Mamdani wants to slash NYC library budgets by $30M— despite calling similar cuts by Adams ‘cruel’

He’s making a return on his promise.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani is turning the page on his campaign promise to boost funding for libraries — instead pushing to slash their budgets by nearly $30 million — after calling similar cuts under his predecessor “cruel.”

Under Mamdani’s $127 billion preliminary budget plan, the Manhattan branch of the New York Public Library would see an $11.6 million slash to funds, while Brooklyn and Queens would shrink $8.7 and $9.2 million, respectively, compared to last year.

The cuts would impact programs for the elderly and services for those seeking to become US citizens.

It’s a direct reversal of Mamdani’s campaign promise that he would boost funding for all three of the library branches so that they’d get 0.5% of the entire city budget. He stood by the commitment after his election, at a December press conference at the Greenpoint branch of the Brooklyn Public Library.

“We’re not going to be doing a dance around things that are critically important to New Yorkers. If there is something that we believe in, we will make that clear in our own preliminary, and we will be making announcements soon on our approach to the budget at large,” Mamdani said to boisterous applause.