NYC Council Bill Would Strip Press Passes From Mangionistas

The New York City Council is weighing legislation that would make it simpler for officials to revoke city-issued press passes from people accused of misusing the credentials or relying on them for purposes unrelated to journalism.

“We are introducing a bill today, sponsored by Councilmember Banks that will make reforms to press credentials to solve the problem of the Luigi Mangione fangirl, if you will,” City Council Speaker Julie Menin said Thursday morning on FOX 5 New York’s “Good Day New York.” “These fangirls, who are not journalists, are showing up at the trial with press credentials that the City of New York is giving to them.”

The issue drew wider attention in May, when three supporters of Luigi Mangione displayed their New York City press credentials to the New York Post outside a courthouse on the day of one of the accused assassin’s hearings.

“F— Brian Thompson,” one of the women, identified as Ashley Rojas, told the newspaper, referring to the UnitedHealthcare CEO Mangione killed in December 2024. “That’s all I want to say. F— Brian Thompson. F— his mom.” 

Another supporter, Lena Weissbrot, appeared to defend the killing by saying Thompson “was responsible for more deaths than Usama bin Laden,” the Al Qaeda leader who masterminded the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani later addressed the controversy, telling reporters that “those three individuals should not have received press passes.”

City lawmakers are now moving to make the credential revocation process faster and easier to enforce.

The measure, introduced Thursday and co-sponsored by Councilmembers Chris Banks, Carmen De La Rosa and Inna Vernikov, would allow the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, known as MOME, to suspend or revoke a press pass when the “preponderance of the evidence” supports that action.

That standard would be lower than the one currently in place, which requires “clear and convincing evidence” before the city can take away an official press credential.

“We want them to reform their practices so it’s really journalists, legitimate journalists, who should be getting the press credentials,” Menin, who used to be MOME’s commissioner, said in the FOX 5 interview.

Mangione pleaded guilty to federal charges earlier this year, and his legal team is fighting to have New York state-level charges dismissed on double jeopardy grounds.

He killed Thompson, a 50-year-old father of two from Minnesota, on a Manhattan sidewalk on Dec. 5, 2024. Surveillance video shows Mangione sneak up on him from behind and open fire with a silenced handgun, before fleeing on a bicycle.

He made his way to a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, where police arrested him after customers and restaurant workers recognized him from a wanted poster.