{"id":173626,"date":"2026-03-24T19:43:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T19:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/173626\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T19:43:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T19:43:12","slug":"zohran-mamdanis-nyc-health-department-hit-with-federal-complaint-over-anti-israel-bias","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/173626\/","title":{"rendered":"Zohran Mamdani’s NYC health department hit with federal complaint over anti-Israel bias"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 A Senate panel is deepening its probe into New York City Zohran Mamdani\u2019s administration over the creation of a health department<\/a> \u201cGlobal Oppression Working Group,\u201d first exposed by The Post, that accused Israel of genocide and downplayed Hamas\u2019 role in initiating the Gaza war.<\/p>\n

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) wrote another letter<\/a> to mayor on Monday, noting recent comments from Health Commissioner Dr. Alister Martin raise questions about whether Mamdani\u2019s administration is acting \u201cconsistent with federal law.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cassidy, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, suggested that the Department of Health\u2019s receipt of $600 million in federal funding every year may be at odds with \u201cconditions\u201d imposed by the government.<\/p>\n

Cassidy, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, suggested that the Department of Health\u2019s receipt of $600 million in federal funding every year. Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cPrioritizing a political agenda over compliance with these requirements risks both federal funding and the public health of New York City residents,\u201d he added. \u201cFederal taxpayers should have confidence that funds intended to support public health services are administered in compliance with those obligations.\u201d<\/p>\n

The letter demands more information about the working group, what sort of \u201cspecific federally funded resources\u201d it\u2019s receiving and whether the Mamdani administration is determining whether it has met \u201cfederal nondiscrimination requirements.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat steps, if any, is your administration taking to reassure New Yorkers that taxpayer dollars remain focused on promoting public health and are not being diverted to push a political agenda that singles out the State of Israel?\u201d Cassidy also asked the mayor directly.<\/p>\n

Martin in an interview with NY1<\/a> acknowledged there was \u201cpretty specific evidence that the federal government is not a fan of the work that we\u2019re doing on equity\u201d \u2014 but brushed off that it would cause any issues with funding and declared his department was \u201cnot gonna stop doing that work on equity\u201d even if the federal government \u201ccomes and messes with our money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cassidy first wrote to Mamdani in early February to express concern about the \u201crescission of executive orders related to antisemitism and boycotts of Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDecisions by your administration that weaken established safeguards for Jewish students in New York and are out of alignment with federal executive orders warrant careful scrutiny,\u201d Cassidy warned, highlighting the voided orders that \u201ccreated the Mayor\u2019s Office to Combat Antisemitism to identify and develop efforts to eliminate antisemitism and anti-Jewish hate crime,\u201d and opposed anti-boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) policies.<\/p>\n

Cassidy first wrote to Mamdani in early February to express concern about the \u201crescission of executive orders related to antisemitism and boycotts of Israel.\u201d Luiz C. Ribeiro for NY Post<\/p>\n

Dr. Weeam Hammoudeh was one of several presenters during the working group meeting.<\/p>\n

The initial letter was sent was one day after DOH staffers held the first \u201cGlobal Oppression and Public Health Working Group\u201d meeting, where one presenter noted, \u201cWe really developed in response to the ongoing genocide in Palestine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another said \u201cthe working group aims to address the growing interests among the health department staff to learn about current and ongoing global oppression in its many forms and how it influences the advancement of health equity.\u201d<\/p>\n

No presenters or attendees mentioned Hamas\u2019 Oct. 7, 2023, attack<\/a>\u00a0that killed 1,200 \u2014 including dozens of Americans \u2014\u00a0in Israel, according to a transcript of the meeting and a source who was present.<\/p>\n

A slide that was presented during the working group meeting focusing on conflict in Gaza.<\/p>\n

Cassidy\u2019s most recent missive on March 23 asks whether other \u201cethnic or national groups affected by global geopolitical conflicts\u201d will be provided access to \u201cseparate working groups\u201d \u2014 \u201cor whether the Department\u2019s sole interest is in denouncing the Israeli Palestinian conflict to the exclusion of all others.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Senate GOP chairman has asked for a response to all his queries by April 6.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear whether Mamdani replied to the previous letter.<\/p>\n

Reps for his office and the city health department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 A Senate panel is deepening its probe into New York City Zohran Mamdani\u2019s administration over the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":173627,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[5337,17446,68,4739,5237,9,56,63,65,64,87,58,82],"class_list":["post-173626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-bill-cassidy","tag-dei","tag-exclusive","tag-federal-funding","tag-health-department","tag-new-york","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-politics","tag-us-news","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173626"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173626\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/173627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}