New York Knicks threaten legal action against mayoral hopeful Zohran Mamdani over campaign advert

The New York Knicks have issued a 'cease-and-desist' letter to mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani over his use of the team's logo in a campaign ad.

The NBA giants also made clear that they do not endorse the Democratic front-runner and threatened to 'pursue all legal remedies to enforce our rights.' 

Mamdani is the current favorite to become New York City mayor. He is locked in a bitter fight with independent Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa to succeed Eric Adams.

On Wednesday night, during New York's season opener, the Democratic candidate aired an advertisement that featured the team's orange and blue logo with 'Knicks' replaced by 'Zohran'.

The advert also appeared on his campaign's social media accounts alongside the caption: 'This is our year. This is our time'.

But, according to the New York Post, Mamdani pulled the advert on Friday after receiving a letter from the team which said it was 'likely to mislead the public into believing that the Campaign is affiliated with, sponsored or endorsed by, or in some way connected with the Knicks.'

In the letter, as reported by the Post, the NBA giants also reportedly demanded that Mamdani's team remove any of the Knicks' intellectual property from its campaign.

'The NY Knicks have sent NYC Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani a cease-and-desist letter for using the NY Knicks logo to promote his candidacy,' a team spokesperson told The Post.

'The Knicks want to make it clear that we do not endorse Mr. Mamdani for Mayor, and we object to his use of our copyrighted logo. We will pursue all legal remedies to enforce our rights.'

The owner of the Knicks, billionaire James Dolan, has not publicly endorsed any of the candidates for mayor.