In Mamdani’s world psycho killers are forever wronged — and victims should remain silent and check their privilege

It was a crime that shocked the soul.

Jose Miranda stopped by a laundromat in The Bronx to wash his clothes one hot August day two years ago, and was hacked to death, randomly, by a maniac with a meat cleaver.

He left ­behind two boys.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s tweet on X regarding the death of an inmate at Rikers Island. X/ Mayor Zohran Mamdani

But Miranda and his orphaned children aren’t the kind of people Mayor Zohran Mamdani has in mind when he waxes poetic about “New Yorkers.”

Their father’s murderer, however, very much is: When Clarence Woodward, a career criminal with 27 prior arrests, died in custody this week — the circumstances of his death are still unclear — the mayor took to ­social media to mourn the loss of our great homicidal neighbor.

“I am deeply saddened by the death of a New Yorker in City custody at a jail on Rikers Island early this morning,” the mayor wrote.

“My thoughts are with his family and loved ones as they grieve this loss.”

Every life lost, for whatever reason, is a tragedy.

But why would the mayor offer his solemn sympathies to the Woodwards while having nothing to say in support of the Mirandas?

Because in Mamdani’s moral universe — the inverted, bizzarro worldview championed by the radical left — psycho killers are forever wronged and aggrieved souls worthy of our adoration, while their victims should remain silent and check their privilege.

Misguided Mam

It has always been so with Mamdani.

As a young man, going by the moniker Mr. Cardamom, he rapped enthusiastically in support of the Holy Land Five, convicted of routing millions of dollars to Hamas.

He has little to say about the victims of Hamas terrorist ­attacks.


New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks at a press conference.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks at a press conference at Manhattan Housing Court in New York City on Tuesday, August 25, 2026. Michael Brochstein/ZUMA / SplashNews.com

No matter the location, no matter the circumstances, the Mamdani moral principle is simple: Always side with the killers, never with their victims.

You’re free to dismiss this worldview as just another example of higher education gone wrong, and dismiss the young mayor as just another clueless college grad reared on the sheer lunacy that passes for progressive politics these days.

But when the person holding these dangerously immoral beliefs is in charge of the safety and well-being of millions, it turns out bad ideas lead to disastrous consequences.

“We do not yet know the cause of death,” Mamdani declared in his statement, “but we do know that too many New Yorkers have died on Rikers ­Island.”

Maybe!

But guess what?

Too many New Yorkers have also fallen victim to violent crimes under an administration that clearly cares more about the perpetrators than their prey.

Backward pity

It’s progressives who pushed through a host of justice “reforms” that make sure criminals aren’t given bail and don’t face prison.

The Mamdani administration will no doubt investigate the circumstances of Woodward’s death to back up their own ­biases against Rikers in particular and justice in general.

But who in the city government will wonder why career-criminal Woodward was freed on parole just a few weeks before he strolled into the 303 Laundromat on East 170th Street, took one look at Miranda, and then chopped at his legs and upper body until he died?

Let all of us, particularly the mayor, concentrate on those truly worthy of our condolences — the widows and orphans and bereaved parents whose world was shattered by killers coddled by virtue-signaling ­morons.

Liel Leibovitz is editor at large for Tablet and senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.

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