- The claim that 700,000 New Yorkers had signed petitions asking to recall New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and remove him from office is unproven and, due to the existence of much earlier posts, likely outdated.
- The claim has circulated online at least since Mamdani first took office in January 2026.
- Snopes found no evidence of the alleged petitions online. However, to account for the small possibility that such a petition exists that none of our searches could find, we leave this claim unrated.
- Regardless of whether the petitions existed, no number of signatures could have directly caused Mamdani's removal because of New York State and city laws.
In May 2026, a claim (archived) circulated online that 700,000 New Yorkers had signed petitions asking to recall New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and remove him from office.
One Facebook user wrote on May 13, 2026, "New Yorkers are already in open revolt against Mayor Zohran Mamdani, with petitions reportedly gaining 700,000 signatures in just 10 days demanding his recall and removal from office."
Claims that New Yorkers were flocking to sign petitions to ouster Mamdani also circulated on X (archived) and Reddit (archived). Snopes readers also contacted us to ask about the claim.
The "700,000 signatures" claim had circulated online for months by May 2026. Snopes found one posting (archived) from Jan. 11, 2026. The "10 days" time frame for the alleged signatures that many users mentioned indicated the post could have originally circulated then, as Mamdani took office on January 1, 2026.
As of May 2026, we found no evidence that 700,000 people had signed one or more petitions seeking to remove Mamdani from office. Search engines such as DuckDuckGo, Google and Yahoo (archived, archived, archived) did not return results for the alleged petitions themselves or news reports about them. Given the large reported number of signatures, such a large-scale effort to remove Mamdani would have been reported by reputable news outlets. That was not the case.
Because we found no evidence of the alleged petitions against Mamdani and the claim has circulated since the start of his tenure as mayor, we determined it is unproven and likely outdated. However, to account for the small possibility that such a petition exists that none of our searches could find, we've left the claim unrated.
Snopes' searches found various individual petitions to remove Mamdani but their signature numbers were nowhere near 700,000.
Regardless of whether the petitions existed, no number of signatures could have directly removed Mamdani as mayor because of New York State and city laws (more on that below).
How to lose a mayor (in slightly more than 10 days)
New York state law and the New York City charter do not allow political recall where citizens can remove an elected official before the end of their term. According to the city's charter, only the state's governor or a so-called inability committee can remove a sitting New York City mayor.
The New York City charter does not give specific reasons a governor must provide to remove a mayor. According to the charter, a mayor (Section 9):
...may be removed from office by the governor upon charges and after service upon him of a copy of the charges and an opportunity to be heard in his defense.
The governor can suspend the mayor for 30 days while preparing the charges.
Alternatively, the charter allows a five-person inability committee (Section 10) to find a mayor temporarily or permanently unable to carry out their job. If four members of the five-person committee declare the mayor unable to carry out their duties, the "Panel on mayoral inability," which is generally composed of the city council, has 21 days to vote on whether it agreed.
If two-thirds of the panel, which would consist of the 51 city council members as of May 2026, found the mayor unable to carry out their duties, they could remove that mayor from office.
It is possible a large public outcry against a sitting mayor could prompt the governor to charge and remove them from office or lead to the convening of an inability committee, but neither has ever happened before.
Two former mayors — Jimmy Walker and William O'Dwyer — resigned before they could be removed from office.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul reportedly considered removing former New York City Mayor Eric Adams from office after the U.S. Department of Justice charged him with bribery and campaign finance offenses in late 2024.
A federal judge dismissed the charges in April 2026 and blocked the DOJ's request for approval to bring the charges against Adams again at a later date. Hochul ultimately did not use her authority to remove Adams.
New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, who ran against Mamdani in the Democratic primaries for New York City Mayor, wrote to Adams in February 2025 to say he would consider convening an inability committee. The comptroller is one of the roles that can convene the committee, according to the New York City charter, but Lander never did.
In sum, claims that 700,000 New Yorkers had signed one or more petitions to remove Mamdani were unproven and likely outdated. Even if such petitions did exist, they could not lead directly to Mamdani's removal, but could perhaps spur the governor or inability committee on to start removal proceedings.
Sources:
'Council Members & Districts'. New York City Council, https://council.nyc.gov/districts/. Accessed 14 May 2026.
Jeyaretnam, Miranda. 'How to Remove a New York Mayor—and What Comes Next'. TIME, 18 Feb. 2025, https://time.com/7253521/eric-adams-mayor-new-york-remove-governor-inability-committee-explainer/.
Mayors of the City of New York. https://www.nyc.gov/site/dcas/about/green-book-mayors-of-the-city-of-new-york.page. Accessed 14 May 2026.
'NEW YORK CITY CHARTER'. American Legal Publishing, 25 Apr. 2026, https://codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/newyorkcity/latest/NYCcharter/0-0-0-5717.
Ngo, Emily. '"A True Believer": Brad Lander's Failed NYC Mayoral Campaign Has Won Him a Wave of Good Will'. POLITICO, 2 July 2025, https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/02/brad-lander-is-riding-a-wave-of-good-will-00436553.
'NYC Comptroller Lander Sends Letter to Mayor Adams Demanding a City Contingency Plan Following the News of Deputy Mayor Resignations'. Office of the New York City Comptroller Mark Levine, https://comptroller.nyc.gov/newsroom/nyc-comptroller-lander-sends-letter-to-mayor-adams-demanding-a-city-contingency-plan-following-the-news-of-deputy-mayor-resignations/. Accessed 14 May 2026.
Ramos, Nicolas Lesenfants. 'US Judge Dismisses Corruption Case Against NYC Mayor Adams, Rejects DOJ Bid to Refile Charges'. OCCRP, https://www.occrp.org/en/news/us-judge-dismisses-corruption-case-against-nyc-mayor-adams-rejects-doj-bid-to-refile-charges. Accessed 14 May 2026.
'Recall (Political)'. Ballotpedia, https://ballotpedia.org/Recall_(political). Accessed 14 May 2026.
Southern District of New York | New York City Mayor Eric Adams Charged With Bribery And Campaign Finance Offenses | United States Department of Justice. 26 Sept. 2024, https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/new-york-city-mayor-eric-adams-charged-bribery-and-campaign-finance-offenses.
'Statement from Governor Kathy Hochul'. Governor Kathy Hochul, 17 Feb. 2025, https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/statement-governor-kathy-hochul-58.
