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Saturday, July 11, 2026

Blakeman: I’ll use NY Constitution to block Mamdani’s Soviet-style supermarket plan

Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman aims to use a little-known clause in the state Constitution to try squashing NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s taxpayer-funded, $70 million city-owned grocery store scheme.

The “Gift and Loan Clause” prohibits municipalities from giving and lending public money or property to private entities.

“This unconstitutional subsidy poses a direct threat to long-standing, tax-paying businesses, risking widespread closures and job losses within the community,” Blakeman told The Post.

The 150-year-old law — which was created to stop local governments from diverting public funds to private railroad companies and other favored individuals and entities — also mandates municipal funds be used for a public purpose or benefit.

Mamdani’s plan to open a city-owned supermarket in each of the five boroughs, run by select private companies, violates the law because it undermines other private-market competitors by using public funds to keep prices down, the Nassau County executive contends.

“Local independent supermarkets and bodegas, which operate on razor-thin margins, cannot compete with a government-backed entity that faces zero overhead costs,” said Blakeman, who trails Gov. Kathy Hochul by 6 points in the latest gubernatorial race polls

Hochul, who endorsed Mamdani for mayor, has expressed indirect criticism of the HIzzoner’s plan, telling business leaders at an August 2025 breakfast in the Hamptons: “I favor free enterprise.” Since then, she has not made any public comments on the plan.

Any legal challenge to Mamdani’s Soviet-style supermarket plan would likely end up in court, as it is not certain it meets the clause’s public benefit standard.

The mayor would likely contend that lowering grocery costs for New Yorkers qualifies, legal experts say. Blakeman argues the opposite — that publicly run stores would drive out competition, eliminate jobs and shrink consumer choices.

James M. McGuire, a former state appellate judge and chief counsel to Republican ex-Gov. George Pataki, said Blakeman “may have a difficult time” having his argument hold up to any legal challenges based on “precedents” set by the state Court of Appeals.

Gristedes supermarket CEO John Catsimatidis said he’s unfamiliar with the Gift and Loan Clause, but he hopes “common sense prevails” and that Mamdani’s supermarket plan is spiked — no matter who wins the gubernatorial race.

The billionaire WABC-AM radio owner also said that if Mamdani is serious about driving down grocery costs he should simply subsidize grocers who buy milk, eggs and bread in bulk on the condition they pass the savings on to customers.

The Mayor’s Office didn’t return messages.

Blakeman called Mamdani’s plan “an incredibly expensive socialist pipe dream that forces local mom-and-pop shops — who already pay astronomical state taxes — to compete against a government monopoly subsidized by those very same tax dollars.”

“We are literally forcing neighborhood grocers to fund their own demise,” he continued. “New York runs on fiscal responsibility, free enterprise, and the grit of local entrepreneurs — not bottomless government spending on Soviet-style supermarkets.”

https://nypost.com/2026/07/11/us-news/blakeman-ill-use-ny-constitution-to-block-mamdanis-plan/

Bullets fly at NYC hoops tournament, kill player, hurt 2 others: ‘We need more police’

A European professional basketball player was fatally shot and two people wounded Friday night at a Harlem basketball tournament, cops and witnesses said.

Kinu Rochford, a standout at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey, was struck twice in the head at around 10:30 p.m. at the Kingdome Basketball Tournament in the Martin Luther King Jr. Towers on Lenox Avenue, police said.

Rochford, 35, who was playing in the tournament, was shot while watching between games, according to cops.

Witnesses said Rochford was struck the second time when he was already on the ground bleeding. Cops have not confirmed that.

Emergency responders gave CPR to Rochford, who lived in Crown Heights, and rushed him to Mount Sinai Morningside Hospital, but he couldn’t be saved, cops said.

The two injured — a 28-year-old man was shot in the shin and a 22-year-old woman was shot in the right forearm — were among the estimated 500 in the crowd watching the tournament between West 112th Street and West 115th Street.

They were both taken to Harlem Hospital in stable condition.

There were no arrests, and the motive wasn’t clear, a police spokesman said.

The FDU Knights posted condolences on Instagram about Rochford, a standout power forward and center when he played there from 2011 to 2013.

“FDU is devastated to hear of the tragic passing of former men’s basketball player Kinu Rochford (‘13),” the post reads.

“A standout Knight and leader, Rochford built a legacy in Hackensack. He was 35 years old.”

Dave’s Joint, a website dedicated to basketball, also posted about Rochford’s death on X.

“Our condolences go out to the family & friends of Kinu Rochford, a former standout at Globe Tech & at FDU in the early to mid 2010’s,” the post reads. “May he rest in power!

Rochford began playing professionally in 2013 and won the Lithuanian National Basketball League championship in 2017 with Garonne Sūduva-Mantinga.

A man who identified himself as “Freak” said it was the first day of the well-known tourney that was delayed Thursday because of rain.

“This s–t needs to stop,” Freak told the Post. “I got kids running around these projects.”

He said there were about 500 people packed into seats watching the games.

“This is a day for the community and we’re probably not gonna have this no more,” he said. “We need more police (on) patrol.”

Jessica Montgommery, who has been living in the towers for a decade, was at the tournament when sheheard the gunshots.

“It sounded like a firework,” the 45-year-old said. “And then I heard it again and people started running.”

A man, who identified himself as “Wavy,” saw paramedics working on Rochford.

“He was one of the players,” he said. “He was just warming up for the next game.”

A mural painted at the court’s surface a day earlier shows Walt Frazier passing the championship trophy to New York Knicks point guard Jalen Brunson.

“All I know is that young black man that came out here to play basketball and he is not going home tonight,” Wavy added.

https://nypost.com/2026/07/11/us-news/basketball-player-killed-at-packed-harlem-tourney/

'State-run Tehran newspaper depicts Trump, Netanyahu in crosshairs'

Hamshahri, a newspaper owned by Tehran Municipality, published an image depicting US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in crosshairs, alongside the caption: “Revenge is certain.”

The image also showed Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio, Brad Cooper, Mike Huckabee, Israel Katz, Eyal Zamir, Giorgia Meloni, Gideon Sa’ar, Friedrich Merz, Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer wearing prison uniforms.

https://www.iranintl.com/en/liveblog/202607116587

'Mojtaba Khamenei’s absence signals shifting role for Iranian leader'

The absence of Iran’s supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei from the funeral ceremonies of Ali Khamenei raised questions about his health and fear of assassination, as well as indicating he may perform a quite different function as number one compared with his all-powerful father.

The marathon funeral ceremonies for Ali Khamenei, killed on February 28 in an airstrike on the first day of the US-Israeli war with Iran, culminated on Thursday in the holy city of Mashhad, with a who’s who of key figures in the Islamic Republic attending his burial.

Those present included the speaker of parliament and chief negotiator in talks with the United States, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, powerful chief justice Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, and Ali Khamenei’s eldest son, Mostafa Khamenei.

But there was no sign of Mojtaba Khamenei, who was appointed supreme leader shortly after his father’s killing and has only communicated via written statements since, with no public appearances.

Despite many unverified claims and social media users scouring images of the events for a glimpse of the 56-year-old, there was no confirmed appearance from him.

Was he too badly wounded or even disfigured in the airstrike that killed his father to appear? Or was there concern that Israel or the US would directly target him too?

The flower petal-covered coffin of the late Iranian supreme leader ayatollah Ali Khamenei is carried above mourners reaching out to touch it outside the Imam Hussein Shrine in Karbala, Iraq, July 9, 2026. (AP/Khalil Hamra)

Whatever the case, Mojtaba Khamenei is shaping up to be a different political figure from his father — let alone from Ali Khamenei’s predecessor, revolutionary founder Ruhollah Khomeini — with even more power set to be delegated to the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) ideological army amid possible political infighting, analysts say.

But it is also far too early to write him off as a political actor, while disappearance and occultation are familiar themes among Iran’s majority Shia population, who believe in the return of the occulted twelfth imam Mahdi.

‘Further subordinated to the IRGC’

“His low overall public profile and absence from his own father’s funeral don’t look good for his public image, but it may be temporary, and is manageable in the long-term,” said Farzan Sabet, a managing researcher at the Geneva Graduate Institute.

He told AFP that Mojtaba was likely absent due to “a combination of physical injury that means he’s not publicly presentable” and security considerations “given the risk that public appearances will be used to track him and prepare the grounds for a future assassination.”

Sabet said he expected a “power struggle” potentially involving Mojtaba and Ghalibaf, who since the war has become the most prominent public face of the Islamic Republic.

Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, in Islamabad, Pakistan, on April 11, 2026. (Pakistan Prime Minister Office via AP)

“In the grand scheme though, his power and authority will be further subordinated to the IRGC,” he added.

Another prominent figure who did emerge during the funeral ceremonies in Tehran was the Revolutionary Guards commander Ahmad Vahidi, who had not been seen during the war and whose predecessor was killed in the same strike that killed Khamenei.

Jason Brodsky, policy director of US-based think tank United Against Nuclear Iran, said Mojtaba had relied on the support of the IRGC to win the post and was “more dependent” on the force.

“The balance of power between the office of the supreme leader and the IRGC has shifted,” he told AFP.

Brodsky described Mojtaba Khamenei as a “weaker leader” than his father but noted it took Ali Khamenei “years to consolidate his authority” after being named in 1989.

He argued that while “Iran is trying to portray strength, cohesion and survival” after the war, Mojtaba’s absence shows that “behind the scenes there is paranoia and fear” after not just his father but a whole layer of officials were killed in the war.

A man holds a picture of Iran’s new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei at the Imam Khomeini Mosalla Grand Mosque, during funeral ceremonies for slain supreme leader ayatollah Ali Khamenei and members of his family in Tehran, Iran, July 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

‘Lifetime of crises to build’

Alex Vatanka, senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, said Mojtaba Khamenei “cannot summon Khomeini’s charisma, and he cannot fake his father’s authority, which took a lifetime of crises to build,” while the authorities are aware that “hereditary succession” was exactly what was rejected when the Islamic revolution ousted the shah in 1979.

“Mojtaba will most likely rule through the institutions, rather than over them,” he wrote on the Al-Majalla outlet.

“For most Iranians, Mojtaba will likely have even less legitimacy than his father, and appear weaker,” said Sabet.

“But he can establish his authority among the regime’s core followers especially if he becomes more visible later on after his injuries have healed and the security situation permits,” he added.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/mojtaba-khameneis-absence-signals-shifting-role-for-iranian-leader/