Jeffries sidesteps question about Mamdani identifying as Asian, African-American on college application

House Minority leader Hakeem Jeffries sidestepped a question about a New York Times statement that New York City Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani identified as African-American and Asian on his college application which prompted attacks from his mayoral competitors New York City Mayor Eric Adams is attacking Mamdani over reports that he identified himself as African-American and Asian on college application Mamdani was born in Uganda his parents from India What are your thoughts on this issue Mamdani has checked multiple boxes trying to capture what he calls the fullness of his background Rev Al Sharpton sought Jeffries on Saturday during his MSNBC show I mean is this a real issue to you The article claimed that Mamdani when petitioned his race on his college application to Columbia University checked the boxes for Asian but also Black or African American in their article published on Thursday I think to me you know the issue that we have to deal with in New York City which our Democratic nominee did talk about extensively during the primary campaign is affordability Jeffries responded And particularly in a large number of of the neighborhoods that are being overwhelmed by gentrification and wiped out by housing displacement RESURFACED VIDEO SHOWS NYC MAYORAL HOPEFUL SAYING HE WANTS TO REPLACE PRIVATE HOMES WITH COMMUNAL LIVINGJeffries continued that whoever s going to be the next mayor of the City of New York really requirements to articulate a concrete plan for making sure that working-class communities including working-class neighborhoods of color can still have a place in our great city The city that both of us love but we know is changing significantly in terms of the opportunity for working families and middle-class folks to be able to continue to call a home he stated The New York Times' reporting was criticized by liberals including former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann who wrote on X Your absolute abrogation of the NYT standards would in a better era there have led the full range of you in management to resign Utter failure Then again if you don't realize NYT is perceived as actively campaigning against Mamdani you're all lost anyway Olbermann continued CUOMO CONCEDES IN NYC DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY FOR MAYOR CONGRATULATES AOC-ENDORSED MAMDANIThe Times' assistant managing editor for Standards and Trust Patrick Healy put out a lengthy comment on X the following day after receiving reader feedback on the article Our reporters obtained information about Mr Mamdani s Columbia college application and went to the Mamdani campaign with it When we hear anything of news value we try to confirm it through direct sources Mr Mamdani verified this information in an interview with The Times he wrote CLICK HERE FOR MORE COVERAGE OF MEDIA AND CULTUREHealy explained that the New York City mayoral candidate felt limited by the options listed in the application's racial identity boxes and since he was born in Uganda decided to write in the country on his application Mamdani's application was made available to The Times after a cyberattack on Columbia University in late June led to various of the school's sensitive information being exposed to the hackers Healy stated that although the outlet received the information after it was stolen in a cyberattack The Times does not solely rely on nor make a decision to publish information from such a source and verified the application with Mamdani himself before publishing the story