Mamdani on AI: 'Our Risk, Their Reward' and a Bubble He Expects to Pop

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani says he does not trust "the Sam Altmans of the world," believes AI is in a bubble comparable to the pre-2008 housing bubble, and expects that bubble to pop. He made the remarks in a sit-down interview with WIRED editor Katie Drummond at New York's City Hall, roughly one year after the outlet first interviewed him in his campaign office ahead of his October 2025 election win and titled him "the internet's Mayor."

The stakes are considerable. Mamdani's approval rating among New York City voters stands at 69 percent ten months into his term, according to the interview, and he has become one of the most influential figures on the American left. His positions on AI and data centers now carry weight in a national debate over energy costs, regulation, and a patchwork of state and local restrictions on infrastructure buildout.

What does Mamdani want done about data centers?

Mamdani has supported a one-year pause on data center construction in New York state, and he framed the opposition movement as unusually broad. "The movement to oppose data centers is one that gives me a real sense of hope," he said. "Me and Ron DeSantis don't have much in common, and yet there is a similar opposition to the development of these kinds of data centers."

He argued the resistance is driven by concrete costs: electricity rates and environmental impact. To illustrate the scale of energy consumption, he cited the claim that training the version of ChatGPT took the same amount of energy required to power all of San Francisco for three days. He also noted that municipalities in California have begun banning data center construction entirely — a signal, in his view, that the issue cuts across partisan lines from Florida to New York.

His sharpest formulation described current AI governance as "our risk, their reward." He called for a recognition of the costs that come with AI, while acknowledging that regulators are working with deliberately limited information. "When we're talking about these incredibly powerful companies, we also are talking about a level of opacity that renders it almost impossible for us to make an informed conclusion as to how much this query is actually costing us as a society," he said.

The takeaway: Mamdani wants disclosure before buildout, not after.

Does he really think AI is a bubble?

Yes, on both counts. Asked directly whether he worries the industry is in a bubble and whether it will pop, Mamdani answered "Yes" to each question. He drew a direct parallel to the 2007-2008 housing bubble and said federal policymakers should confront "wildly varying estimates of actual profitability" and business dealings designed to "prop up a completely artificial valuation" that justifies daily spending.

He compared the industry's self-regulation pitch to Facebook's 2008 argument that it should police itself, and accused AI companies of cultivating an image of the technology as "mythical or as if it is divine" — an investment, he said, in the idea "that this is so complicated that the only rational response should be that we trust those who created it."

He also argued AI's harms are present-tense, not hypothetical. He cited AI hallucinations that he said "almost led us to war with China" and outdated information that he said led the government to bomb an Iranian children's school. He criticized "arms race terminology" with China as a justification for "every abdication of duty" in American policymaking. Asked whether he trusts the Sam Altmans of the world, he said: "No."

The claim about a bubble is a judgment, not a forecast with numbers attached — and Mamdani offered no valuation figures to back it.

What is New York City actually doing on AI?

Mamdani outlined a set of municipal rules adopted, in his words, "in the face of a complete abdication of federal law":

• A school AI moratorium he described as one of the most comprehensive in any American school system, banning generative AI use for students from 2K (the city's pre-K program for 2-year-olds) through eighth grade. He justified it by saying students need "room to be students" and to end "the use of our students as guinea pigs for the profit motives of technology companies." He likened tech-company influence on classrooms to letting pharmaceutical companies write science curricula.
• A Department of Consumer and Worker Protection rule barring realtors from using AI-generated apartment images. "They looked incredible, but they were not real," he said. "You don't need to wonder if your dream apartment is actually a dream."
• A rule limiting "doom loops" with chatbots that trap New Yorkers seeking city services.

He also raised an often-overlooked dimension: AI's emotional toll on work. He referenced a recent interview by The Daily with a mathematics professor who spoke in tears about AI's ability to solve a problem type that had given his field purpose. "For all of the focus on job numbers and what jobs will be replaced by AI, there also has to be a reckoning with job satisfaction," Mamdani said.

On surveillance, he said private citizens should not wield the kind of power James Dolan's Madison Square Garden operates, referencing WIRED's reporting and the lawsuit Dolan has filed against the outlet. He pointed to legislation introduced by City Council member Shahana Hanif as the remedy and cited a reported case of a lawyer barred from Radio City Music Hall over her professional work.

Is technology making democracy stronger or weaker?

Mamdani's answer was unchanged from a year ago: weaker. His evidence was personal. Family members have sent him AI-generated videos of himself believing they were real, including one showing a 45-minute debate with a European member of parliament that never happened. "I have a family member who complimented me on a 45-minute debate that I had with a European member of parliament. And I watched the video, I was like, 'This is not me,'" he said.

He called it "a real crisis of faith as to what is real right now" — noting the fakes are sometimes funny but "quite terrifying" in an age of already-diminished institutional trust. That concern is not abstract in his own politics: the interview itself touched on AI-generated videos of Mamdani and Governor Kathy Hochul discussing a "delusion pill," which Mamdani attributed to Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman.

The political backdrop: midterms and the Hochul endorsement

Mamdani is not on the November ballot, but he has endorsed and campaigned for Hochul's reelection despite earlier criticism of her. He framed the endorsement around results: on the eighth day of his administration, Hochul agreed to $1.2 billion for Universal 2K, universal childcare for 2-year-olds. He described a family that had paid $2,300 a month for childcare and saved more than $20,000 through the program. The program is scheduled to grow from 2,000 2-year-olds to 12,000 next year, with expansion to all of the Bronx and all of Staten Island planned, and a stated goal of covering every 2-year-old in every borough.

He attacked Blakeman's positions — saying the opponent pledged to cut universal childcare and halve Medicaid, and had called the childcare program a benefit for "lazy parents." "I have yet to meet a lazy parent in New York City," Mamdani said. He joked he wanted to find "the consultant who sold him that dream" of making working people's lives more expensive.

On the Democratic Socialists of America, whose candidates have won races nationwide this cycle, he credited the organization's focus on "material wins for working-class people" and noted, "the D stands for 'democratic.'"

Asked what he hopes the Democratic Party looks like in 2036, he said: one that "realizes the only majority in this country is the working class." His own ten-year plan is modest: "Hopefully I will have finished a second term, but I can never take that for granted."

On federal AI policy specifically, including under an administration he otherwise deals with productively, his verdict was blunt: "federal policy has been lacking thus far."

For a mayor governing a city he calls the most expensive in America, AI policy is now part of the affordability agenda — and Mamdani is betting that voters, not investors, get the last word on the bubble.