A Secret Chat for a Secret Agenda
New York City just got a new kind of media strategy, and it smells suspicious. Mayor Zohran Mamdani has quietly assembled an army of nearly 200 influencers in a secret Signal group chat. This isn’t about community outreach; it’s about controlling the narrative. The administration is feeding these creators daily talking points and clips to push their specific political agenda straight to the feeds of regular New Yorkers.
The setup is simple but slick. Instead of holding press conferences where journalists can ask tough questions, City Hall is bypassing the press entirely. They are handing pre-packaged messages to social media stars who agree to post them. It’s a direct line of communication that skips the fact-checking and the scrutiny we all rely on in a free society.
Teachers, TikTokkers, and Out-of-Staters
Who is in this chat? According to reporting from the NY Post, the group includes public school teacher Sari Beth Rosenberg. She works as a digital content strategist for the American Federation of Teachers, employing over 420,000 followers. “A lot of people are too busy to seek out news about New York City but they might follow my content or someone else’s, and might engage with it more, so that it’s going to pop up on their feed more,” Rosenberg told reporters.
Then there is Nile Berry, who runs the @urbanexplained Instagram account with 109,000 followers. He is in the group chat receiving talking points on the Big Apple’s future. But the list gets weirder. The chat includes out-of-state influencers like Allie O’Brien, who lives in Connecticut and called Mamdani the “mayor of uncontrollable joy.” Another account, bananadotgov, is based in Columbus, Ohio. Why are non-New Yorkers getting paid or prioritized to talk about our city?
Emilia Rowland, the Director of New Media and Cultural Communications, runs the operation. She turned the campaign group “Creators4Zohran” into an official government op. The report notes that the Creators4Zohran group, a collection of influencers and content creators backing his election campaign, was reconfigured to promote talking points and coverage from the Mayor’s office. Some of these influencers are reportedly pocketing taxpayer funds for specific messaging campaigns, though exact dollar amounts aren’t detailed in the initial reports.
Why This Is a Danger to Our City
Let’s be clear: this feels like a propaganda machine, not a government service. We are seeing a two-pronged approach where the city pays creators to promote services while simultaneously feeding them talking points to shape public opinion. The NY Post Opinion piece argues this is a brazen move that partners with the Democratic Socialists of America to organize tenants in an anti-landlord crusade.
We have to ask ourselves if this is how a democracy works. If the mayor wants to clean up illegal dumping, he should do it and let the results speak. Instead, he’s paying influencers to talk about it before the work is even done. “Every fix on the bracket is getting done eventually, but the winning neighborhood gets their project completed by the mayor himself by his 100th day in office,” one creator noted. That sounds like a promise, but when backed by paid shills, it feels like a sales pitch.
Sari Beth Rosenberg admitted she isn’t always on board, saying, “Sometimes I’m pro what the mayor’s up to, other times I’m outwardly critical of it.” Yet, she remains in the chat. Saying, “To their credit they are holding on to people who are not always in alignment,” the report credits the administration. But does alignment matter when the goal is to flood the zone with specific narratives? The spike in 311 complaints by 25% this year compared to 2025 suggests the messaging is working, but at what cost to honest discourse?
The Next Move for New Yorkers
The clock is ticking on this administration’s first 100 days. The promise is that winning neighborhoods will see their projects completed by the mayor himself during this period. If you want to see if the “clean up” messaging translates to real results, watch the 311 data closely in the coming months. The next concrete test will be whether the 25% spike in complaints leads to actual solutions or just more noise from the Signal chat.
This is opinion and commentary from the RapForMayor team.
