Prompt Grok to create an Alex Jones-inspired headline about modern American politics and it would be easy to conceive a title similar to that of this article. Of course, like chemicals in the water turning frogs gay—or, at least, significantly impacting their sexual functions—this would result in another quarter in the “Alex Jones is right jar.”
Zohran Mamdani’s unexpected nomination as the Democrat nominee in New York City’s mayor’s race has been a boon for political pundits. For the left, he embodies the future of the American political left: a charismatic radical with bold visions who consistently churns out social media content that attempts to provide leftwing solutions to “kitchen table” problems. On the right, he is a perfect example of the true socialist impulses lurking behind their opposing party and, perhaps, a symptom of some deep-seated Islamic agenda in America.
While the political impact of Mamdanism is difficult to forecast, the history of the Mamdani family does serve as an interesting example of the consequences of state-directed immigration policy.
To truly understand the Mamdani story, we must return back to the days of the Cold War. In 1959, a Kenyan liberation activist named Tom Mboya organized with the African American Institute a plan to subsidize the travel of African college students to America for their intellectual development. While attempts to secure direct Washington funding initially stalled, Mboya found an essential benefactor in the form of Senator John F. Kennedy, who at the time was running for president in 1960.
His family’s Kennedy Foundation dedicated $100,000 to the program, resulting in 295 African students being brought to American universities as part of the initial run of the “Kennedy Airlift.” For JFK’s political ambitions, history judges it to be a prudent decision. Mboya’s time in America gave him the admiration of many of the leading Civil Rights leaders of the time, including Martin Luther King, Jr. and Harry Belafonte. In 2009, The Nation noted that Tom Shachtman, a historian of the effort, credits JFK’s support for the project as being “’equally if not more crucial’ in Kennedy’s razor-thin victories in several key states with significant African-American voting strength than the often-cited phone call Kennedy made to Coretta Scott King after her husband was arrested and a subsequent call Robert Kennedy made to the judge in the case.”
One of the students that benefited from this program was Mahmood Mamdani, father of Zohran.
While one could point to the Kennedy Airlift as a purely private venture, the historical record is a bit more complicated. While it is true that the Kennedy Foundation was a major benefactor in the plan to come to life, the Eisenhower State Department offered to match the funding offer, widely viewed as an attempt to prevent JFK from obtaining valuable political capital with black voters.
More important though, the CIA had their own plans for the students that made the trip to the United States. With rising Soviet influence in Africa, Washington officials saw the potential for the development of a rival political elite that could compete with political leaders whose alliance was directed towards Moscow. In 1967, it was revealed that the CIA was funneling money to a number of international youth groups and student organizations, which included the African American Institute—the same organization Mboya used to help support his airlift program. In 2024, the CIA published previously classified documents revealing that the organization had assets so deeply embedded in AAI that it would report full meeting minutes back to the State Department.
Originally reported by the Washington Post, historian Dr. Susan Williams noted “The exposure of the CIA was picked up by the radical magazine Ramparts and the Saturday Evening Post, which fleshed out the details. ‘Like electricians tracing out the underground wiring of complicated circuits’, reported one journalist in 1969, newsmen dug deeper and ‘examined hundreds of foundation tax records and grant lists. Again and again, to their amazement they succeeded in making connections between a labyrinth of non-profit organisations and a hidden generator. This generator was demonstrably the CIA’.”
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