Politics
‘I love Hitler’: Leaked messages expose Young Republicans’ racist chat
NEW YORK — Leaders of Young Republican groups throughout the country worried what would happen if their Telegram chat ever got leaked, but they kept typing anyway.
They referred to Black people as monkeys and “the watermelon people” and mused about putting their political opponents in gas chambers. They talked about raping their enemies and driving them to suicide and lauded Republicans who they believed support slavery.
William Hendrix, the Kansas Young Republicans’ vice chair, used the words “n–ga” and “n–guh,” variations of a racial slur, more than a dozen times in the chat. Bobby Walker, the vice chair of the New York State Young Republicans at the time, referred to rape as “epic.” Peter Giunta, who at the time was chair of the same organization, wrote in a message sent in June that “everyone that votes no is going to the gas chamber.”
Giunta was referring to an upcoming vote on whether he should become chairman of the Young Republican National Federation, the GOP’s 15,000-member political organization for Republicans between 18 and 40 years old.
“Im going to create some of the greatest physiological torture methods known to man. We only want true believers,” he continued.
Two members of the chat responded.
“Can we fix the showers? Gas chambers don’t fit the Hitler aesthetic,” Joe Maligno, who previously identified himself as the general counsel for the New York State Young Republicans, wrote back.
“I’m ready to watch people burn now,” Annie Kaykaty, New York’s national committeewoman, said.
The exchange is part of a trove of Telegram chats — obtained by Blue Light News and spanning more than seven months of messages among Young Republican leaders in New York, Kansas, Arizona and Vermont. The chat offers an unfiltered look at how a new generation of GOP activists talk when they think no one is listening.
Since Blue Light News began making inquiries, one member of the group chat is no longer employed at their job and another’s job offer was rescinded. Prominent New York Republicans, including Rep. Elise Stefanik and state Senate Minority Leader Rob Ortt, have denounced the chat. And festering resentments among Young Republicans have now turned into public recriminations, including allegations of character assassination and extortion.
A liberating atmosphere
The 2,900 pages of chats, shared among a dozen millennial and Gen Z Republicans between early January and mid-August, chronicle their campaign to seize control of the national Young Republican organization on a hardline pro-Donald Trump platform. Many of the chat members already work inside government or party politics, and one serves as a state senator.
Together, the messages reveal a culture where racist, antisemitic and violent rhetoric circulate freely — and where the Trump-era loosening of political norms has made such talk feel less taboo among those positioning themselves as the party’s next leaders.
“The more the political atmosphere is open and liberating — like it has been with the emergence of Trump and a more right wing GOP even before him — it opens up young people and older people to telling racist jokes, making racist commentaries in private and public,” said Joe Feagin, a Texas A&M sociology professor who has studied racism for the last 60 years. He’s also concerned the words would be applied to public policy. “It’s chilling, of course, because they will act on these views.”
The dynamic of easy racism and casual cruelty played out in often dark, vivid fashion inside the chats, where campaign talk and party gossip blurred into streams of slurs and violent fantasies.
The group chat members spoke freely about the pressure to cow to Trump to avoid being called a RINO, the love of Nazis within their party’s right wing and the president’s alleged work to suppress documents related to wealthy financier Jeffrey Epstein’s child sex crimes.
“Trumps too busy burning the Epstein files,” Alex Dwyer, the chair of the Kansas Young Republicans, wrote in one instance.
Dwyer and Kaykaty declined to comment. Maligno and Hendrix did not return requests for comment.
But some involved in the chat did respond publicly.
Giunta claimed the release of the chat is part of “a highly-coordinated year-long character assassination led by Gavin Wax and the New York City Young Republican Club” — an allusion to a once obscured internecine war that has now spilled into the open.
“These logs were sourced by way of extortion and provided to Blue Light News by the very same people conspiring against me,” he said. “What’s most disheartening is that, despite my unwavering support of President Trump since 2016, rouge (sic) members of his administration — including Gavin Wax — have participated in this conspiracy to ruin me publicly simply because I challenged them privately.”
Wax, a staffer in Trump’s State Department, formerly led the New York Young Republican Club — a separate, city-based group that is at odds with the state organization, the New York State Young Republicans. He declined to comment.
Despite his allusions to infighting, Giunta still apologized.
“I am so sorry to those offended by the insensitive and inexcusable language found within the more than 28,000 messages of a private group chat that I created during my campaign to lead the Young Republicans,” he said. “While I take complete responsibility, I have had no way of verifying their accuracy and am deeply concerned that the message logs in question may have been deceptively doctored.”
At least one person in the Telegram chat works in the Trump administration: Michael Bartels, who, according to his LinkedIn account, serves as a senior adviser in the office of general counsel within the U.S. Small Business Administration. Bartels did not have much to say in the chat, but he didn’t offer any pushback against the offensive rhetoric in it either. He declined to comment.
A notarized affidavit signed by Bartels and obtained by Blue Light News also sheds light on the intraparty rivalry that led the “RESTOREYR WAR ROOM” Telegram chat to be made public. Bartels references Wax as well. He wrote that he did not give Blue Light News the chat and that Wax “demanded” in a phone call that he provide the full chat log.
“When I attempted to resist that demand, after providing some of the requested information, Wax threatened my professional standing, and raised the possibility of potential legal action related to an alleged breach of a non-disclosure agreement,” Bartels claimed in the affidavit. “My position within the New York Young Republican Club was directly threatened.”
Walker, who now leads the New York State Young Republicans, touched on a similar theme, saying that he believes portions of the chat “may have been altered, taken out of context, or otherwise manipulated” and that the “private exchanges were obtained and released in a way clearly intended to inflict harm.”
He also apologized.
“There is no excuse for the language and tone in messages attributed to me. The language is wrong and hurtful, and I sincerely apologize,” Walker said. “This has been a painful lesson about judgment and trust, and I am committed to moving forward with greater care, respect, and accountability in everything I say and do.”
251 times
Mixed into formal conversations about whipping votes, social media strategy and logistics, the members of the chat slung around an array of slurs — which Blue Light News is republishing to show how they spoke. Epithets like “f—-t,” “retarded” and “n–ga” appeared more than 251 times combined.
In one instance, Walker — who at the time was a staffer for Ortt — talked about how a mutual friend of some in the chat “dated this very obese Indian woman for a period of time.”
Giunta responded that the woman “was not Indian.”
“She just didn’t bathe often,” Samuel Douglass, a state senator from northern Vermont and the head of the state’s Young Republicans, replied to Giunta.
In a separate conversation, Giunta shared that his flight to Charleston, South Carolina, landed safely. Then, he offered some advice for his fellow Young Republicans.
“If your pilot is a she and she looks ten shades darker than someone from Sicily, just end it there. Scream the no no word,” Giunta wrote.
Douglass did not respond to requests for comment.
In a statement, Ortt called for members of the chat to resign.
“I was shocked and disgusted to learn about the racist, anti-Semitic, and misogynistic comments attributed to members of the New York State Young Republicans,” Ortt said. “This behavior is indefensible and has no place in our party or anywhere in public life.”
Walker had been in line to manage Republican Peter Oberacker’s campaign for Congress in upstate New York, but a spokesperson for the campaign said Walker won’t be brought on in light of the comments in the chat.
Seeking Trump’s endorsement
The private rhetoric isn’t happening in a vacuum. It comes amid a widespread coarsening of the broader political discourse and as incendiary and racially offensive tropes from the right become increasingly common in public debate. Last month, Trump posted an AI-generated video that showed House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries in a sombrero beside Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, whose fabricated remarks were about trading free health care for immigrant votes — a false, long-running GOP trope. The sombrero meme has been widely used to mock Democrats as the government shutdown wears on.
In his 2024 campaign, Trump spread false reports of Haitian migrants eating pets and, at one of his rallies, welcomed comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage” and joked about Black people “carving watermelons” on Halloween.
Liz Huston, a White House spokesperson, rejected the idea that Trump’s rhetoric had anything to do with the chat members’ language.
“Only an activist, left-wing reporter would desperately try to tie President Trump into a story about a random groupchat he has no affiliation with, while failing to mention the dangerous smears coming from Democrat politicians who have fantasized about murdering their opponent and called Republicans Nazis and Fascists,” she said. “No one has been subjected to more vicious rhetoric and violence than President Trump and his supporters.”
In the “RESTOREYR WAR ROOM” chat, Giunta tells his fellow Republicans that he spoke with the White House about an endorsement from Trump for his bid to become chairman of the national federation. Trump and the Republican National Committee ultimately decided to stay neutral in the race.
A White House official said that it has no affiliation with RESTORE YR and that hundreds of groups ask the White House for its endorsement.
Giunta was the most prominent voice in the chat spreading racist messages — often encouraged or “liked” by other members.
When Luke Mosiman, the chair of the Arizona Young Republicans, asked if the New Yorkers in the chat were watching an NBA playoff game, Giunta responded, “I’d go to the zoo if I wanted to watch monkey play ball.” Giunta elsewhere refers to Black people as “the watermelon people.”
Hendrix made a similar remark in July: “Bro is at a chicken restaurant ordering his food. Would he like some watermelon and kool aid with that?”
Hendrix was a communications assistant for Kansas’ Republican Attorney General Kris Kobach until Thursday. He also said in the chat that, despite political differences, he’s drawn to Missouri’s Young Republican organization because “Missouri doesn’t like f–s.”
Blue Light News reached out to Danedri Herbert, a spokesperson for the attorney general who also serves as the Kansas GOP Chair, and shared with her excerpts of the chat involving Hendrix. In response, Herbert said “we are aware of the issues raised in your article” and that Hendrix is “no longer employed” in Kobach’s office.
In another exchange, Dwyer, the Kansas’ chair, informs Giunta that one of Michigan’s Young Republicans promised him the group “will vote for the most right wing person” to lead the national organization.
“Great. I love Hitler,” Giunta responded.
Dwyer reacted with a smiley face.
Few minority groups spared
Giunta, who serves as chief of staff to New York state Assemblymember Mike Reilly, ultimately fell six points short of winning the chairmanship to lead the Young Republican National Federation earlier this year — despite earning endorsements from Stefanik and longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone.
Reilly did not respond to requests for comment.
Earlier this year, Stefanik accepted an award from the New York State Young Republicans. She lauded Giunta for his “tremendous leadership” in August and had her campaign and the political PAC she leads donate to that state organization. Alex deGrasse, a senior adviser for Stefanik, said the congresswoman “was absolutely appalled to learn about the alleged comments made by leaders of the New York State Young Republicans and other state YRs in a large national group chat.”
“According to the description provided by Blue Light News, the comments were heinous, antisemitic, racist and unacceptable,” he continued, noting Stefanik has never employed anyone in the chat. “If the description by Blue Light News is accurate, Congresswoman Stefanik calls for any NY Young Republicans responsible for these horrific comments in this chat to step down immediately.”
Stone also condemned the comments in a statement.
“I of course, have never seen this alleged chat room thread,” he said. “If it is authentic, I would, of course, denounce any such comments in the strongest possible terms, This would surprise me as it is inconsistent with Peter that I know, although I only know him in his capacity as the head of the New York Young Republicans, where I thought he did a good job.”
Few minority groups are spared from the Young Republican group’s chat. Their rhetoric — normalized at most points as dark humor — mirrors some popular conservative political commentators, podcasters and comedians amid a national erosion of what’s considered acceptable discourse.
Giunta’s line on a darker-skinned pilot, for example, echoes one used by slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk last year when he said, “If I see a Black pilot, I’m going to be like, boy, I hope he’s qualified.” Kirk was discussing how diversity hiring “invites unwholesome thinking.”
Walker also uses the moniker “eyepatch McCain” (originally coined by conservative commentator Tucker Carlson) in an apparent reference to GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw. Crenshaw lost his eye while serving as a Navy SEAL in Afghanistan. Walker also makes the remark, “I prefer my war heroes not captured,” a repeat of a similar 2015 line from Trump.
Art Jipson, a professor at the University of Dayton who specializes in white racial extremism, surmised the Young Republicans in the chat were influenced by Trump’s language, which he said is often hyperbolic and emotionally charged.
“Trump’s persistent use of hostile, often inflammatory language that normalizes aggressive discourse in conservative circles can be incredibly influential on young operatives who are still trying to figure out, ‘What is that political discourse?’” Jipson said.
White supremacist symbols
Jipson reviewed multiple excerpts of the Young Republicans’ chat provided by Blue Light News. One was a late July message where Mosiman, the chair of the Arizona Young Republicans, mused about how the group could win support for their preferred candidate by linking an opponent to white supremacist groups. But Mosiman then realized the plan could backfire — Kansas’ Young Republicans could end up becoming attracted to that opponent.
“Can we get them to start releasing Nazi edits with her… Like pro Nazi and faciam (sic) propaganda,” he asked the group.
“Omg I love this plan,” Rachel Hope, the Arizona Young Republicans events chair, responded.
“The only problem is we will lose the Kansas delegation,” Mosiman said. Hope and the two Kansas Young Republicans in the chat reacted with a laughing face to the message. Hope did not respond to requests for comment. Mosiman declined to comment.
Jipson said the Young Republicans’ conversations reminded him of online discussions between members of neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups.
“You say it once or twice, it’s a joke, but you say it 251 times, it’s no longer a joke,” Jipson said. “The more we repeat certain ideas, the more real they become to us.”
Weeks later, someone in the chat staying in a hotel asks its members to “GUESS WHAT ROOM WE’RE IN.”
“1488,” Dwyer responds. White supremacists use the number 1488 because 14 is the number of words in the white supremacist slogan “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children.” H is the eighth letter in the alphabet, and 88 is often used as a shorthand for “Heil Hitler.”
In another conversation in February, Giunta talks approvingly about the Orange County Teenage Republican organization in New York — which appears to be part of the network of national Teen Age Republicans — and how he was pleased with its young members’ ideological bent.
“They support slavery and all that shit. Mega based,” he said. The term “based” in internet culture is used to express approval with an idea, often one that’s bold or controversial.
In a statement, Orange County GOP Chairwoman Courtney Canfield Greene said the party was disappointed to learn its teen group was mentioned in the chat.
“Our teen volunteers have no affiliation with the NYSYR’s or the YRNF,” she said. “This behavior has no home within the Republican Party in Orange County.”
Ed Cox, the chair of the New York State GOP, also condemned the remarks made in the chat.
“I was shocked and disgusted to learn about the reports of comments made by a small group of Young Republicans,” he said. “Just as we call out vile racist and anti-Semetic rhetoric on the far left, we must not tolerate it within our ranks.”
Vicious words for enemies
Members of the Telegram chat speak about their personal lives, too. Extensive discussions about their everyday lives include one exchange about how devoutly Catholic some chat members are and how often they attend church.
Many of the slurs, epithets and violent language used in the chat often appear to be intended as jokes.
Mosiman was derided by members of the chat as “beaner” and “sp-c.”
“Stay in the closet faggot,” Walker of New York also jested in July, though he is the group’s main target for the same epithet.
The group used slurs against Asians, too.
“My people built the train tracks with the Chinese,” Walker says at one point, referring to his Italian ancestors.
“Let his people go!” Maligno responds. “Keep the ch–ks, though.”
In another instance, Mosiman tells the group that, “The Spanish came to America and had sex with every single woman.”
“Sex is gay,” Dwyer writes.
“Sex? It was rape,” Mosiman replies.
“Epic,” Walker says.
There’s more explicit malice in some phrases, too, especially when they turn their ire on opponents outside the chat, such as the leader of the rival Grow YR slate, Hayden Padgett, who defeated Giunta and was reelected chairman of the Young Republican National Federation this summer.
“So you mean Hayden F—-t wrote the resolution himself?” Giunta asked the group about the National Young Republicans chair in late May.
“RAPE HAYDEN,” Mosiman declared the following month.
“Adolf Padgette is in the F—-tbunker as we speak,” Walker said in July.
Padgett responded to the chat’s language in a statement.
“The Young Republican National Federation condemns all forms of racism, antisemitism, and hate,” Padgett said. “I want to be clear that such behavior is entirely inconsistent with our values and has no place within our organization or the broader conservative movement.”
Giunta also had expletive-laden criticism for the Young Republicans in states that were supporting or leaning toward Padgett’s faction.
“Minnesota – f—-ts,” he messaged, continuing: “Arkansas – inbred cow fuckers Nebraska – revolt in our favor; blocked their bind and have a majority of their delegates Maryland – fat stinky Jew … Rhode Island – traitorous c—s who I will eradicate from the face of this planet.”
Giunta also said he planned to make one of the competing Young Republicans “unalive himself on the convention floor.”
In another instance, Douglass, the Vermont state senator, describes to the group members how one of Padgett’s Jewish colleagues may have made a procedural error related to the number of Maryland delegates permitted at the national convention.
“I was about to say you’re giving nationals to (sic) much credit and expecting the Jew to be honest,” Brianna Douglass, Sam’s wife and Vermont Young Republican’s national committeewoman, replied to her husband’s message. Brianna Douglass did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
‘If we ever had a leak of this chat.…’
While reporting this article, Blue Light News was examining a separate allegation: that Giunta and the Young Republicans mismanaged the New York organization’s finances and hadn’t paid at least one venue for a swanky holiday party it hosted last year. Blue Light News’s report detailed how the organization was missing required financial disclosure forms and how their subsequent efforts to file the forms revealed the organization was in more than $28,000 of debt. As of Tuesday, updated records show the organization is in more than $38,000 of debt.
Donations to New York State Young Republicans’ political account must be reported to the state Board of Elections. Expenditures must be reported too.
At the time, Giunta told Blue Light News the allegations were “nothing more than a sad and pathetic attempt at a political hit job.” But in their “RESTOREYR WAR ROOM” chat, he and Walker speak flippantly about mishandling the club’s finances.
“NYSYR Account be like: $500 – Balding cream $1,000 – Ozempik,” Walker said in one message. “NYSYR will be declaring bankruptcy after this I just know it,” he said in another.
“I drained $10k tonight to pay for my next vacation to Italy,” Giunta appeared to joke about the organization’s bank account.
“I spent it on massage,” he says of another check that was deposited in the account.
“Great. Can’t wait to get sued by our venue,” Walker replies.
Members of the chat occasionally appeared to be aware of its toxicity and even made remarks that considered the possibility someone outside their tight-knit group could view it.
Walker seemed to consider that possibility the most.
In one instance, he joked about bombing the Young Republican National Federation’s convention in Nashville and then remarked, “Just kidding for our assigned FBI tracker.”
In another, he considered the totality of the thousands of messages he and his peers had written, and what would happen if the public saw them come to light.
“If we ever had a leak of this chat we would be cooked fr fr,” he wrote.
Sen. Jon Ossoff hosted a few hundred donors and supporters for a recent Washington fundraiser — but it wasn’t just for him.
Instead, the Sept. 16 gathering was geared toward raising money for the Democratic Party of Georgia and its coordinated campaign, according to an Ossoff aide and one attendee, who was granted anonymity to describe a private event.
It’s part of his broader effort to boost state Democrats as they look to flip the governor’s mansion for the first time in over 20 years and improve their margins in the legislature. And the timing, just weeks before November, signals confidence in Ossoff’s own reelection prospects and the sizable warchest he’s raised for himself.
This month’s event was the latest of several similar fundraisers Ossoff has held over the last two years. He plans to host more fundraisers for Georgia’s Democratic Party and the coordinated campaign ahead of Election Day, according to one person familiar with his planning, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly.
If his moves are successful and November ushers in historic wins for Georgia Democrats, Ossoff will have cemented his status as a serious leader in the critical swing state. He would hold on to a crucial seat in the Senate as the party looks toward the South to shore up its future. He’d be credited in part with helping elect former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms as the country’s first Black woman governor. And though Ossoff has said he’s not interested in joining a 2028 presidential race, leading a November sweep would ultimately raise his national profile.
“It would be hard to call him anything but a leader of the [state] party at that point. He’s already inching his way towards that kind of designation,” said Andrew Heaton, a Georgia-based Democratic strategist who supports the ticket. “But if there is the kind of success that a lot of people are predicting for the cycle, he would receive a large portion of the credit for that.”
Ossoff’s campaign did not comment beyond confirming the fundraisers.
The events are just part of Ossoff’s endeavor to help build out the Georgia Democratic Party’s apparatus after a rough 2024 election cycle.
The senator has transferred $3.6 million of his own campaign funds to the party’s coordinated campaign to date, which the Atlanta Journal-Constitution first reported. Since the effort was announced in July, the party has opened 30 field offices across the sizable state, and employs more than 100 field staffers helping with grassroots organizing for races up and down the ballot.
The coordinated campaign is led by a former Ossoff political director, Kyle Tromley. Caroline Saudek, a longtime fundraiser for Ossoff’s political operation, also joined the state party in January in a fundraising-focused role.
Democrats across the state — from the densely populated Atlanta metro to Georgia’s small sliver of Atlantic coast — said they’ve seen a marked difference in the coordinated campaign’s involvement this cycle, from consistent communication to investment in smaller-profile races. That transformation, several noted, started when Chair Charlie Bailey took the helm.
Bailey, an attorney from rural Harris County and former statewide candidate for lieutenant governor, became the leader of the party in mid-2025 with Ossoff’s crucial support.
“It is definitely a stronger coordinated campaign than I’ve seen in years, and in previous cycles. And it feels like it is better staffed, they staffed up earlier,” Heaton, the Georgia-based Democratic strategist, said.
Republicans are also taking note of the newly improved Democratic machine in a state that, until 2020, was a safe-red hold for the most high-profile races. Already, GOP fears are growing about Rep. Mike Collins’ ability to beat Ossoff. And polls show GOP gubernatorial nominee Rick Jackson locked in a tight battle with Bottoms, despite having dropped tens of millions from his own bank account into the race.
Georgia Republican Party Chair Josh McKoon shrugged off Democrats’ fundraising efforts and said he feels “very good” about Republicans’ field resources.
“We’ve had a field program in place for months now. We have field staff on the ground all over the state,” he said in an interview, though he declined to provide details on the size of the Georgia GOP’s paid and volunteer operation.
Others aren’t as dismissive.
“The Democratic Party has deployed resources to hire staff that mobilizes and turns out voters. Republicans have not had this competitive of a race in a while, so they don’t have that type of muscle memory,” said Ryan Mahoney, a longtime Georgia-based Republican strategist.
“The Democrats are in such a great spot,” he added. “It’s because the apparatus has been tested and is working.”
POLICING PROBLEMS: In the early days of his administration, Mayor Zohran Mamdani placed a new requirement on the NYPD: The department would have to secure permission from his office to deploy its Strategic Response Group to make arrests at protests.
The directive, which hasn’t been previously reported, shows Mamdani sought to exert significant influence over a core function of the police department. Its existence also calls into question why the mayor hasn’t more frequently used that authority to stop the SRG from being deployed at protests — since he promised as a candidate to disband the specialized unit.
The unit — which has long weathered criticism for its heavy-handed protest responses — just last week arrested activists protesting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s appearance at the United Nations General Assembly. Several politicians allied with Mamdani were among those put in handcuffs.
When asked about those arrests, an NYPD spokesperson revealed the pre-approval policy to Playbook, confirming that the mayor’s office has the final say whenever the department wants to deploy SRG to detain protesters.
“We communicate with City Hall on this topic as we do on a host of things related to the department,” the spokesperson said.
The police spokesperson declined to comment on when exactly the mayor first instituted the SRG pre-clearance process. But a person familiar with the timing, who was granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive issue, said the policy was put in place during the first few months of Mamdani’s term.
The mayor suggested at a press conference on Monday that he didn’t see a justification for using the SRG in last week’s arrests outside the U.N. “I’ve been clear that my vision is for the disbanding of the SRG,” he told reporters when asked if he thought it was an appropriate use of police resources.
A Mamdani spokesperson declined to comment Tuesday on why the mayor didn’t use his power to call back the SRG last week if he didn’t think its deployment was justified. The spokesperson also would not say if the mayor has ever used his authority to reject a request from the NYPD for SRG intervention.
Amanda Jack, The Legal Aid Society’s policy director for criminal law reform, laced into the Mamdani administration after being informed of the existing policy.
“It is deeply troubling that City Hall has the authority to stop SRG deployments, yet continues to approve them at demonstrations, including at the protests outside the United Nations last week where the mayor himself acknowledged that the deployment was an inappropriate use of police resources,” said Jack, whose group has long advocated for abolishing the SRG. “This further confirms that regulating SRG deployments isn’t the solution. City Hall must finally make good on Mayor Mamdani’s campaign promise to disband SRG for good.”
The future of the SRG is one of several sources of friction between Mamdani and Jessica Tisch, his politically moderate NYPD commissioner. It’s also an issue that the mayor risks disillusioning his leftist base with the longer he keeps dragging his feet on fulfilling his 2025 campaign pledge.
Tisch has defended using the unit, saying it’s a key tool in the department’s network of crime-fighting strategies.
But Mamdani — a democratic socialist who, before launching his 2025 mayoral bid, supported calls to defund the NYPD — has long said the unit should be dismantled. Since taking office, he’s said he’s in active conversations with Tisch about finding a way to break up the unit, but those talks haven’t resulted in any tangible action nine months into his term.
Founded in 2015, the SRG was initially just tasked with counterterrorism work. The group’s responsibilities have since come to include responding to protests that turn chaotic or violent.
In arguing for abolishing the unit, Mamdani and other police reform advocates have pointed to SRG officers racking up disproportionately high rates of misconduct claims while responding to protests.
The SRG was subject to a court settlement in 2023 that put new guardrails around how the unit could be deployed during protests. But Mamdani and like-minded voices have contended that’s not enough and that the SRG should be broken up so it can return squarely to its original counterterrorism function.
In his remarks on Monday, Mamdani reaffirmed that view.
“I have made that promise, I will fulfill that promise,” he said. “The only question is the timeline of it.” — Chris Sommerfeldt
MARK YOUR CALENDAR: Join Blue Light News’s New York Outlook: Affordability, Industry & The Economy on Oct. 14 for live conversations about the business and policy decisions being made today — from City Hall to the State Capitol — that will shape the city’s economic future. The lineup includes New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin, New York City Economic Development Corp. CEO Anthony Shorris, Partnership for NYC CEO Steven Fulop, Citizens Budget Commission President Andrew Rein, Charles H. Revson Foundation President Maria Torres-Springer, and more. Register now to attend in person or watch the livestream.
From the Capitol
CORNELL UNDER FIRE: Gov. Kathy Hochul is calling for an independent review of Cornell University’s response to a 2024 gang rape case, as the case draws national attention and the school faces mounting criticism.
The Tompkins County district attorney said his office is reopening a criminal probe into an alleged gang rape at a Cornell fraternity house, following a civil lawsuit filed by the plaintiff in mid-September.
The plaintiff, a former Cornell student referred to as Jane Doe, alleges in the lawsuit that several men raped her at the Chi Phi house after she was coerced into consuming drugs. The lawsuit names Cornell, several Chi Phi organizations, the former president of Cornell’s Chi Phi chapter, a local bar and unnamed individuals as defendants.
The governor called for outside counsel to conduct a “transparent, independent” review of the university’s response to determine whether Cornell “met every obligation to protect its students and pursue justice.”
“I support the district attorney’s decision to reopen the criminal investigation,” she said in a statement. “But there are also serious questions about Cornell’s campus culture and its systems for prevention, reporting, and response.”
She called the allegations in the case “nothing short of horrifying.”
“For any student to come forward after an experience like this takes extraordinary courage,” Hochul said. “No student should ever be left wondering whether the institutions meant to protect them will listen and act.”
Rebecca Valli, a Cornell spokesperson, told Playbook the school plans to work with the governor and other state officials.
“Cornell shares Governor Hochul’s commitment to addressing campus culture issues, which affect universities across the nation and New York,” Valli said in a statement. “We are committed to continuing to work with state officials to advance student safety and wellbeing.” — Madina Touré
EYES ON AI: When it comes to who’s getting involved in addressing the rapid rise of artificial intelligence, Hochul offered a straightforward perspective today: the more the merrier.
Speaking to reporters after a meeting of her FutureWorks Commission, which is set to deliver recommendations by the end of the year regarding AI and the workforce, Hochul welcomed the City Council’s recently announced moves to regulate AI.
“This is an area where we need an all-hands-on-deck approach,” she said in response to a question regarding whether the Council’s proposals might overlap with the state’s. “I applaud the City Council for getting more information. … If they come up with an idea that would make sense at the state level, we’ll embrace it. We have an idea at the state level, it already covers the city. So this is an area, we’re on the same team in terms of making sure we get this right, because the risks are too high.”
Hochul said the commission is looking to address how AI is reshaping jobs, the best ways to train workers on the technology, protecting those vulnerable to job cuts and “the best ways to harness the benefits of AI for everyday New Yorkers.” Tom Perez, the co-chair of the commission and former U.S. secretary of labor, said there are “more questions than answers at this point” but he has “great optimism that we can tackle this challenge.” — Madison Fernandez
FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL
SUPER PAC SURGE: Super PACs backing Hochul have reported $4.8 million in contributions since yesterday, giving the governor a comfortable advantage over Republican Bruce Blakeman in the outside spending arms race.
Greater Empire State, a committee run by the Democratic Governors Association, received $1 million from the Greater New York Hospital Association – a perennial top spender in New York politics that gave the state Democratic Committee $1.5 million in June.
The DGA group also received $500,000 from former gas company CEO John Hess. It reported a dozen four- or five-figure donations from pediatricians and other healthcare groups as well. At least 10 of those have connections to the physician network Somos Community Care, a longtime Hochul benefactor.
Additionally, the landlord-backed New York Apartment Association gave $3 million to Leadership for New York, a pro-Hochul super PAC launched by former NYAA official Jay Martin. That committee subsequently transferred $1 million of its money to the one run by DGA. — Bill Mahoney
BROOKLYN BATTLE: The state Supreme Court’s appellate division ruled in favor of a group of self-described reformers who were looking to unseat Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn as chair of the Brooklyn Democratic Party.
The decision comes just hours before the executive committee is scheduled to meet to vote on the next party chair. Julio Peña III, the district leader put forth by reformers to unseat Bichotte Hermelyn, has been locked in a legal battle over Bichotte Hermelyn’s move to change the makeup of the executive committee — a maneuver she claimed would promote inclusivity, but one her opponents insisted was only carried out to pad her support before the leadership election.
A state Supreme Court judge ruled that the vote on the expansion was invalid, but Bichotte Hermelyn appealed the decision. Today’s appellate division ruling voids the expansion — seemingly a win for Peña, who has said he has enough support to win the leadership election under the unchanged structure.
But there’s still plenty up in the air. Last night, Bichotte Hermelyn said she decided not to run for another term as chair. After her announcement, City & State reported that she is backing state Assemblymember Nikki Lucas, who had not been actively running for the position.
Reformers are in court today looking to prevent this evening’s meeting from happening in light of last week’s chaotic organizational meeting. — Madison Fernandez
FROM CITY HALL
COMBAT READY: Mamdani released a highly anticipated blueprint to combat rising antisemitism today amid ongoing criticisms that he’s fueled the problem.
Under his plan, the Mayor’s Office to Combat Antisemitism will weigh in on $26 million that was allocated in this year’s budget to the Mayor’s Office for the Prevention of Hate Crimes, which has a broader mandate to fight all forms of hate.
The cash infusion will mean more money for organizations already engaged in combating antisemitism online and for supporting victims of antisemitic incidents. In particular, the city has doubled the investment in groups doing this work to $6.4 million and has earmarked $1 million for physical security at sensitive sites like synagogues. And it will work to increase visits to the Museum of Jewish Heritage for middle schoolers.
“We hold a responsibility to sustain and protect our Jewish neighbors — a responsibility that belongs to each of us,” Mamdani said in a video message accompanying the report. “That is the work we are undertaking at City Hall, and I am asking every New Yorker to join us.”
While the report generated plaudits from across the political spectrum, several prominent Jewish organizations said the mayor failed to define antisemitism and to acknowledge that some of his own rhetoric is to blame.
“While the Mayor’s plan has a number of positive elements, including some increased security funding for Jewish institutions and expanding proven programs, it fails to address a central issue that the Mayor himself has perpetuated: rhetoric that demonizes and delegitimizes Israel inevitably leads to the targeting of Jewish New Yorkers,” the UJA-Federation of New York, JCRC-NY, AJC New York and New York Board of Rabbis wrote in a joint statement.
Read more from Blue Light News’s Joe Anuta here.
BRIDGE TO HOME: NYC Health + Hospitals is opening a second site for the “Bridge to Home” program, an initiative by former Mayor Eric Adams to provide a place for homeless patients to continue healing after a hospital stay.
Patients will be able to stay as long as 12 months at the new Crown Heights site in Brooklyn, where they will have 24/7 medical support from Woodhull Hospital providers and get help applying for permanent housing.
“Bridge to Home is a bridge between getting well in the hospital and building a life in the community,” Omar Fattal, NYC Health + Hospitals’ chief behavioral health officer, said during a press conference this afternoon. “And for someone like me who spent many years working in inpatient psychiatry, it means that when we ask, ‘Where does this person go next?’, we finally have a better answer.”
Since the first “Bridge to Home” site opened in Midtown Manhattan in September 2025, 18 participants have moved into permanent housing, according to NYC Health + Hospitals.
The first resident of the Crown Heights site, which has capacity for roughly 50 program participants, moves in next week. — Maya Kaufman
IN OTHER NEWS
INFLUENCER ARMY: A group of influencers under instruction from City Hall are reportedly planning a campaign against top New York CEOs, a claim Mamdani’s administration denies. (New York Post)
ENERGY FUTURE: A flurry of new energy-intensive projects are underway in upstate New York. (Times Union)
FRUIT FUMES: Bureaucracy and politics have led to the unraveling of a years-in-the-works plan to modernize a diesel-spewing produce market in the South Bronx. (Gothamist)
Missed this morning’s New York Playbook? We forgive you. Read it here.
Politics
Democrats are running pastors for office. Republicans are attacking their religious comments.
A slate of Democrats are running for Congress leaning on their Christian bona fides. Republicans are trying to portray them as wolves in sheep’s clothing.
In Texas, Republicans are running ads blasting seminarian James Talarico for saying he’s “a Christian who hates Christianity.” In Iowa, they are going after a pair of clergy in key House races as “PINOS” — “pastors in name only,” because they “don’t profess the true gospel of Jesus Christ.” In Kansas, Republicans pan megachurch pastor Adam Hamilton as “too woke and too weak.”
“His sermons are essentially a carbon copy of the Democrat National Committee platform,” said Brent Robertson, chief of staff to Hamilton’s opponent, Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas), pointing to a past sermon in which Hamilton urged followers to reduce their carbon footprint.
The closing arguments on these Democrats — as evidenced by the most recent ads — shows a concerted effort to turn their preaching against them to paint them as fake, corrupt or even blasphemous.
In Texas, MAGA Inc. is on air painting Talarico as a “liberal weirdo,” clipping Talarico’s controversial statements, like “Jesus Christ Himself was a radical feminist” and “God is non-binary.”
The Trump-aligned No Going Back PAC is on air in Iowa’s 2nd District hitting Presbyterian minister and Democrat Lindsay James as inauthentic: “When the cameras are on, Lindsay James goes into a character, a caring pastor who says what you want to hear, but when there’s no spotlight, Lindsay James shows just how radical she can be.”
And in Kansas, GOP Sen. Roger Marshall’s campaign is on air slamming Hamilton as a “slimy,” “millionaire megachurch CEO,” saying he “used faith to fatten his wallet” and “asked churchgoers to pony up for God, then use church resources for his own campaign.”
“The swamp’s got enough money changers,” the ad says.
The attacks are coming precisely because these candidates have proven to be formidable candidates in purple to red areas, using their faith backgrounds to bolster themselves against GOP accusations that they’re out of their state’s mainstream. Talarico poses Democrats’ best chance to flip a Texas Senate seat in nearly four decades. Hamilton has turned deep-red Kansas into a battleground. And James and Sarah Trone Garriott, a Lutheran minister, are running tough in a pair of Iowa districts Trump won in 2024.
Voters “understand and appreciate authenticity, and they know that faith without works is dead,” said Chaz Molder, the Democratic nominee in Tennessee’s deep-red 2nd District who leads a Sunday School class with his wife. “And just posting scripture on Sunday morning to point out that they went to church is not enough.”
But with Democrats’ clerical credibility comes a practical challenge: years and years of on-camera sermons, a treasure trove for oppo researchers. It’s become a challenge in Hamilton’s race, where Vice President JD Vance joined the pile-on earlier this month: During a visit to Iowa, he took a shot at Hamilton as having “kind of a ‘gee whiz, I’m a nice pastor’ vibe,” but said he “tells his congregation not about the gospel of Jesus Christ, but that they need to repent for their white privilege while eating beef.”
Democrats have largely brushed off the attacks. Talarico has said he’s “missed the mark” on some of his “cringey” past comments, but has doubled down on his sermonizing: “When I take on the politicians who are serving themselves and not the people, I’m doing it on biblical grounds,” he said in a sermon last weekend. A James spokesperson criticized Republicans for “desperately attacking Lindsay’s deeply held faith commitments. If it wasn’t so insulting to other Iowa Christians, it would be laughable.” Hamilton has seen clergy run to his side: 120 fellow Methodist ministers across Kansas wrote an open letter to Marshall telling him to stop attacking Hamilton’s pastoral ministry, saying the attacks “tear at the fabric that is the body of Christ.”
“We’re not the first Christians to be attacked for our faith, and we won’t let smears and lies from a couple of Washington politicians stop us from living out our values in the world,” Hamilton said in a video after Vance’s speech.
In many ways, this election marks something of a faith resurgence for the Democratic Party. While only half of Democrat- and Democrat-leaning U.S. adults identify as Christian (a 24-percentage-point decline since 2007), Democrats this cycle are running clergy, Sunday School teachers, chaplains and other devout Christians across the map.
“As a person of faith, I think that it’s time for the Democratic Party to reassert that Democrats are a big tent, and we have many elected officials from different faiths for whom faith is something very important to them,” said Ben McAdams, the Democratic nominee in Utah’s 1st District and a volunteer Sunday School teacher in his Latter-day Saint congregation in Salt Lake City. “The Republican Party of Donald Trump does not seem to be reflecting the Christian values that I grew up with.”
Doug Pagitt, executive director of progressive group Vote Common Good, counts nine clergy running for federal office this cycle as Democrats — something he hasn’t seen before.
“The idea that a faith leader, especially a white faith leader, would run as a Democrat and be forthright about it … it’s really unusual,” Pagitt said. “We’ve had candidates [in the past] whose moms were pastors, and they were nervous about mentioning that in the Democratic Party circles. But that seems to have shifted and changed.”
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