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The criticism of tweets sent by Rama Duwaji, the wife of Mayor Zohran Mamdani, when she was 15 have placed her status as the First Lady of New York in the spotlight- more specifically, they have reignited the debate about whether or not she is a public figure and therefore is or is not accountable for the things she said or believed. In the tweets, she stated that Tel Aviv should not exit and dropped the “n-word.” Meanwhile, the mayor has repeatedly told people that his wife is not fair game for criticism or second-guessing because she is not a public figure. 710 WOR’s Curtis Sliwa and Larry Mendte in the Morning program jumped head-first into the fray, with both hosts saying to some extent that Duwaji’s status as the wife of a public official is not enough for her to deflect reproach or questioning.
Larry chose to cut Duwaji some slack, because she is not the person whose opinions directly shape the city’s official policy: “I really don’t care that much about her and what she believed back in the past, and maybe she still believes it; that would be concerning, I’m more concerned about Zohran Mamdni and what he believes, and the fact that they’re married. Now, one of the things she … She was answering the question she was asked, so I give her some grace I all of this. She’s not a politician. You’re right, she’s a public figure, being a wife of a mayor. I’m more concerned about the lying of this mayor in what he truly believes.”
Curtis, meanwhile, drew upon the experience that he, Andrew Cuomo and Eric Adams shared when he campaigned last year for mayor to show a double standard in how the Mamdanis are treated by the media: “If you remember, everything about our lives, including our teenage lives, were brought to the surface. We had to answer for it, rightfully so… How do you suddenly say that anything you tweeted or said publicly is off the radar screen until you got sworn into office as an assemblyman when you were 28 on January 1st of 2020?”
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