The White House deleted a post using the New York Knicks logo to mock the city’s mayor-elect, Zohran Mamdani, after being contacted by the NBA team.
The official account for the White House on X posted the altered logo on Tuesday hours after Mamdani beat Andrew Cuomo, who was endorsed by President Donald Trump, and Curtis Sliwa in the mayoral race. “Trump Is Your President,” read the altered Knicks logo.
By Wednesday, the post had been deleted. A source close to the Knicks tells Front Office Sports that the team reached out to the White House about the post, and they voluntarily took it down.
“The Knicks remain neutral on political matters,” the team said in a statement to FOS on Wednesday. “We hope all our elected officials, whether current or recently elected, do a great job in office.”
The Mamdani campaign did not immediately respond to questions. The White House press office provided an automatic reply blaming “staff shortages resulting from the Democrat Shutdown” for any delays in responses, but did not answer questions.
The exchange comes two weeks after the NBA team sent Mamdani a cease and desist letter for using his own altered version of the logo, reading “New York Zohran,” in a basketball-themed campaign ad aired during the Knicks opener. The ad, which Mamdani took down, featured men playing basketball, crowd noise, and narration such as “New York, this is our year,” and “We’ve struggled, we’ve had dreams dashed and hearts broken.”
According to the source close to the team, the Knicks had reached out to Mamdani’s campaign about the ad but hadn’t heard back, so they sent the letter concerned that the ad gave the impression that the team had endorsed him, which it had not.
“The Knicks want to make it clear that we do not endorse Mr. Mamdani for Mayor, and we object to his use of our copyrighted logo,” a team spokesperson said at the time. “We will pursue all legal remedies to enforce our rights.”
The Lanham Act, which dictates U.S. trademark law, says an entity “shall be liable in a civil action” if they use another’s identity to promote themselves in a way that could mislead people into thinking they had received sponsorship or approval.
“Adjustments are being made to the ad and while the Knicks might not be able to publicly support our campaign, we’re proud to publicly support our NY Knicks,” a campaign spokesperson told Bloomberg.
On Sunday night before the election, Mamdani, a democratic socialist, attended a Knicks game and sat in the nosebleeds. Cuomo, the former New York governor, and outgoing mayor Eric Adams attended the Oct. 24 home opener courtside. FOS previously reported that Cuomo and Adams each paid for their own ticket, although Adams had intended to mark it as a city expense before Cuomo joined.
Teams owned by James Dolan are known for ferociously protecting their intellectual property. Last year, the Knicks, Rangers, and MSG Sports sued the anonymous vendors selling bootleg merchandise outside the stadium, leading a judge to issue a temporary restraining order outside Madison Square Garden.
Though Dolan did not publicly support a candidate in this year’s mayoral election, he strongly backed Diana Florence for Manhattan district attorney; the independent only received about 5.5% of the vote. The Coalition to Restore New York, a political action committee funded by Dolan’s MSG Entertainment, ran ads against some of Mamdani’s proposals such as free buses.
Dolan made six-figure donations to Trump’s presidential campaigns in 2016 and 2020.
