{"id":91523,"date":"2026-01-06T21:03:21","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T21:03:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/91523\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T21:03:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T21:03:21","slug":"nyc-mayor-zohran-mamdani-admits-no-federal-security-clearance-for-briefings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/91523\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani admits no federal security clearance for briefings"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!\n <\/p>\n

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani<\/a> admitted he has no federal security clearance on Monday, just a day after claiming he had been “briefed” about the U.S. capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.<\/p>\n

Mamdani was asked directly about his security clearance during a Monday press briefing, ultimately saying that he had not yet received it. The freshly-inaugurated mayor had been the butt of viral jokes on social media from users suggesting he had inflated his access to information about the strike in his initial statement.<\/p>\n

“You don’t have federal security clearance yet, and has anyone from a federal agency reached out to you or members of your team to begin the vetting to get federal security clearance?” a reporter asked.<\/p>\n

“That briefing, yes, was conducted by my team,” Mamdani responded. “And the question of federal security clearance is one that’s on and on.”<\/p>\n

US MILITARY DETAILS TIMELINE OF OPERATION TO CAPTURE MADURO, REVEALING MORE THAN 150 AIRCRAFT INVOLVED<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Mayor <\/p>\n

Zohran Mamdani was elected in November 2025 and sworn in as New York City’s first socialist mayor on Jan. 1, 2026. (Michael M. Santiago\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

“So you do have it?” the reporter pressed.<\/p>\n

“No, not as yet,” the mayor admitted.<\/p>\n

The exchange came after Mamdani’s initial statement on the Venezuela raid appeared to suggest he had received inside information on the operation.<\/p>\n

JONATHAN TURLEY: MADURO OPERATION WAS LEGAL, BUT TRUMP MAKES IT COMPLICATED<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Zohran <\/p>\n

Mamdani is sworn in as mayor on Jan. 1, swearing the oath on a pair of family Qurans. (Amir Hamja\/Pool via Reuters)<\/p>\n

“I was briefed this morning on the U.S. military capture of Venezuelan President<\/a> Nicol\u00e1s Maduro and his wife, as well as their planned imprisonment in federal custody here in New York City,” Mamdani wrote on X after news of Maduro’s capture broke.<\/p>\n

He went on to condemn the move by President Donald Trump<\/a>, but some users on social media called him out for inflating his access.<\/p>\n

“Called it,” wrote one user whose post on the topic received over 140,000 “likes.”<\/p>\n

\"Venezuelan <\/p>\n

Nicolas Maduro was captured and flown to New York City following a daring military operation this weekend. (XNY\/Star Max\/GC Images via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP<\/a><\/p>\n

Mamdani’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.<\/p>\n

Anders Hagstrom is a reporter with Fox News Digital covering national politics and major breaking news events. Send tips to Anders.Hagstrom@Fox.com, or on X: @Hagstrom_Anders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani admitted he has no…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":91524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,24,56,63,65,64,87,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-91523","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-city","10":"tag-ny","11":"tag-nyc","12":"tag-nyc-headlines","13":"tag-nyc-news","14":"tag-politics","15":"tag-zohran-mamdani"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91523","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=91523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}