Zohran Mamdani spending big on private security despite earlier calls to defund police

Expenses reported in the New York City Campaign Finance Board show that Mamdani's campaign submitted three payments to Advanced Security & Investigations in June and July.

Advanced Security & Investigations, a New York state-based security professionals' group, offers a range of services, including armed and unarmed protective services. 

According to the company's website, it is also a "proud employer" of personnel from the New York Police Department, which Mamdani previously called to defund, as well as the New York State Police, New York City Sheriff's Office and several other law enforcement departments in the area.

The purpose listed for the various payments, which ranged from about $8,000 to around $13,000, is "security."

The three-day-long exclusive wedding bash in Uganda also included masked military security and a cellphone-jamming system. 

"We need a socialist city council to defund the police," he wrote again on July 3, 2020.

Again, in December 2020, Mamdani wrote, the New York City Council "tried to make the NYPD reduce its overtime budget by half. They simply refused. There is no negotiating with an institution this wicked & corrupt. Defund it. Dismantle it. End the cycle of violence."

However, Mamdani has taken a very different tone during his campaign, saying this week that those tweets are "out of step with my positions as a candidate."

After the shooting, he told reporters during a press conference, "I am not running to defund the police."

However, he has not disavowed a more recent social media post from December 2024 in which he pledged to disband the NYPD's Strategic Response Group (SRG), which is tasked with responding to mass shootings and other emergencies.

He wrote, "As Mayor, I will disband the SRG, which has cost taxpayers millions in lawsuit settlements and brutalized countless New Yorkers exercising their First Amendment rights."

Fox News Digital reached out to the Mamdani campaign for comment but did not immediately receive a response.