Exclusive: Vance on Mamdani: ‘Who the hell does he think that he is?’

Vice President JD Vance tore into the Democratic rising star Zohran Mamdani in a Saturday-night speech over his apparent ingratitude and disregard for American tradition as he vies to helm the United States' largest city.

During his keynote speech for the Claremont Institute on Saturday, Vance methodically detailed how Mamdani's mayoral candidacy insults the very culture, history, and generosity of the country that allowed him to succeed, according to a transcript exclusively obtained by Blaze News. Mamdani, whose family fled political persecution in Uganda, won the Democratic mayoral primary in New York City and is shaping up to be the front-runner in the contested race against current NYC Mayor Eric Adams (independent).

"If our victory, if President Trump's victory in 2024 was rooted in a broad, working- and middle-class coalition, Mamdani's coalition is almost the inverse of that," Vance said.

'Hatred. ... This is the animating principle of the American far left.'

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Although he campaigned on progressive policies that are typically targeted toward "underprivileged" and protected classes, Mamdani won high-income, college-educated voters. He also did particularly well in New York City's gentrified neighborhoods, like Ridgewood and Bushwick. At the same time, he struggled among black voters and voters without a college degree.

"That's an interesting coalition," Vance noted. "Maybe it works in the New York Democratic primary. I don't think it works particularly well in the United States at large."

"His victory was the product of a lot of young people who live reasonably comfortable lives but see that their elite degrees aren't really delivering what they expected," Vance added.

"And I say that not to criticize them, because I think that we should care about all the people in our country. ... But we have to be honest about where his coalition is. It is not the downtrodden. It is not poor Americans. It is not about dispossession. It's about elite."

Vance describes Mamdani and his supporters' progressive worldview as ultimately paradoxical, uniquely motivated by a disdain for the American tradition.

"How could privileged whites march around with a straight face decrying white privilege?" Vance asked. "How could progressives pretend to love conservative Muslims despite those Muslims' views on gender and sexuality? But the answer is obvious. ... The radicals at the far left, they don't need a unifying ideology of what they're for, because they know very well what they're against."

"What unites Islamists, gender studies majors, socially liberal, white urbanites, and Big Pharma lobbyists? It isn't the ideas of Thomas Jefferson or even of Karl Marx," Vance added. "It's hatred. ... This is the animating principle of the American far left."

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   Photographer: Christian Monterrosa/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Vance takes issue with the progressives' disregard for American history and, by proxy, for American values. In Mamdani's case, Vance criticizes his ungrateful attitude toward the very country that welcomed him and allowed him to prosper.

"The person who wishes to lead our largest city had, according to multiple media reports, never once publicly mentioned America's Independence Day in earnest," Vance said. "But when he did so this year, this is what he said, and this is an actual quote: 'America is beautiful, contradictory, unfinished. I am proud of our country, even as we constantly strive to make it better.' There is no gratitude in those words, no sense of owing something to this land and the people who turned its wilderness into the most powerful nation on Earth."

"I wonder, has he ever read the letters from boy soldiers in the Union army to parents and sweethearts that they'd never see again?" Vance asked. "Has he ever visited the grave site of a loved one who gave their life to build the kind of society where his family could escape racial theft and racial violence? Has he ever looked in the mirror and recognized that he might not be alive were it not for the generosity of a country he dares to insult on its most sacred day? Who the hell does he think that he is?"

Editor's note: This article has been corrected after publication. The speech was given Saturday, not Sunday. We regret the error.

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