Zohran Mamdani spent Friday afternoon posting his radical propaganda on official City Hall accounts.
By Monday, a six-foot reminder of what New Yorkers thought about his agenda was standing on a pedestal outside his office window.
And the man who put it there gave it a gift tage that nearly any fed-up New Yorker could agree with.
Scott LoBaido Plants Giant Middle Finger Statue Outside NYC City Hall
Staten Island artist Scott LoBaido rolled up to New York City Hall at 3:40 p.m. on May 18 and unveiled a bronze-colored, six-foot sculpture of a raised middle finger – mounted on a stone pedestal and aimed directly at Mamdani's front door.
The plaque on the base read "Vaffanculo" – Italian for "go fuck yourself."
Supporters cheered.
Videos spread across X, Instagram, and Facebook so fast that by Monday evening the statue had racked up hundreds of thousands of views.
City Hall issued no statement.
The statue didn't move.
Mamdani Started This Fight Long Before Monday
Here's what makes the statue so perfect.
In June 2020, Mamdani posted a photo of himself giving the middle finger to a Christopher Columbus statue in Astoria, Queens.
His caption: "Take it down."
He then ran a poll asking his followers who should replace Columbus – and the winner was Sacco and Vanzetti, two anarcho-communist criminals executed in 1927.
Forty Italian-American organizations came after him during his mayoral campaign.
Columbus Heritage Coalition president Angelo Vivolo delivered the verdict: "We will defend Columbus Day and Columbus statues. He is being disrespectful to the Italian American community."
Trump made his position clear too, blasting Democrats for doing "everything possible to destroy Christopher Columbus" and pledging to bring "Columbus Day back from the ashes."
Mamdani won the election anyway.
And then governed exactly like the campaign version.
One of his first moves in office was signing an executive order making New York a no-go zone for federal ICE agents – a direct challenge to the Trump administration's deportation operations that drew immediate condemnation from the Department of Homeland Security.
LoBaido had been fighting him since before any of that.
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Last August, when Mamdani brought his "Five Boroughs Against Trump" campaign tour to Staten Island, LoBaido showed up with a megaphone and made his feelings known.
The NYPD arrested him on three charges: disorderly conduct, using a sound device without a permit, and foul language.
A Staten Island judge threw the case out, ruling the key charges legally insufficient.
LoBaido's attorney Mark Fonte delivered the verdict: "When a socialist waltzes into Trump country spewing his nonsense, he has to expect some push back."
The City That New Yorkers Didn't Vote For
Here's what connects all of it.
The man who gave the finger to a Columbus statue in 2020 is now the mayor who shields illegal immigrants from federal law enforcement and spends his first months in office picking fights with the Trump administration.
Campaign Mamdani and Mayor Mamdani are the same person.
LoBaido understood that before Election Day.
The people of Staten Island understood it when they told him to go home.
A "Stop Mamdani" rally packed Brighton Beach the Sunday before the statue went up, with hundreds demanding safer streets and an end to what organizers called his "radical communist agenda."
New York is not a city that goes quietly.
And Scott LoBaido's six-foot bronze middle finger is still standing in front of City Hall.
Mamdani hasn't said a word about the statue.
He's seen it.
It's aimed right at his window.
Sources:
- "Giant Middle Finger Statue Goes Up Outside NYC City Hall Targeting Mamdani," Trending Politics News, May 18, 2026.
- "NYC Gets The Finger: LoBaido Plants Giant Middle Finger at Mamdani's City Hall," Dallas Express, May 18, 2026.
- "Not Welcome Here: Staten Island Activist Arrested After Confronting NYC Mayoral Candidate," Fox News, August 15, 2025.
- "Staten Island Judge Dismisses Case Against Scott LoBaido After Protest of Mamdani's Anti-Trump Tour," Staten Island Advance, August 29, 2025.
- "NYC Mayoral Candidate Faces Backlash for Flipping Off Columbus Statue," Fox News, July 8, 2025.
- "Heritage Groups Accuse Zohran Mamdani of Italian-American 'Hate' Over Columbus Stance," New York Post, August 6, 2025.
- "Vaffanculo! Go F— Yourself: Giant Middle Finger Statue Targets NYC Mayor Mamdani at City Hall," IBTimes UK, May 19, 2026.
