Zohran Mamdani vetoes school 'buffer zone' bill against wishes of major Jewish groups [View all]

Mayor Zohran Mamdani vetoed a “buffer zone” bill insulating “educational facilities” from protests on Friday morning, drawing the ire of a number of Jewish organizations that supported it.

The bill, introduced by Jewish City Council member Eric Dinowitz, was part of a legislative package proposed in response to a pair of pro-Palestinian protests outside synagogues in the fall.

In a statement — and an accompanying video — Mamdani said Dinowitz’s bill, Intro 175-B, posed concerns about limiting people’s right to protest, including “college students demanding their school divest from fossil fuels or demonstrating in support of Palestinian rights.”

The national student pro-Palestinian movement in 2024 had as its epicenter Columbia University in Manhattan’s Morningside Heights neighborhood, where protesters gathered even after the school closed the campus to outsiders.

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Another bill in the legislative package, introduced by Jewish Council Speaker Julie Menin, addresses protests outside houses of worship and passed in City Council with a veto-proof supermajority.

https://www.jta.org/2026/04/24/ny/zohran-mamdani-vetoes-school-buffer-zone-bill-against-wishes-of-major-jewish-groups