Indian American filmmaker Mira Nair — the mother of Democrat Socialist New York City mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani — described her son as “not an American at all” in an unearthed 2013 interview.
“He is a total desi. Completely,” Nair told the Hindustan Times in a 2013 interview, when her son Zohran Mamdani was 21 years old, studying Arabic and Politics at Bowdoin College, where he cofounded the school’s Students for Justice in Palestine chapter.
“We are not firangs at all,” she continued — referring to a Hindi or Urdu term used to describe foreigners or Westerners — adding, “He is very much us. He is not an Uhmericcan [American] at all.”
New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani waves to the crowd during a rally, Sunday, October 26, 2025, in New York. (Heather Khalifa/AP)
Notably, the word “firang” is not “some harmless cultural term,” Mehek Cooke, political comentator and attorney who was born in India, told Breitbart News.
“It’s a slur,” Cooke explained, adding that “firang” is used in India “to mock outsiders,” and essentially say “you don’t belong.”
“Calling someone a ‘firang’ isn’t affectionate — it’s contemptuous. It implies they don’t belong, that they’re lesser, that they’re suspect simply for being different,” Cooke told Breitbart News.
“So when Mamdani’s mother used that term to draw a line between being ‘desi’ and being ‘firang,’ she wasn’t just distinguishing cultures — she was rejecting the idea of assimilation, of belonging to America,” the attorney added.
Cooke said, “Using that word about your own child, who was raised and educated in the United States, carries the same tone as calling someone a derogatory name for being American.”
“It’s flippant, divisive, and dripping with contempt for the very nation that gave your family a better life,” Cooke asserted.
Mamdani’s mother went on to say that the now-Democrat Socialist New York City mayoral candidate “was born in Uganda, raised between India and America. He is at home in many places. He thinks of himself as a Ugandan and as an Indian.”
“He is a very chaalu [savvy or street smart] fellow. We speak only Hindustani at home. He is involved with popular culture but he is not into movies, as in he doesn’t make them — unlike me,” Nair added.
Nair also said that she did not “see it” in her son to follow in her footsteps and make movies, but rather, “He is very involved with current affairs, politics, and political issues.”
“I think he can be engaged in the world in someway to make a difference. He is very very interested in that,” she added.
As Breitbart News reported, Zohran Mamdani has radical roots. His father, Mahmood Mamdani, a prominent postcolonial scholar at Columbia University, has an X account filled with radical pro-Palestinian statements, including the defense of the use of terrorism.
Alana Mastrangelo is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on Facebook and X at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.
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