{"id":353774,"date":"2026-09-22T18:36:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-22T18:36:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/353774\/"},"modified":"2026-09-22T18:36:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-22T18:36:13","slug":"mamdani-admin-ordered-nyc-staff-not-to-use-signal-but-they-ignored-ban-to-collude-with-influencer-army","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/353774\/","title":{"rendered":"Mamdani admin ordered NYC staff not to use Signal \u2014 but they ignored ban to collude with influencer army"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mamdani administration staffers ignored an explicit order not to use an encrypted messaging app as they communicated with an army of nearly 200 \u201cinfluencers\u201d<\/a> to arrange fawning coverage of the mayor on social media, The Post has learned.<\/p>\n

Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s communications workers were told on Jan. 15 that they were not to use either Signal or WhatsApp for work, according to a memo from Mamdani\u2019s chief counsel Ramzi Kassem<\/a> that spells out how City Hall employees are required to preserve all their emails and messages under records laws.<\/p>\n

The admin even held a training in early March to walk workers through the policy, according to insiders.<\/p>\n

\"NYCAccording to a memo from Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s chief counsel Ramzi Kassem, communications workers were told on Jan. 15 that they were not to use either Signal or WhatsApp for work. Brigitte Stelzer for NY Post<\/p>\n

Regardless, Emilia Rowland<\/a>, the director of Mamdani\u2019s New Media and Cultural Communications, and others on her staff continued to use Signal to chat with influencers as part of their push to tap into the pro-Mamdani influencers from the campaign to prop up the administration.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou should not use WhatsApp, Signal, or any other communications app or platform for work,\u201d the memo reads. \u201cIf you have questions about the use of other platforms, please contact the Office of the Chief Counsel.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kassem, however, had a different response publicly when news of the encrypted chat and influencer army broke<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no City policy against using Signal,\u201d he said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe conversation is not inaccessible to the public because the settings were set to auto-delete until reporters started reaching out about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

City Council members were expected to grill the staffers over the cheerleader group chat at a hearing on Tuesday \u2014 but instead the admin only sent the director of the mayor\u2019s office of mass engagement, Tascha Van Auken<\/a>, and the records commissioner, Shawnta Smith-Cruz.<\/p>\n

\"ZohranThen-mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani holds a news conference for \u201cnew media and content creators\u201d during his campaign, Oct. 28, 2025. X\/@EmiliaWinterRo<\/p>\n

Neither was involved with the influencer chat.<\/p>\n

When pressed on the memo contradicting Kassem\u2019s public statements Tuesday, Mamdani referred questions to the counsel\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo quote the chief counsel, there are trainings and there are re-trainings, and that will continue because for us, being in accordance with the record-keeping laws of the city is of paramount importance. I will defer to chief counsel to answer more specifically to your question.\u201d<\/p>\n

City Hall did not respond to follow-up questions about the memo and Kassem\u2019s statement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mamdani administration staffers ignored an explicit order not to use an encrypted messaging app as they communicated with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":353775,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1091,4686,57,9,56,63,65,64,58,82],"class_list":["post-353774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-democratic-socialists-of-america","tag-influencers","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-us-news","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353774","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=353774"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353774\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/353775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=353774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=353774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=353774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}