Mayor Zohran Mamdani at a Holi celebration.
Photo by Lloyd Mitchell
Saturday and Sunday, March 28-29, marked the 87th and 88th days of Zohran Mamdani’s term as mayor. amNewYork is following Mamdani around his first 100 days in office. We are closely tracking his progress on fulfilling campaign promises, appointing key leaders to government posts, and managing the city’s finances. Here’s a summary of what the mayor did yesterday and today.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani spent Sunday celebrating the Christian holiday Palm Sunday and the Hindu holiday Holi after his administration responded to a massive anti-Trump “No Kings” protest on Saturday in Midtown Manhattan.
He also participated in his first annual “Inner Circle” show as mayor on Saturday night, roasting reporters and taking jabs from the City Hall press pool, which stages an annual parody show about city government.
Mayor marks religious holidays in Queens
Mamdani delivered remarks at the Greater Allen A.M.E. Cathedral of New York in Jamaica, Queens, as Christians across the city celebrated Palm Sunday. Mamdani noted that the last time he was at the cathedral in August 2025, he was running for office.
He took the opportunity to discuss his affordability agenda, reflecting on the mayoral campaign as a refusal by New Yorkers to “abandon their belief that a better city is possible.” He discussed the “trust” that his voters placed in him and his administration to run the city responsibly and with a focus on mitigating the city’s high cost of living.
“That trust exists because so many in this congregation and in so many others across this city grew weary of change never arriving, and decided to deliver it themselves,” Mamdani said.
He turned to the meaning of Palm Sunday, which Christians celebrate to mark Jesus Christ’s entrance into Jerusalem.
“Deliverance does not always have to arrive on a donkey, riding past the mount of olives,” Mamdani said. “Sometimes it arrives from the people themselves.”
He quoted the Bible and discussed society’s rejection of Christ, saying that too many New Yorkers have “felt rejection” from their own city. He said that 200,000 Black New Yorkers have been “pushed out” of the city in the past two decades, referring to census data, “because they cannot afford a dignified life here.”
“The burden of building a responsible and prosperous future has been placed most heavily on the backs of working people. And if that is not a politics of rejection, it is hard to know what is,” Mamdani said.
Later in the day, he joined the 38th Annual Phagwah (Holi) Parade in Queens, marching with Hindu New Yorkers celebrating the religious holiday. Holi celebrates the love between the Hindu deities Radha and Krishna, as well as light, color, and the coming of spring.
Mamdani takes — and dishes out — jabs at annual ‘Inner Circle’ show
The mayor took part in his first Inner Circle Show as mayor on Saturday night. Each year, the New York City press organization Inner Circle coordinates a fundraising event featuring a musical political roast of the mayor and their administration. This year’s show, titled “Free-for-All,” took particular aim at Mamdani’s identification as a democratic socialist.
City & State Editor Jeff Coltin played the starring role of Mamdani, and former Republican candidate for mayor Curtis Sliwa, who ran against Mamdani in the 2025 election, made a special appearance in a pre-recorded skit.
During Mamdani’s address, he poked fun at the press and the politicians in attendance, quipping that he hadn’t “been this close to the 1% since the Emerson poll in February 2025,” City & State reported.
“There is no other room of Andrew Cuomo voters where I’d rather be,” he joked.
Mamdani oversees mass protest response on ‘No Kings’ day
The mayor oversaw the city’s response to mass protests on Saturday, as thousands of New Yorkers took to the streets to rail against President Donald Trump and his administration.
Protesters condemned the president’s immigration crackdown, the U.S.-Israel war in Iran, his targeting of political enemies like New York Attorney General Letitia James, and his involvement in the ongoing Jeffrey Epstein inquiry.
The NYPD reported that it made no protest-related arrests on Saturday, and wrote in a post on X that protests had dispersed by 6 p.m.
Mamdani has long been critical of Trump and his policies, particularly his hostility to immigrants, though he has developed a working relationship with the president and has met with him twice at the White House.
