[NYPost] Mayor Zohran Mamdani and a controversial Iranian-American lobbying group will be honored with “peacemaker” awards by a New York state non-profit group next week.
The mayor won’t be in attendance to accept the William Sloane Coffin Jr. Peacemaker Award at the October 5 event hosted by the Peace Action Fund of New York State, a City Hall spokesperson said Friday, but did not provide any additional clarity on the decision.
Mamdani was awarded the honor “as a former student organizer whose support of Palestinian rights resonates with many of the students of our Campus Organizing Program,” PAFNYS, an anti-war non-profit group, wrote on Instagram.
But the organization — the educational and research arm of Peace Action New York State — is also honoring the National Iranian American Council, a Washington DC-based non-profit whose ethics have been called into questions in recent years, City Journal first reported.
“This year’s event honors the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) for being a leading voice for peace and diplomacy with Iran,” and Mayor Zohran Mamdani,” PAFNYS wrote.
Critics of the group, including Republican Sens. Ted Cruz, Tom Cotton, and Mike Braun, in 2020 called on the Justice Department to investigate it for possible coordination with the Iranian government.
Last week, NIAC — which states its primary mission as to bridge relations between the US and Iran — filed a lawsuit against President Trump’s administration challenging the war in Iran, arguing “the president is waging an unconstitutional war without authorization from Congress.”
“NIAC is an independent Iranian-American nonprofit organization that has advocated for our community for more than 20 years. Our work is guided by our members and our longstanding commitment to human rights, civil liberties, diplomacy, and peace,” a spokesperson for the organization told The Post in a statement.
“NIAC is funded by the Iranian-American community and prominent American foundations. NIAC does not receive funds from either the Iranian government or any government.”
City Hall came under fire just three months ago for a planned meeting between Mamdani’s international affairs commissioner, Ana Maria Archila, and Iranian ambassador and UN envoy Amir-Saeid Iravani.
The scheduled July meeting was thwarted by the US State Department – and Hizzoner downplayed his office’s involvement at the time of the revelation.
“The commissioner recognizes that this was made in error and we’re working on a new process in terms of new meeting requests,” he told reporters at an unrelated event in July.
“Again, this was a request that came into the office, not one that originated from the office.”
The William Sloane Coffin, Jr. Peace Maker awards will take place at Scandinavia House in Midtown on Monday at 6 p.m.
[BB] A Biden-appointed federal judge in Miami claims a federal ban on noncitizens voting is unconstitutional and has dismissed a case against a migrant who voted in 2020.
U.S. District Judge David Leibowitz, appointed to the bench by Joe Biden in 2024, threw out a case against Chelsea Michelle Ann Cox, who knowingly voted despite being a noncitizen in Broward County in 2020.
In his 31-page opinion, Leibowitz claimed that the U.S. Congress overstepped its role by passing a law prohibiting noncitizens from voting because in his view the Constitution maintains that the states are to determine voter eligibility.
Trump Department of Homeland Security (DHS) General Counsel James Percival blasted the judge, and wrote on X, “A Biden appointed judge in Florida says that federal bans on noncitizen voting are unconstitutional. The thing that never happens is now ‘constitutionally protected activity!'”
Should Leibowitz’ ruling stick, the Cox case could have far-reaching consequences for future illegal voting cases.
The judge claims that the 1996 federal law prohibiting noncitizens from voting in federal elections is unconstitutional. The law includes penalties of a year in prison and fines if violated.
But Leibowitz claims that the law is a violation of Article I, Article II, and the 17th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
“When you’re prosecuted based on a law that Congress did not have the authority to pass, the prosecution cannot stand,” he wrote in his opinion.
Federal prosecutors maintain that congressional powers over immigration gives Congress the right to exclude noncitizens from voting. Prosecutors also maintain that a 1970 Supreme Court case validating a law by Congress lowering the voting age to 18 also shows precedent that Congress has the right to affect voting rules in federal elections.
#2
Well past time for some of these judges to stop breathing.
Posted by: chris ||
10/03/2026 7:30 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Well there is a Art I, Section 4 of the Constitution that places authority for elections with the states. However, this guy is ignoring the over-riding language (Art IV, Section 4) that says "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government." If clean voting doesn't come under that heading, nothing does.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
BREAKING: Israel says pilot tried to hijack flydubai flight to Tel Aviv that diverted, landed in Saudi Arabia
