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ANGELA WEISS \/ Contributor via Getty Images<\/p>\n
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New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a news conference to announce a lawsuit challenging the federal government’s new public charge rule, which could make it harder for immigrants to obtain green cards if they rely on public benefits, at City Hall in New York City on September 14, 2026<\/p>\n
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Zohran Mamdani discussed keeping New York affordable enough for artists to live and create there.
\n The four-minute video includes footage from Mamdani\u2019s visit to the Bronx School of Hip Hop, with appearances by Fat Joe and other figures.
\n Mamdani said New York must remain Hip Hop\u2019s home rather than being content with its status as the genre\u2019s birthplace.<\/p>\n
Between rising rent prices and inflation making nearly everything more expensive, it\u2019s becoming increasingly difficult to both live and create art in cultural capitals like New York City. However, Zohran Mamdani<\/a> is hoping to change that in the future. On Wednesday (Sept. 30), the mayor sat down with Nas to talk about Hip Hop’s past, present, and future in the very city that birthed the genre more than 50 years ago.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can\u2019t be content with having been the birthplace of Hip Hop<\/a>. We want to still be the home,\u201d Mamdani opened the four-minute video, later discussing how, for many people \u201cstruggling in the city,\u201d making it can also mean saying goodbye to the place they grew up. \u201cHow do we also make those neighborhoods the places that, if you make it, you want to choose to stay there?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s more to life than just surviving,\u201d Nas chimed in. \u201cIt\u2019s all about the youth and how do we get them to avoid the mistakes that so many people made. I know so many people from this neighborhood that had so much potential, but there was nothing showing them a different way.\u201d The two notably sat down together in a park, with the rest of the footage following Mamdani during his visit to the Bronx School of Hip Hop, where Fat Joe and several other icons also made cameos.<\/p>\n Zohran Mamdani explains why affordable housing matters for New York\u2019s artists<\/p>\n Speaking with Billboard<\/a>, which exclusively premiered the video, Mamdani also addressed the city\u2019s housing crisis and what it means for the next generation. He told the publication, \u201cIf we allow New York to become such an expensive city that art becomes a luxury good, then we are depriving future generations from the magic of art. New Yorkers deserve a city that is a living, breathing testament to what it looks like when we create the conditions to help this art form flourish.\u201d<\/p>\n And for anyone who might assume otherwise, no, Mamdani\u2019s interest in keeping the arts alive didn\u2019t suddenly materialize once he entered politics. In fact, before he became New York City\u2019s first Muslim mayor, he actually rapped under quite a few monikers.<\/p>\n
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