Hedge fund billionaire and Donald Trump megadonor Bill Ackman has pledged “hundreds of millions of dollars” to defeat Zohran Mamdani for New York City mayor. He’s launched a wave of vicious attacks based on Mamdani’s Muslim faith, even attempting to link Mamdani to suicide bombers and terrorism. The amount of money that Ackman is talking about would blow away the all-time record for spending on any New York City election, and given his personal fortune of nearly $10 billion, there’s no reason to think he’s bluffing. The Intercept has a long history of investigating dark-money campaign spending, and our team is digging deep to reveal the torrent of right-wing money pouring into this race. Will you donate $5 to expose the flood of billionaire money attacking Zohran Mamdani? If you’ve saved your payment information with ActBlue Express, your donation will go through immediately: Ackman is a longtime megadonor who has given to both Democrats and Republicans, but in 2024 he fully embraced Trump’s reelection, pushing Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s anti-vaccine disinformation and various other MAGA-aligned conspiracy theories. This year, Ackman spent half a million dollars against Mamdani in the primary, while a pro-Andrew Cuomo super PAC spent a whopping $25 million in support of his failed bid to defeat Mamdani. Now that looks like it was only a warm-up for an even bigger flood of spending in the general election. This month, Ackman endorsed incumbent New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who he says is “ready to go to battle, guns blazing with enormous energy and clarity on why Mamdani and his socialist/communist (‘We must seize the means of production’) and anti-NYPD policies would be catastrophic for NYC.” Meanwhile, he has been pushing a wave of attacks painting Mamdani as an antisemite due to his criticism of the Israeli government. The Intercept has a long history of tracking campaign spending and the influence of money in politics. For instance, in 2024, when AIPAC spent big to attack progressive Democrats who had spoken up in favor of Palestinian rights, we tracked every dime. Today, we’re poring over campaign finance reports to expose the billionaires, real estate magnates, and other big-money interests jumping into New York’s mayoral race. But the only way we, as a nonprofit, reader-funded organization, can undertake this kind of ambitious independent journalism is with the support of readers like you. Will you donate $5 to expose the big-money special interests attacking Zohran Mamdani? 
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