Dave Portnoy calls NYC mayoral candidates Andrew Cuomo and Zohran Mamdani "pervert" and "nepo baby" as he criticizes the debate

Dave Portnoy reacted to the NYC mayoral debate that took place on Thursday, October 16, 2025. Portnoy took to X, formerly known as Twitter, on October 16 and criticized Andrew Cuomo and Zohran Mamdani. He called Cuomo and Mamdani "pervert" and "communist nepo baby," respectively.

Portnoy further spoke about Curtis Sliwa and claimed that he had no chance of winning. The tweet further read,

"The #NYCMayoralDebate is the absolute bottom of the barrel politics. You got a guy who got kicked out of office for being a pervert and who already lost the primary vs a communist nepo baby, who has never had a job in his life, hates America, hates the police and is pro terrorist and a 3rd guy who actually loves NYC but has no shot at winning. I feel bad for every person who cares about NYC."

More than 1.5 million people viewed the tweet, and over 46.5K liked it. Meanwhile, many took to the platform to share their take on the tweet as well as on the mayoral debate that happened. While some resonated with Dave Portnoy's thoughts, others expressed a different point of view.

For the unversed, the debate happened amongst the three candidates, Zohran Mamdani, Curtis Sliwa, and Andrew Cuomo. The election to decide the mayor of New York City is set to take place on November 4, 2025.

Zohran Mamdani has received bashing and criticism, with people calling him a "nepo baby"

Many MAGA activists like Laura Loomer and Meghan McCain criticized him for the same reason. On June 29, Loomer wrote in a tweet,

"Your mom lets you stay in her $2 million condo in Chelsea. Why are you pandering? You are rich. You are a nepo baby."

In another tweet that she posted in July, Loomer wrote,

"His whole campaign is a performance, directed by his Indian film director mother, Mira Nair, starring her son, the Islamic, champagne communist fraud."

At the time, McCain shared a tweet in which she bashed Mamdani claiming that he had a lavish background. Third reaction was in response to a statement by Mamdani where he said that he believed that there should be no billionaires.

According to McCain, Mamdani's family became rich and successful in the US in the same system that he thought needed to be "more like a 3rd world autocracy." The tweet garnered more than 2 million views at the time and several netizens agreed with the perspective and added to it on social media.

According to Forbes, if Zohran Mamdani wins the November election, he will become the youngest mayor at the age of 34 since Hugh John Grant. For the unversed, Grant was 30 years old when his inauguration happened back in the year 1889.