Zo\u2019s flacks got their Signals crossed.<\/p>\n
City Hall officials broke state record-keeping rules with a secret Signal chat filled with pro-Zohran Mamdani influencers, the mayor\u2019s top attorney seemingly admitted Friday.<\/p>\n
Chief Counsel Ramzi Kassem revealed that officials took \u201ccorrective actions\u201d \u2014 but only after learning from a reporter that the message thread was set to auto-delete until last week.<\/p>\n
Mayor Zohran Mamdani has come under fire after it was revealed the Signal app was used to coordinate propaganda efforts among social media influencers. Getty Images<\/p>\n
Emilia Rowland, director of new media and cultural communications at the NYC Office of the Mayor. X\/EmiliaWinterRo<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce we learned about this particular instance from reporting, the corrective actions that we took included reminding staff to disable disappearing messages,\u201d Kassem said during a security briefing for the weekend\u2019s<\/a> upcoming J\u2019Ouvert and West Indian American Day festivities.<\/p>\n The New York Times reported<\/a> the influencer chats ran by Mamdani\u2019s \u201cnew media\u201d whiz Emilia Rowland<\/a>, who draws a $175,000-a-year salary, were set to erase messages after she sent them.<\/p>\n Watchdogs and critics argued the self-destructing messages not only clearly violated state law requiring public officials to maintain records, but also dovetailed with concerns that Mamdani\u2019s administration was underhandedly trying to sway public opinion.<\/p>\n City Councilman Phil Wong is pushing a bill to provide guardrails<\/a> for how New York City government taps influencers after it was revealed Mamdani\u2019s staff maintained the secret chat feeding online personalities administration talking points.<\/p>\n \u201cCouncil members are racing to introduce legislation because this is one of the biggest scandals we\u2019ve seen out of City Hall, and the administration calling it a \u2018faux scandal\u2019 after they royally screwed up only makes it worse,\u201d he told The Post on Friday.<\/p>\n \u201cBlatantly using taxpayer dollars and government resources for a propaganda machine is a huge red flag, and the Council needs to come down hard on it because New York City has a mayor, not a king.\u201d<\/p>\n Watchdogs and critics argued the self-destructing messages clearly violated state law requiring public officials to maintain records. dpa\/picture alliance via Getty Images<\/p>\n Mamdani isn\u2019t the first New York pol to potentially run afoul of record-keeping and transparency laws.<\/p>\n Former Mayor Bill de Blasio had to cough up emails<\/a> with his closest private advisers in 2017 after a lawsuit from The Post and NY1.<\/p>\n