Independent mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo on Saturday accused Zohran Mamdani of lying about not knowing a virulently anti-LGBTQ Ugandan official with whom Mamdani recently posed for smiling photos.
The inflammatory snapshots — and Mamdani’s response to criticism of him about them — has put the Democratic nominee in New York City’s Nov. 4 mayoral election on the defensive.
The photos were taken at Entebbe airport in Uganda during Mamdani’s trip back to his native country for his wedding after his stunning win in the June 24 Democratic mayoral primary.
One photo shows Mamdani smiling with Rebecca Kadaga, Uganda’s first deputy prime minister and former parliament speaker. One of the country’s longtime and most powerful politicians, Kadaga in 2012 championed a bill to make homosexuality punishable by death.
In another photo taken during the same meeting, the two are joined by the candidate’s father, Mahmood Mamdani.
Mamdani, the Big Apple’s mayoral front-runner, has claimed he didn’t understand who Kadaga was when he posed for photos with her. But Cuomo in a minute-long video statement posted on X, called that a lie.
“Zohran, you should be ashamed of yourself for posing with a woman who would have had a death penalty for gays with that smile and then lying about it,” the ex-governor said.
“Zohran said he didn’t know who she was,” he continued. “It turns out, after reporting, that was a lie. His father knew Kadaga very well for many years. She’s a longtime, well-known public official. It was a lie and it was reprehensible especially to New Yorkers,” Cuomo said, adding that the bill was internationally condemned.
Mamdani on Saturday tried to push back on the ongoing controversy at a campaign event he held for National Coming Out Day.
“Had I known that she was the architect of this horrific legislation and attack on queer Ugandans, I would not have taken it,” he told reporters, according to NY1.
After this article’s publication online, Dora Pekec, Mamdani’s spokesperson, told the Daily News, “Zohran didn’t know who he was taking a photo with… It was just a selfie and happened at the airport lounge.” She added that, if you zoom in on the photo, “you can see his passport and boarding pass.”
“It’s not a legitimate attack,” Pekec scoffed of Cuomo’s tweet, contrasting it with Mamdani’s live campaign events.
In addition, in connection with the photos, Cuomo on Monday called on Mamdani to renounce his dual Ugandan citizenship due to the African nation’s institutional homophobia.
“Why would you keep a citizenship in Uganda, which is a country that outlaws the LGBTQ community — why? Why be a citizen of that country?” Cuomo said.
“I believe in the LGBTQ community, and it would be a total act of hypocrisy to be a citizen of a country that abuses LGBTQ people,” Cuomo continued. “It’s pure hypocrisy.”
Mamdani was born in Uganda but moved to the U.S. as a child and became an American citizen in 2018.
Mamdani, in addition to saying he didn’t know who Kadaga was when he took the photos with her, called her extreme anti-gay legislative efforts a “horrific attack on queer Ugandans.”
But Cuomo spokesperson Rich Azzopardi reiterated to the Daily News that Cuomo is saying Mamdani flat-out lied by saying he didn’t know who Kadaga was when she approached him for a photo.
The Mamdani campaign has countered that Cuomo’s attack over Mamdani’s cheery pictures with the homosexual-hating Ugandan pol is a distraction from more important issues.
“Andrew Cuomo’s recent behavior is increasingly Trumpian — issuing desperate personal attacks to distract from his lack of any vision or plans to address the affordability crisis,” Pekec said. “Does Cuomo want every dual citizen in a city of 3 million immigrants to give up their citizenship?”
Originally Published: October 11, 2025 at 9:53 PM EDT
