Even the Reds are seeing red.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani has succeeded in at least one thing during his fresh-faced administration — infuriating everyone, including his typically ride-or-die lefty buds, over his bald-faced lie that the City Council’s budget plan cuts services.
Peeved City Council members roundly ripped Mamdani after he used one of his slick social-media videos Wednesday to call out Speaker Julie Menin by name and wrongly portray her budget proposal — an alternative to his doomsday version — as slashing billions of dollars from city agencies.
“This is deeply misleading and potentially harmful! I thought these four years were going to be different,” Councilman Kevin Riley (D-Bronx) — an obviously disappointed Mamdani backer — posted on X.
Councilwoman Virginia Maloney (D-Manhattan) also served up a blistering online rebuttal of Mamdani’s assertions.
“I know math is hard, but the @NYCCouncil finance team did the work—digging into the details to find real solutions,” she wrote.
“The Mayor’s proposed City budget is a whopping $127 billion. The City’s not broke, we’re just badly managed. And we can balance this budget responsibly without putting our long-term fiscal health at risk.”
The furious backlash led the thin-skinned mayor to then fire off irked texts to a council member complaining about the critical social-media posts, sources said.
A source said Maloney’s post appeared to prompt his texting spree, claiming, “That Virginia Maloney tweet really got under their skin.
“Even the socialists aren’t backing the mayor. He’s clearly over his head,” the source noted.
“The speaker’s press conference [about the alternative budget] wasn’t really attacking him, and then he instantly puts out a tweet and then drops a video of him sitting behind that desk like a dictator.”
A council insider added of Mamdani, “He’s lost the council.
“He’s flailing. He even texted one member to complain about their tweets.
“It’s a lie, he’s a liar,” the insider said about Mamdani’s head-scratching contention that the City Council plan would slash city services.
The brouhaha erupted as Menin and City Council members released their official response earlier Wednesday to Mamdani’s $127 billion proposed 2027 budget.
Their alternate spending plan argued Mamdani’s projected $5.4 billion budget shortfall could be bridged with a mix of re-estimated revenues, savings and creative funding sources — and without resorting Hizzoner’s preferred method of taxing the rich.
Even before Menin released the alternative proposal, Mamdani’s fellow travelers with the city’s Democratic Socialists of America launched a coordinated attack against her.
They sneeringly deemed her a “millionaire” who’d rather cut services for working-class New Yorkers rather than tax her wealthy compatriots.
Mamdani suspiciously echoed those broadsides in his later video response calling out Menin.
“If her proposal was adopted, it would result in slashing billions of dollars from agency budgets, and working New Yorkers would pay the price,” he said as he solemnly sat behind a desk in the video.
The mayor’s video retort — which was viewed 2.4 million times on X as of Thursday — baffled and infuriated City Council members of all political persuasions.
A council source said Mamdani risked burning bridges with lawmakers over standard disagreements during budget negotiations.
“Speaker Menin did her job, and the mayor responded with a wild personal attack, and that’s going to affect his relationship with the entire council moving forward,” the source said.
The council rose up to defend its leader and the budget proposal.
Councilwoman Jen Gutiérrez, a leader of the council’s Progressive Caucus, angrily shot down fellow lefty Mamdani’s assertion that Menin’s budget cut services.
“Slashing services? Absolutely not,” Gutiérrez wrote on X. “I’ve seen what that looks like under the last administration. This isn’t that; there are no cuts to services. There is waste, and we should be real about it.”
Gutiérrez’s blunt response was reposted by the council’s Majority Leader Shaun Abreu, another Mamdani ally who rebutted the mayor’s lie about service cuts.
“The City Council has not proposed to cut any services,” Abreu posted. “We’re fighting to protect programs that working families rely on. Let’s pass a budget that delivers for New Yorkers.”
Socialist council members Alexa Avilés, Tiffany Cabán, Shahana Hanif and Chi Ossé also issued a joint statement that pointedly didn’t repeat his attacks against Menin, even as they backed his call to tax the rich.
“We appreciate that the Council budget seeks creative solutions to closing the budget deficit,” the statement read. “We are also encouraged that the Mayor and Speaker are both working towards a balanced budget that maintains essential programs for New Yorkers.”
Ossé, in a statement of his own, shot down Mamdani’s assertion that Menin is pushing service cuts.
“It is the City Council’s responsibility to weight every possible solution to close the budget deficit we’re facing,” he said. “I have been in the room for many budget discussions, and I know that the City Council and Mayor ultimately share the goal of opposing any service cuts.”
City Hall officials did not return a Post request for comment.
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