Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani: Good evening, everyone. It is an honor to be here at City Winery and a privilege to join all of you for Seder. I want to acknowledge and thank the founder and CEO of City Winery, Michael Dorf. I want to acknowledge a number of leaders that we have here. We have our speaker, Julie Menin, who's here with us; our comptroller, Mark Levine; our former comptroller, Brad Lander; and we have our executive director of the Mayor's Office to Combat Antisemitism, Phylisa Wisdom. And for those who think I'm too young, a man younger than me as well, one of my advisors, Morris Katz.
This week across our city, Jewish New Yorkers will gather with family and friends, neighbors and strangers around the Seder table. Hands will be washed in silence, karpas will be dipped, and in the fourth step of the Seder, the middle matzo will be broken. The larger half, the afikomen, will be set aside for later in the evening. But over the course of the night, as voices both young and old tell the story of Passover, a story of liberation from enslavement, they will do so over the broken middle matzo, a physical reminder of the ruptures that have defined so much of Jewish history, a physical reminder of how much of our world today remains broken and incomplete. Those fractures run deep.
For too many in our city, the dream of liberation has drifted out of reach. The affordability crisis deprives so many of dignity and possibility. Too many of our neighbors cannot afford a home to raise their families in, cannot keep up with the rising costs of groceries or child care, and can no longer afford to stay in the city that they love. The rising tide of antisemitism has caused enormous pain for so many Jewish New Yorkers. Doors are locked that used to be open, routine subway journeys [feel] fraught, [and] synagogues that once felt like sanctuaries now require armed protection. ICE is enormous cruelty - I say it because we know that if there was complete decorum anywhere that we were, we would have to ask ourselves if we had left the city that we love.
And it is important to be here and to acknowledge that this is what it means to love and to leave the place that we call home. And if the breaking of the middle matzo connects us to the brokenness we reckon with each day, as we eat the afikomen, we feel the fractured pieces of the middle matzo recombine within ourselves. This reminds us that though there may be much suffering in the world, it need not be permanent. Repair is possible. We can mend the ruptures that we've inherited. And as we tell the story of bondage to redemption, we remember that liberation is not a static thing. It is not inevitable. It is a practice of solidarity, something that we must deliver together. Liberation was not realized when Moses demanded, "Let my people go," nor was it delivered when God intervened with the plagues.
Liberation was attained when the Jewish people came together to escape their enslavement in Egypt, neighbor helping neighbor, protecting one another, and sharing what little they had. When I think of those practices of solidarity, liberation, [and] repair, I think of the legacy of Jewish New Yorkers, Jewish New Yorkers who have long stood on the front lines of the civil rights movement, like Henry Moskowitz, founder of the NAACP, [and] Rabbi Heschel, who marched from Selma alongside Dr. King.
Jewish New Yorkers who have stood at the helm of our labor movement, like Clara Lemlich and Rose Schneiderman, who led the fight for better working conditions for garment workers, organizing, mobilizing, [and] building power for the working people of our city. And Jewish New Yorkers have undertaken the daily work to care for and protect all who call New York City home, leading food and clothing drives, standing up legal clinics for those targeted by ICE, and fighting for affordable housing, accessible health care, and equitable education. And I know that so much of this fight is built into the very structure of the holiest faces of Jewish New York City.
I recall visiting CBST, and as I was being given a tour, [I was] shown that this is the room where we provide legal assistance for asylees. This is the way that so many Jewish New Yorkers practice that faith and that belief in solidarity in our city. And on Passover, we recommit ourselves to this work. It is why doors are left ajar. Not just so that the wandering spirit of Elijah may come and rest, but as is said, Ha Lachma Anya, "All who are hungry may come and eat." And they will eat the same no matter who they are.
It is why the Mishnah instructs us that even the poorest among us should not eat until he reclines on his left side, just as the free and the wealthy do. And it is why we are directed to share our plenty, distributing no fewer than four cups of wine to each and every person. Or on evenings like this, perhaps more. These directives extend beyond the Seder table. Let us build a city where every New Yorker is accorded the dignity of rest. Where even the poorest among us know their cup will be filled. And we all know that if they seek shelter, they will find it. If they are hungry, they will be fed. There is a crack, a crack in everything.
But as Passover teaches, and as Leonard Cohen sings, "That is how the light gets in." Though things may be broken, so too do they become whole again. I am grateful for the opportunity to join you this evening. I look forward to working with all of you in the coming months and years as we build a more whole New York City together. And let that be a city where there is dissent. Let that be a city where there is disagreement. Let that be a city that has room for critique of your mayor. Because if it wasn't that city, then we know that it wouldn't be the one that we love. Thank you so much.
