{"id":362304,"date":"2026-10-01T23:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-01T23:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/362304\/"},"modified":"2026-10-01T23:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-01T23:28:11","slug":"why-mamdani-failed-pete-davidsons-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/362304\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Mamdani failed Pete Davidson’s challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"

Again proving you can\u2019t take all the Staten Island out of a Staten Islander, comedian Pete Davidson brought the crowd alive on Jimmy Kimmel\u2019s show the other night by calling on Mayor Zohran Mamdani<\/a> to fix the \u201cf\u2014ing BQE.\u201d<\/p>\n

He wasn\u2019t griping about Mamdani in particular, but rather slamming<\/a> the same thing countless motorists see, especially in blue states: \u201cThe BQE has been under construction since before I was born. And here\u2019s my problem with it\u201d: \u201cThey\u2019re never doing anything.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomeone\u2019s just standing there eating a sandwich or on the phone, and there\u2019s all these cones around.\u201d<\/p>\n

We won\u2019t get into why public projects of all kinds in these parts always cost more and take far longer than they should, but highway roadwork . . . um, road \u201cwork\u201d . . . is a particularly galling example, and good on Pete for calling it out.<\/p>\n

And while the mess long predates this mayor, it\u2019s the kind of thing he could look at addressing if he\u2019s at all serious about showing the value of \u201csewer socialism.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sadly, Mamdani\u2019s instant reaction as Kimmel\u2019s next guest was what you\u2019d expect from any politician: After Jimmy relayed Pete\u2019s request, the mayor bragged about . . .\u00a0throwing money at the problem.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re gonna be putting [out] a multibillion-dollar plan to actually repair the part the city owns,\u201d Mamdani said, meaning the $4 billion in work to be done on the BQE stretch<\/a> from Atlantic Avenue to Sand Street.<\/p>\n

That won\u2019t start before 2030 (because government) and will drag on for a decade; Kimmel then translated: \u201cSo you\u2019re saying Pete\u2019s daughter will also be complaining about this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Funny because it\u2019s so painfully true \u2014 except it doesn\u2019t have to be that way, if New York can ever elect politicians willing to fight to change it, so that government works for the people and not the other way around.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Again proving you can\u2019t take all the Staten Island out of a Staten Islander, comedian Pete Davidson brought…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362305,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[29551,304,5520,9,11,10,299,9374,1211,82],"class_list":["post-362304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-brooklyn-queens-expressway","tag-editorial","tag-jimmy-kimmel","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-opinion","tag-pete-davidson","tag-socialism","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362304","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=362304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362304\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}