat, a Congressional Hispanic Caucus chairman backed by AIPAC, the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. The Washington Examiner reported that Mamdani's decision stemmed in part from Espaillat's prior support of Andrew Cuomo and his ties to Jeffries, even though Mamdani himself had previously squashed a primary challenge against Jeffries from City Councilman Chi Osse.
Mamdani framed his endorsement in broad terms, stating: "We have to be fighting for a vision that reckons with the fact that working people were not left behind just four years ago or 16 years ago. They were left behind a long time before that."
That language is vague enough to mean almost anything. What it does not address is the candidate's specific record of hostility toward law enforcement, the American flag, and interracial couples.
Espaillat, for his part, offered a measured response: "One endorsement does not make a race. Voters do." That is true. But a mayor's endorsement carries institutional weight, and Mamdani's choice tells voters something about his own priorities and standards.
This is not the first time Mamdani's associations have drawn scrutiny. The Washington Free Beacon reported that Mamdani paid multiple visits to Sheikh Fadhel Al-Sahlani, an imam who told the New York Sun in 2006 that Holocaust death toll figures "have been exaggerated" and called for more "study" on the subject. Al-Sahlani also praised Hamas in November 2023, saying the group "has made a big difference not only for the Arab Muslim world, but the whole world." Mamdani visited Al-Sahlani's mosque at least three times since January 2025, telling the congregation during a February Ramadan visit, "It feels like returning home to be here."
A pattern emerges. Mamdani has broken a 61-year mayoral tradition by skipping the Israel Day Parade, cultivated warm ties with a Holocaust-denying imam, and now lent his name to a candidate who called for abolishing police and wiped her hand on the American flag for laughs.
Set aside the social media posts for a moment and look at the platform. Avila Chevalier wants to abolish prisons. She wants to legalize prostitution and all private drug use. She wants to scrap ICE entirely. She wants to end all U.S. military support to Israel.
These are not mainstream Democratic positions. They are not even mainstream progressive positions. They represent the furthest fringe of the DSA's policy agenda, a wish list that would leave communities without law enforcement, borders without enforcement agencies, and America's closest Middle Eastern ally without support.
Avila Chevalier gained prominence through organizing protests at Columbia University against the war in Gaza. Her candidacy is an extension of that activism, transplanted into electoral politics with the full backing of New York's mayor.
The broader Democratic Party is already straining under internal tensions. Senate candidates have distanced themselves from Chuck Schumer as leadership revolts grow. Mamdani's endorsement of Avila Chevalier adds fuel to a factional conflict that establishment Democrats have tried to manage quietly.
Mamdani's own contradictions compound the problem. A mayor who has courted Wall Street while running on a tax-the-rich agenda now champions a candidate who called the country a "disgrace" and branded both major-party presidential nominees as rapists. The gap between Mamdani's public rhetoric about "working people" and his chosen allies' actual records is wide enough to drive a campaign bus through.
Several important questions remain unanswered. Avila Chevalier has not publicly addressed or defended her social media posts. It is unclear when she deleted her X account or whether she stands by the statements she made between 2019 and 2020.
Mamdani has not explained how he reconciles his endorsement with the candidate's record of anti-police rhetoric, anti-American statements, and racially charged commentary about interracial relationships. No Democratic leader beyond Espaillat has publicly responded to the endorsement or the social media revelations.
Voters in the district, the specific district number has not been identified in available reporting, will ultimately decide whether Avila Chevalier's brand of politics represents their values. But they deserve to know exactly what those values are, spelled out in the candidate's own words, before they cast a ballot.
When a candidate wipes her hand on the flag and calls it a joke, calls for zero police, and mocks people for the race of their partners, and the mayor of America's largest city says, "That's my pick", voters are entitled to ask what, exactly, the Democratic left is building. The answer, based on the evidence, is not reassuring.
