Why did New York City's Zohran Mamdani take his mayoral oath on the Quran?

Zohran Mamdani became New York City’s first Muslim mayor on January 1, 2026, taking his oath on three Qurans across two ceremonies. One manuscript dates to the late 18th or early 19th century and is held by the New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. With this, Mamdani highlighted his identity as the city’s first Muslim, South Asian and African-born mayor