Federal Judge Delivers Blockbuster Ruling on Zohran Mamdani's Order
Mamdani Visits WH After Federal Judge Blocks NYC Bankruptcy Sale
A federal judge has temporarily blocked Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s attempt to stop the bankruptcy sale of more than 5,000 rent-subsidized apartments across New York City, dealing an early blow to the newly sworn-in mayor’s housing reform agenda.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge David Jones of the Southern District of New York recently ruled that the city could not intervene in the ongoing sale of properties owned by Pinnacle Group, one of the city’s largest landlords. The company declared bankruptcy in May after defaulting on $560 million in loans, and the Mamdani administration has claimed it owes the city $12.7 million in unpaid housing code fines.
Mamdani had directed the city’s Law Department to intervene, arguing the deal could worsen housing instability for thousands of tenants living in subsidized apartments. But Judge Jones rejected the city’s motion, saying the bankruptcy auction must move forward.
Pinnacle, owned by billionaire Joel Wiener, controls more than 140 buildings and 9,000 units across the five boroughs. Court filings show Summit Real Estate Holdings has offered $450 million to buy roughly 90 of the company’s properties.
“Completion of the bankruptcy auction process will bring financial stability along with the opportunity to stabilize services, outcomes which we would expect the City would not want to disrupt,” said Ken Fisher, an attorney representing Pinnacle.
City lawyers countered in filings that Summit might not have the financial strength to rehabilitate the buildings, warning that “continuing losses and mounting expenses might lead to additional bankruptcies or reorganizations, a state of financial and social chaos potentially worse than the current situation.”
Tenant groups opposing the sale say Pinnacle has neglected maintenance and allowed conditions to deteriorate, while others fear the new owners could raise rents or further reduce oversight.
The battle over Pinnacle’s holdings became a flashpoint during the mayoral race, where Mamdani campaigned on preserving rent-subsidized housing and protecting low-income tenants. On inauguration day, he visited one of the properties in Brooklyn to criticize the company’s record.
The court defeat also adds political strain for Mamdani as he defends his choice of Cea Weaver to head the Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants. Weaver has faced criticism for past posts describing homeownership as “a weapon of white supremacy.” She later apologized, calling the comments “poorly phrased and not reflective of my work.”
Mamdani met with President Donald Trump at the White House on Thursday, which was a surprise as the two men spoke about building more homes in New York City.
The meeting was not on the president’s schedule or on Mamdani’s schedule, who became mayor of the city last month. It happens on the same day that the Department of Homeland Security took a Columbia University student into custody.
Mamdani called the meeting “productive,” and a picture of him with the president showed Trump holding two printouts of New York Daily News front pages, one real and one fake, that Mamdani had given him. According to the New York Times, the fake printout tried to make it look like Trump was in favor of building more housing in New York City.
“Just got off the phone with President Trump,” Mamdani posted on X. “In our meeting earlier, I shared my concerns about Columbia student Elmina Aghayeva, who was detained by ICE this morning. He has just informed me that she will be released imminently.”
Columbia officials and Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal said that the immigration enforcement agents had lied about who they were to get into a building on campus. For example, they said they were looking for a missing person.
The school made it clear that police officers must show a court order or subpoena to get into private areas of the university, such as housing and classrooms.
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Obama Accuses JD Vance Of Promoting ‘Blood And Soil’ Politics
Former President Barack Obama rarely mentions Vice President JD Vance by name, but that changed this week with one of his sharpest public attacks since Vance took office.
The comments immediately fueled speculation that Democrats are beginning to focus more attention on the vice president as Republicans look ahead to the post-Trump era.
Speaking Thursday during a conversation with author Malcolm Gladwell, Obama accused Vance of promoting what he described as a “blood and soil” vision of America, despite being married to Usha Vance, the daughter of Indian immigrants.
Obama made the remarks while discussing the Reconstruction era and arguing that many of the same debates over citizenship, voting rights and national identity continue today.
“We have a politics now that at least one of our major parties has been captured by politics that is not that subtle about suggesting that ‘We the people’ means a certain kind of people,” Obama said.
“When you have the vice president, current vice president, making a speech that is basically a blood and soil version of ‘We the people,’ that it matters who your parents were and how long they’ve been here despite him being married to a daughter of an immigrant himself.”
The phrase “blood and soil” is historically associated with Nazi Germany and white nationalist ideology.
Obama went on to argue that debates over who belongs in America remain central to the nation’s politics.
“That echoes, then, ideas about who can be a citizen, who belongs, who gets to make decisions,” he said.
Gladwell followed by accusing Vance of hypocrisy, arguing that the vice president was making what he called a nativist argument despite his own family’s immigrant background.
Obama agreed.
“That is progress,” Obama said.
“Listen, hypocrisy is progress. It is, because it means that you feel guilty enough to either lie to yourself or others.”
Fox News Digital reported that it reached out to Vance’s office for comment.
Obama did not identify the specific speech he was criticizing, but Vance’s most recent nationally televised remarks came during Independence Day celebrations marking America’s 250th birthday.
In that speech, Vance encouraged Americans to reject what he called a “two-dimensional view” of the country focused only on its historical failures.
“So what I’d ask you to do, my fellow Americans, on our 250th birthday, is to reject the two-dimensional view of your fellow citizens and reject the two-dimensional view of your country,” Vance said.
“Reject the view of your nation that sees only its sins, but not its grace and its greatness.”
He also emphasized that America’s accomplishments were achieved by “a common people working towards a common future.”
Obama has generally avoided making Vance a regular target since the vice president took office.
One notable exception came during the 2024 presidential campaign when then-Vice President Kamala Harris selected Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate.
Without naming Vance directly, Obama contrasted Harris’ choice with the Republican ticket.
“When a presidential candidate chooses a running mate, it says a lot about who they are and what kind of president they’ll be,” Obama said at the time, Fox News reported.
Political observers have increasingly discussed Vance as a potential frontrunner for the 2028 Republican presidential nomination, though he has not announced any plans to run.
Against that backdrop, Obama’s unusually direct criticism is likely to fuel speculation that some Democrats are beginning to sharpen their message against a politician they view as a likely future standard-bearer for the Republican Party. While no Democratic leaders have publicly described their strategy in those terms, prominent figures often begin drawing contrasts with potential future rivals well before a presidential campaign officially begins.
Whether that proves to be the case remains to be seen, but Obama’s remarks marked one of his most pointed critiques of Vance to date and ensured the vice president once again found himself at the center of the national political conversation.
