Zohran Mamdani's New York City mayoral election campaign was accompanied by many false and misleading claims circulating online, and his win on November 4 did not put an end to them. 

Many posts on social media now focus on alleged resignations in response to Mamdani's victory, companies retracting their services, public figures' responses, and repeated fears around Mamdani being a Muslim. 

DW Fact check takes a closer look at three claims. 

Did the NYC Fire Chief resign because of Mamdani's victory?

Claim: In this video shared on TikTok and viewed over 582,000 times, a woman states that the New York City Fire Department (NYFD) commissioner resigned in response to Zohran Mamdani's win. 

DW Fact check: True 

Posts on Xand TikTokclaiming that thousands of New York Police Department (NYPD) officers had resigned following Mamdani's victory, or that trucking companies were suspending operations in the city, were falseor satire, but this one is true. 

NYFD Commissioner Robert Tuckerhanded in his resignationone day after Mamdani's election. The timing was unusual as the commissioner typically waitsfor a successor to be named before resigning. 

Tucker himself stated in an interview with the Israeli newspaper The Jerusalem Postthat he holds different opinions than the newly elected mayor, citing ideological misalignment. 

"I also think I could have functioned well under him but, ideologically, our feelings are different. Therefore, I think he deserves the respect of appointing his own commissioner, someone who may be more aligned with him ideologically than I am."

Muddying the waters: taking an AI-generated video seriously 

Claim: This post on X, with 4.4 million views at the time of writing, includes a video of Elon Musk which, according to the user, explains "what is going on in America right now, why @ZohranKMamdani won in NYC, and what the risks are for our country and the world."

DW Fact check: Fake

The user states: "If you want a glimpse of the future where we do not know what is real and what is fake, this is worth watching for that reason alone." 

While the user notes that he is "pretty sure but not totally sure that it is AI," he still treats the content seriously, saying: "What Elon says here is one of the most important things you will watch this year."

It is a slippery slope to engage with AI-generated content as if it were genuinely spoken by the person depicted. Often, when such videos are reposted, the labels or descriptions of it being AI-generated disappear. 

The YouTube channel that uploaded the video on November 6 included a clear disclaimer, stating that it used "a synthesized voice that does not belong to Elon Musk" and explaining: "We use visual lip-syncing and dubbed narration to match the spoken words with on-screen footage, purely to enhance clarity, create a cinematic experience, and make the content more engaging for viewers."

This serves as an example of how advanced AI‑generated content has become: the imitation of Musk's voice is indeed very convincing, although the image occasionally jumps or falls out of sync. 

AI‑generated videos represent a new way of putting words into the mouths of public figures. A more traditional approach is the fabrication of news articles, such as this oneclaiming how high-profile US lawyer Alan Dershowitz would react to Mamdani's win, which Dershowitz himself later deniedever making.

It remains essential to verify the sources and ensure that statements are accurately attributed to the real person behind them. 

Did the New York Jets cheerleaders' outfits change after Mamdani won? 

Claim: One post on X, shows women wearing green niqabs and sporting attire with the Jets logo on the front. Superimposed text reads: "The new cheerleaders for the New York Jets coming 2026."

DW Fact check: Fake

A reverse image search led us to dozens of similar posts across various social media platforms, including Facebook, Reddit and Instagram, all shared since November 7.

The posts – and the discussions below them – seem to treat the image as a joke about the possible consequences of Mamdani's win, but the image is clearly fabricated. 

The blurriness around the heads and rigid stances point to an AI-generated image. The Jets logo is an older logothe team stopped using in 2023. The mentioned reverse image search also yielded multiple videos labelled with AI watermarks. 

The New York Jets, an NFL franchise, do not incorporate religious symbols into their team identity. While hijabs are sometimes worn by female athletes in other countries, the niqab is very rare in sports contexts. 

A study by the Center for the Study of Organized Hate, a non-profit think tank based in Washington DC, found an "overarching emphasis on Islamophobia, constructing Mamdani as a terrorist, jihadist, or radical Muslim" in social media discourse surrounding the recent election. 

On October 24, Mamdani held a press conferenceaddressing the Islamophobia targeting him and Muslim New Yorkers. "While my opponents in this race have brought hatred to the forefront, this is just a glimpse of what so many have to endure every day across the city," he said.

Mamdani has often been targeted with claims that he holds extremist religious beliefs. As we discussed in a previous article, the often repeated claimsthat he wants to impose Sharia law are complete fabrications. In the context of claims that Mamdani is a proponent of Islamic radicalism, the above image can be seen as a fictional elaboration on that fear.