New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani refused to withdraw his endorsement of congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier at a Wednesday news conference, even after deleted social media posts attributed to her, calling the United States "a f-----g disgrace" and demanding the abolition of borders, police, and prisons, resurfaced publicly.

Mamdani, a self-described democratic socialist, first endorsed the 32-year-old community organizer in late May. When pressed about the posts at the news conference, he did not condemn them. He said he hadn't seen them and pivoted to praise.

The endorsement matters because Avila Chevalier is challenging five-term incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat, D-N.Y., in New York's 13th congressional district, a seat covering Upper Manhattan and parts of the west Bronx, ahead of a June 23 primary. The race puts the Democratic Party's internal fault lines on full display: a sitting congressman versus a far-left challenger backed by the city's new mayor, whose own record on immigration enforcement and policing has drawn sharp criticism from federal officials.

What the deleted posts said

The posts attributed to Avila Chevalier span from 2018 to 2022 and were deleted before they resurfaced. Fox News Digital reported that the posts attacked the United States, the Democratic Party, private property, police, and borders, while calling for the nationalization of large portions of the private sector.

In one post, Avila Chevalier wrote: "This country is a f-----g disgrace." In another, she said: "I forgot to get napkins so I just wiped my hand on the American flag behind me."

A 2021 repost attributed to her declared that abolishing borders, prisons, and police is "possible, necessary, and the only moral way forward." Other posts stated "all deportation is wrong" and "Yes, literally abolish the border."

She didn't limit her fire to Republicans. Avila Chevalier reportedly called former President Joe Biden a "rapist" and "war criminal," chastised Sen. Bernie Sanders for his "liberal Zionism," and wrote "F--k Kamala Harris." During the COVID-19 pandemic, she demanded $3,000 per month in universal basic income from the government.

These are not the musings of someone working through policy disagreements. They read like the social media trail of a person who views the American system itself, its laws, its borders, its institutions, as the enemy. And the mayor of the nation's largest city looked at all of it and shrugged.

Mamdani's defense: 'Her views have evolved'

When reporters asked Mamdani about the posts at the Wednesday news conference, he offered a response that was less a rebuttal than a redirect. He told reporters on MS NOW:

"When it comes to Darializa's campaign, I had not seen those tweets and what I've heard from her and what I know a lot of others in the district that have heard from her is that her views have evolved and that the campaign she is running on is reflective of what she's going to be fighting for."

He then went further, casting Avila Chevalier as a champion of working people, and specifically praising her work obstructing federal immigration enforcement.

"And frankly, when I see a candidate who has a record like she does of freeing New Yorkers who are unjustly detained by ICE, of standing up for the working person who has often been left out of our politics, especially in a district that has so many of the same themes that we're speaking of today, a fear of displacement, a fear of being pushed out of a place you helped to build, I think that she would be an incredible champion for that district and for the city as a whole."

Note what Mamdani treats as a credential: interfering with ICE detentions. In his framing, federal immigration enforcement is unjust by definition, and the people who obstruct it are heroes. That tells you everything about the political ecosystem Avila Chevalier is running in, and the mayor who presides over it.

Mamdani's broader pattern of hostility toward immigration enforcement has already drawn federal attention. DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin has called Mamdani a "socialist communist" with "zero respect," saying the department would "restore law" and pursue criminals "no matter where they're at," including New York. The mayor's political network has backed other candidates aligned with the "Abolish ICE" movement, making his endorsement of Avila Chevalier part of a broader strategy, not a one-off.

A candidate who led the Columbia protests

Avila Chevalier's public activism extends well beyond social media. She led what Fox News Digital described as the anti-Israel protests at Columbia University, the same campus upheaval that drew national outrage and raised serious questions about antisemitism, campus safety, and the ideological direction of elite institutions.

That background, combined with her deleted posts, paints a picture of a candidate whose political commitments are far outside the mainstream. Calling for the abolition of borders, police, and prisons is not a policy platform. It is a rejection of the basic framework that allows civil society to function.

Yet Mamdani described her in glowing terms. He told reporters: "She grew up with a commitment to the very people that politics have left behind, and what I see in her is that commitment fulfilled." He added: "I can't wait for her to be introduced to so many across the city and across this country as we fight for that affordability agenda, from New York City to D.C."

Fox News Digital reached out to the offices of Mamdani, Avila Chevalier, and Espaillat for comment. None responded.

The 'evolution' excuse

Mamdani's claim that Avila Chevalier's "views have evolved" deserves scrutiny. The posts in question ran from 2018 to at least 2022, not ancient history. The 2021 repost calling for the abolition of borders, prisons, and police came just a few years before her current congressional bid. These weren't youthful indiscretions from a teenager. Avila Chevalier was in her late twenties.

Politicians who get caught saying unpopular things routinely claim growth. The question is whether voters in the 13th district, many of them working-class, many of them immigrants who came to this country lawfully, will accept that explanation from a candidate who wrote "all deportation is wrong" and demanded open borders.

The pattern of Democratic candidates caught making damaging remarks and then claiming their words don't reflect their real views has become familiar enough to raise a basic question: do these candidates actually believe differently now, or have they just learned which beliefs to delete?

What Mamdani's endorsement reveals

The mayor's refusal to distance himself from Avila Chevalier is not just about one congressional race. It reveals where the Democratic Party's left flank actually stands, and how far its leaders will go to protect their own.

Mamdani praised a candidate who wants to abolish ICE, abolish borders, and abolish police. He did so while running a city that struggles with rising disorder and the consequences of lax immigration enforcement. The city's migrant shelter system has already been plagued by corruption, and taxpayers continue to bear the costs of policies that prioritize ideology over public safety.

The June 23 primary will test whether voters in Upper Manhattan and the west Bronx are willing to send someone to Congress who called the country a disgrace, wiped her hand on the American flag, and demanded the elimination of the institutions that keep communities safe. Mamdani is betting they will.

Meanwhile, the real-world consequences of the open-borders ideology Avila Chevalier champions continue to pile up across the country. Communities deal with the fallout of policies that treat enforcement as oppression and lawbreaking as a civil right, while the human costs of a broken immigration system fall hardest on the most vulnerable.

When a mayor endorses a candidate who called America a disgrace and demanded the abolition of its borders, the question isn't whether her views have evolved. It's whether his ever will.