Altered image of Mamdani spreads online after Knicks parade
- Published on June 23, 2026 at 17:22
- 3 min read
- By Bill MCCARTHY, AFP USA
New York Knicks fans were quick to spot an error during celebrations for the basketball team's 2026 NBA Finals win: banners hanging from City Hall to honor each player attributed legend Patrick Ewing's retired number 33 to bench player Dillon Jones. But the mistake was not repeated on a uniform Zohran Mamdani wore; the image spreading online is fake, carrying a digital watermark that indicates it was created using Google's artificial intelligence tools. Authentic photos from the parade show the mayor in a blue Josh Hart jersey.
"Look at the big Knick Fan???? What a lowlife, disrespecting Patrick Ewing," said American actor Michael Rapaport in a June 18, 2026 post on Facebook.
The post from Rapaport, who has pledged to run against Mamdani for mayor in 2029, purports to show the 34-year-old Democrat in a white New York Knicks jersey bearing the number 33 beneath Jones's name.
Similar posts spread across social media as the Knicks celebrated their NBA Finals victory with a June 18 parade, organized by Mamdani's team, that drew tens of thousands of fans to Manhattan and later saw the mayor award the players symbolic keys to the city outside City Hall.
"Big Knicks Energy from the mayor!!" Dave Portnoy, founder of the sports commentary and pop culture website Barstool Sports, wrote in another post sharing the image.
Portnoy referenced the image again in a video posted to his page. "I see Mamdani -- I don't know if it's Photoshopped or not -- he's wearing a 33 Jones shirt," he said.
The New York City mayor publicly embraced the Knicks throughout their playoff run. He attended the third game of the NBA Finals at Madison Square Garden and was filmed celebrating the team's game four win from a bar in Queens. He also appeared in an ad aired during the Finals, endorsing three congressional candidates.
Some Mamdani opponents criticized his fandom after he spoke at City Hall as part of the team's celebrations, with Portnoy pointing in another post to a moment during a 2025 candidate forum where Mamdani singled out then-coach Tom Thibodeau when asked to name a member of the Knicks besides star guard Jalen Brunson.
The championship parade did feature the prominent mishap involving Ewing's number 33, which the Knicks retired in 2003. Banners hung at City Hall to commemorate the Knicks title-winning roster attributed the number to seldom-used reserve Jones, who actually donned number 1.
The mix-up occurred because the NBA's online Knicks roster listed Jones's number inaccurately, according to Sam Raskin, City Hall's deputy press secretary. Internet archives show the NBA site and ESPN both logged Jones as number 33 as of parade day -- perhaps because he had worn that number for the Washington Wizards.
But the image portraying Mamdani in a similarly erroneous jersey is a digital fabrication.
"That image is not authentic and that's not something he wore," Raskin told AFP in a June 22, 2026 email.
Google's SynthID detection tool found that the image contains a SynthID, an invisible watermark the company says is attached to AI content created using its programs.
The Hive Moderation AI-detection tool also assessed that it "is likely to contain AI-generated or deepfake content," identifying Google's Gemini as the source.
The picture also contains visual irregularities typical of AI-generated content, including a jock tag toward the bottom of the jersey that differs from the woven labels attached to authentic Knicks uniforms available for purchase via the NBA's store (archived here).
Authentic photos and videos from the event show Mamdani wore a blue jersey under his suit jacket bearing the number 3 for Knicks wing Hart (archived here and here). He wore the same apparel previously during a parade celebrating the city's Puerto Rican community (archived here).
AFP has debunked other misinformation about Mamdani here.
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