Mayor Zohran Mamdani delivered an address Friday to mark America’s 250th birthday from behind George Washington’s desk at City Hall.

The desk, kept in the Governor’s Room, was originally used by Washington at Federal Hall on Wall Street when New York served as the country’s first official capital.

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Mayor Zohran Mamdani delivered an address Friday to mark America’s 250th birthday from behind George Washington’s desk at City Hall

Mamdani’s 15-minute speech covered a range of topics about the nation’s founding, what it means to be exceptional and, especially, the plight of immigrants coming to New York City

The mayor, who is himself a naturalized citizen, was surrounded by recently naturalized citizens during the speech

Mamdani’s 15-minute speech covered a range of topics about the nation’s founding, what it means to be exceptional and, especially, the plight of immigrants coming to New York City.

“Each of these new arrivals peered through portholes onto a city that was changing as fast as the nation. They saw merchants peddling their wares on the docks, streets being laid out on a grid, buildings rising into the clouds,” Mamdani said.

“They could not yet see the nativism they would face — the jobs they would be refused, the landlords who would not rent to them, the abject labor and living conditions they would withstand. But no matter how much smog hung over the harbor, they still saw an opportunity to begin anew.”

The mayor, who is himself a naturalized citizen, was surrounded by recently naturalized citizens during the speech.

Mamdani went on to say that “we see a city of contradictions within a nation of contradictions” and gave several examples of what could be considered the good and the bad of the U.S.

“Yes, we see America in a health insurance industry that exploits the sick, but that is not all I see when we look for America. We see it too in the nurse who works a double shift and then stops on her way home to check on an ailing neighbor.”

“Yes, we see America in corporate landlords for whom negligence is a business model. We see it too in the father who tucks his children into bed beneath a ceiling stained with leaks, who wakes before dawn to go to work and still believes his country can do better by his family.“

“Yes, we see America when we spend our tax dollars on bombs and bailouts, when we sell our elections to the highest bidder. Yet we see it just as clearly in every American who still believes this country belongs to we, the people.”