Zohran Mamdani Said He Was Black on Columbia University Application

Yesterday I wrote a round-up of bad news for Columbia University. One of the four stories I mentioned was the hack of Columbia’s computers which appeared to have been done by someone interested in finding out if the school was still using race as a factor in admissions decisions.

The alleged hacker, speaking via text and claiming to work alone, said they sought to acquire information about university applications that would suggest a continuation of affirmative action policies in Columbia’s admissions, following a 2023 Supreme Court decision that effectively barred the practice. The Columbia official said the school’s admissions processes are compliant with the Supreme Court decision.

We’ll have to wait and see if the hacked data backs them up on that. But today we’re learning that at least one applicant seems to have gamed the system in his favor by identifying as black when he is in fact not black. That applicant was New York City’s Democratic primary winner Zohran Mamdani.

…as a high school senior in 2009, Mr. Mamdani, the Democratic nominee, claimed another label when he applied to Columbia University. Asked to identify his race, he checked a box that he was “Asian” but also “Black or African American,” according to internal data derived from a hack of Columbia University that was shared with The New York Times.

Columbia, like many elite universities, used a race-conscious affirmative action admissions program at the time. Reporting that his race was Black or African American in addition to Asian could have given an advantage to Mr. Mamdani, who was born in Uganda and spent his earliest years there.

Mamdani was born in Africa but hasn’t lived there since he was seven years old.

Mamdani was born in Kampala, Uganda, to academic Mahmood Mamdani and filmmaker Mira Nair. His family immigrated to South Africa when he was five years old and then to the United States when he was seven, settling in New York City. Mamdani went on to graduate from the Bronx High School of Science and then earned a Bachelor’s degree in Africana studies from Bowdoin College.

According to the data hacked from Columbia, which came from this user on X, the school classified him as “Black Non-Hispanic” which is not quite the same as “Black for African American.”

The New York Times just reported on the story.

Using the hacked data from Columbia, we found that Zohran Mamdani claimed to be Black when he applied to Columbia.

Despite his fake race and the fact that he listed his father—a professor there—on his application, he was rejected. https://t.co/u6na5SFmPQ pic.twitter.com/3Cha3ATDe2

— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) July 3, 2025

The Times asked for a comment about the Columbia application and here was Mamdani’s response:

Mr. Mamdani, 33, said he did not consider himself either Black or African American, but rather “an American who was born in Africa.” He said his answers on the college application were an attempt to represent his complex background given the limited choices before him, not to gain an upper hand in the admissions process. (He was not accepted at Columbia.)

“Most college applications don’t have a box for Indian-Ugandans, so I checked multiple boxes trying to capture the fullness of my background,” said Mr. Mamdani, a state lawmaker from Queens…

…Mr. Mamdani said he filled out all of his college applications in the same way.

I guess that means he identified as black on his Bowdoin College application as well, the place where he did get in and go to school. Did Bowdoin College give an advantage to Black students at the time? I don’t know for certain but if it did then Mamdani would have gotten an advantage over other applicants.

He told the Times these applications were the only instance he can remember where he identified himself as “Black or African American.” The Times says it wasn’t able to identify any speeches in which he’d referred to himself in this way.

Maybe this was a one off but if so does that make this better or worse? It suggests he wasn’t dumb enough to make this claim out loud but he did do it on applications where a) it could benefit him and b) no one would ever find out he was lying. Indeed, it’s likely no one would have ever known if he hadn’t won the mayoral primary (raising interest in his biography) and if someone hadn’t hacked Columbia’s application data. It reminds me of this story I wrote two years ago. What’s to stop people from just lying on their applications to gain an advantage? Not much it seems.

It goes without saying that a conservative who tried this would be crucified for it, but the rules never really seem to apply to Democrats, or Democratic Socialists in this case.Is this going to matter to any of his voters in NYC?

Mamdani is the Elizabeth Warren of NYC. He lied on his application to Columbia and said he was black. And he still didn’t get in even with his dad being a prof there.

This is hilarious.

But I predict it won’t make any difference in the New York election. pic.twitter.com/gMvodCCflv

— Jennifer Sey (@JenniferSey) July 3, 2025

The memes should be amusing though.

🚨 WOW. Zohran Mamdani identified as a Black Man on his college application.

The latest in a long list of frauds from the Democrat Party. pic.twitter.com/gGjEw3p05c

— Alec Lace (@AlecLace) July 3, 2025