SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — San Luis Obispo County District Attorney Dan Dow appeared in court Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025, to address two posts he shared on his personal X (formerly Twitter) account connecting the election of New York City’s first Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani, to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, according to the Sacramento Bee.
Both posts displayed imagery of planes crashing into the World Trade Center after being hijacked by Islamic extremists, killing 2,977 people.
At 34, Mamdani ran for mayor on a democratic socialist platform advocating for free public transit, lower living costs, and universal child care, the Bee reported.
According to the Bee, Mamdani was the target of a barrage of anti-Islamic hate during his campaign and election victory Tuesday, which drew coverage from multiple outlets, including the New York Times.
The first post Dow shared that evening was from right-wing anti-Islam activist Amy Mek and included footage of the second plane hitting the World Trade Center.
Mek’s post stated, “I can say with a clear conscience that I have given my entire self to warning the world about the threat of Islam after 9/11. … And now … to see New York—my city—stand in this moment, where someone like Zohran Mamdani could even be elected. … My God, New York, what have you done?”
According to the Bee, Mek founded the Rise Align Ignite Reclaim Foundation (RAIR), labeled by the Council on American-Islamic Relations as an anti-Muslim hate organization that publishes conspiracy theories about immigrants and Muslims.
The second post Dow shared came from End Wokeness, an anonymous account that claims to “fight, expose and mock wokeness.”
The Bee reported the post featured a photo of a fireball erupting from the South Tower as the second plane hit, captioned, “New York already forgot.”
When questioned in court about any connection between Mamdani and the 9/11 attacks that motivated him to share the posts, Dow responded by showing a screenshot of his X profile, highlighting the line, “Retweets are not endorsements. Personal Page,” according to the Bee.
In response to Dow’s explanation, the San Luis Obispo Tribune asked why he chose to repost those two specific tweets and how the public should interpret them if they were not endorsements. Dow replied, “It’s not exactly newsworthy,” according to the Bee.
Dow further explained he shared the posts because he is a U.S. Army veteran who served more than 33 years and completed four tours overseas.
“I remember like it was yesterday our nation being attacked by Islamic extremists on 9/11/2001,” he said. “I love this country and I do not in any way share the same views as the 33-year-old socialist Zohran Mamdani.”
“I am very sad to see the Big Apple torn apart by electing an un-American socialist who wants to trample on the values and freedoms that millions of Americans have fought and died for,” he continued.
When asked again how Mamdani’s election was connected to the terrorist attacks, Dow did not respond, according to the Bee.
The Tribune reached out to several Muslim community members for comment. Only one, San Luis Obispo physician Dr. Rushdi Cader, agreed to speak publicly, while others declined out of fear of retribution or a desire to avoid political involvement.
In an email to the Tribune, Cader spoke highly of Dow but called the posts “highly incendiary” and said they “put Muslims at risk for harm, especially hijab-wearing Muslim women like my wife Nisha, whom Dan has himself described as ‘a kind and gentle lady’ who he ‘prayed would be blessed with peace,’” the Bee reported.
Cader said he and his wife know Dow personally and even hosted a fundraiser for him when he was first elected district attorney, according to the Bee.
“Some would equate this misstep as an attack not just on Mayor Mamdani, but also upon Islam and Muslims,” Cader told the Tribune. “Knowing Dan, I would endeavor to have the community view his repost on X through a different lens.”
Cader added that Islamic tradition teaches followers to have “Husn ul Dhan,” meaning to hold a good opinion of others and make excuses for them when they do or say something harmful.
“Muslims were also taught by both Jesus Christ and the Prophet Muhammad to respond to animosity with virtue,” he said.
The Bee reported that Cader suspected Dow reposted the controversial material not out of contempt for Islam but out of strong disagreement with Mamdani’s politics.
Cader told the Tribune that social media reposts often misrepresent how people feel about issues. He said he believes Dow is a devout Christian who strives to live a virtuous life.
“I do not believe that Dan is making Zohran Mamdani’s election as the mayor of New York equivalent to the attacks on our nation on 9/11 or, for that matter, attempting to portray criminalized religionists like the 9/11 hijackers as representing the teachings of Islam,” Cader said.
He added that he suspected Dow “responded in a knee-jerk fashion by reposting a malicious post that I’m sure he now regrets.”
In his final statement, Cader said that in an increasingly polarized time, “it is not indignation that inches our nation forward, it is forgiveness.”
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Here’s a quote from Mamdani to better understand where he is coming from:
“Mamdani says NYPD boots ‘on your neck’ were ‘laced by the IDF’ in vile video”
https://nypost.com/2025/10/28/us-news/zohran-mamdani-made-vile-conspiracy-tinged-statement-tying-nypd-to-idf-resurfaced-video/
Because NYPD and other U.S. police agencies actually trained with IDF and Israeli police forces. That is a fact.
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/joint-us-israel-police-and-law-enforcement-training
Mamdani would be wise to focus on the needs of New York instead of meddling in foreign affairs. We will see if he can do so.
As an old guy I find it troubling when people embrace the red-baiting rhetoric of the right and Mamdami calling himself a socialist falls right into that trap but the young people of New York and perhaps around the country don’t seem to care about that anymore. Perhaps the play book of red-baiting the left since the Upton Sinclair campaign for Governor of California in 1934 has finally run its course. At least it has in New York.
I think the take away of election night and the retirement of Nancy Pelosi is that the baton has been passed from the boomers to a new generation of leadership in Democratic politics and that the party is now undergoing the organic process of finding new leaders it needed in 2024. The Republicans will try to run against Socialism everywhere by tying all Democrats to Mamdami but I doubt it will work in much of the country. The failures of the boomers who privatized student loans, didn’t build enough housing and devalued the dollar by spending too much while taxing the rich too little opened the door to someone like Mamdami.
“As an old guy I find it troubling when people embrace the red-baiting rhetoric of the right”
As opposed to the blue-baiting rhetoric of the left?
This is intellectual laziness on your part. I know we are far from the Cold War, in the Cold War context, red baiting refers to the practice of accusing individuals or groups of being communists, communist sympathizers, or subversives—often with little or no evidence—as a way to discredit or silence them.
Good point. I messed up on that one.
But you missed that red baiting also can be applied to socialists, not just communists.
Should have added fellow travelers in that