New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani met for close to an hour on Monday with the Jewish filmmaker Steven Spielberg, The New York Times reports.
The meeting at Spielberg’s apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan came as Mamdani, a longtime anti-Israel activist, has faced ongoing scrutiny for his approach to antisemitism in the city, which has the largest Jewish population in the world.
Spielberg, one of Hollywood’s most renowned directors and a prominent Democratic donor, has devoted much of his activism and philanthropy to Holocaust remembrance following the release of “Schindler’s List,” his Oscar-winning 1993 film.
In a 2024 speech, nearly six months after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack and the launch of the war in Gaza, Spielberg denounced rising antisemitism, saying “the machinery of extremism is being used on college campuses” and that “I am increasingly alarmed that we may be condemned to repeat history, to once again have to fight for the very right to be Jewish.”
The meeting between the two was not on Mamdani’s public schedule, but his office confirmed it to the Times. Spielberg’s wife, Kate Capshaw, and their son also attended, the paper says, describing it as a “friendly get-to-know-you conversation,” according to people familiar with the get-together.
Mamdani’s mother, Mira Nair, is also a prominent filmmaker.