New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani (D.) has tapped a black nationalist who organized campaigns to free several prominent cop killers—including a Black Liberation Army (BLA) member who admitted to murdering two NYPD officers—to serve on his mayoral transition team.
Lumumba Bandele, an organizer with the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, will serve on Mamdani’s committee on community organizing, according to a list released by Mamdani’s transition team on Monday. Bandele spearheaded campaigns to free former BLA members Mutulu Shakur, Mumia Abu-Jamal, and Sundiata Acoli, all of whom were convicted of murdering police officers. And in 2018, Bandele organized a press conference to support parole for Herman Bell, a BLA member who admitted to murdering two NYPD officers in 1971.
Bandele, a former director of community organizing for the NAACP, was an acolyte of Assata Shakur, convicted of murdering a New Jersey state trooper in 1974. Bandele recently said he met Shakur numerous times in Cuba, where she lived in exile after escaping prison in 1979, and that Shakur was the inspiration behind an organization he cofounded in the 1990s to help “free political prisoners.”
In a “#VeteransDay” message last year, Bandele saluted those cop killers and others as “soldiers that served valiantly in the people’s military to defend our communities.”
Bandele is one of 400 people selected by Mamdani to serve on 17 transition committees to advise the socialist mayor-elect on housing, social justice, community safety, and immigrant justice issues.
“These committees will be tasked with not only making personnel recommendations but policy recommendations,” Mamdani said at a press conference Monday.
Mamdani, who defeated former New York governor Andrew Cuomo (D.) by 9 points earlier this month, faced scrutiny on the campaign trail over his anti-police statements. He called to “defund the police,” and said the NYPD was “racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety.” Mamdani disavowed those remarks and claims he apologized directly to NYPD officers.
In addition to Bandele, Mamdani picked Alex Vitale, the author of The End of Policing, to serve on the transition committee for community safety. In addition to defunding police, Vitale has called to “defund the military,” and “abolish” prisons and the Drug Enforcement Administration.
Bandele, who has described himself as a “child of the Black liberation movement,” has taken credit for helping free several cop killers, a quest he started at the suggestion of Assata Shakur during one of their meetings in Cuba in the mid-1990s.
“One of the things that Assata gave us, which was an assignment: Her assignment was … ‘What are you doing to bring my comrades home?'” Bandele said at an event earlier this month honoring Shakur, who died in September.
Bandele recalled the fugitive telling him, “Why don’t y’all utilize this rap and hip hop to some way provide resources or raise awareness around our political prisoners?” Thus, Bandele cofounded the Black August Hip Hop Project, which held hip hop concerts to raise awareness about black nationalists convicted of murdering police officers.
“Many of the names that [Shakur] lifted up and told us to make sure that we were about the business of bringing them home—most of them are home right now,” said Bandele.
Bandele organized a petition on behalf of Mutulu Shakur, who was sentenced to 60 years in prison for his role in the murder of two police officers during the infamous 1981 Brink’s armored truck robbery in Nanuet, N.Y. Mutulu Shakur also helped Assata Shakur escape prison in 1979.
Bandele was a coordinator for the “Bring Sundiata Acoli Home Alliance” campaign. Acoli was an accomplice of Assata Shakur in the 1974 murder of New Jersey state trooper Werner Foerster. Both Mutulu Shakur and Acoli were released from prison in 2022.
In March 2018, Bandele organized a press conference regarding parole for Bell, who murdered NYPD officers Waverly Jones and Joseph Piagentini in 1971. Bell denied for decades that he was involved in the killing, claiming he was jailed as “a political prisoner.” He admitted to the killings in 2012.
Bell’s attorney, Robert Boyle, said at the press conference that “Mr. Bell has taken responsibility for his actions, has expressed genuine remorse.” Bell was released from prison in April 2018.
The New York City police union and then-New York City mayor Bill de Blasio (D.), now a fervent ally of Mamdani, vehemently opposed Bell’s parole. “Paroling Mr. Bell sends the dangerous signal that killing a police officer is anything less than the most heinous of crimes,” de Blasio said.
Bandele has visited Abu-Jamal, a former BLA member who murdered Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner in 1981, and pushed for his release from prison.
Bandele has called Marilyn Buck a “freedom fighter.” Buck, one of several white women allied with the BLA, was convicted for her roles in helping spring Assata Shakur from prison in 1979, the 1981 Brink’s truck killings, and a bombing of the U.S. Senate building in 1983.
The Mamdani transition team did not respond to a request for comment.
