As federal agents moved Maduro and Cilia Flores toward New York custody, Mamdani tried to draw a line between Washington’s reach and his city’s fragile calm. Calling the operation “an act of war,” he framed his objection less as a partisan shot than a warning about the cost of regime change conducted at gunpoint. In his view, the law cannot be selectively sacred abroad while communities at home absorb the fear and fallout.

In neighborhoods where Venezuelan flags hang from apartment windows, the raid felt less like distant geopolitics and more like a threat creeping into their streets. Mamdani’s message was as much to them as to Trump: New York would not turn a blind eye while their homeland became a battlefield by proxy. He promised vigilance, legal support, and a simple assurance in uncertain hours: your safety is not a bargaining chip.