New York City's new commissioner of the Mayor's Office of International Affairs is a radical activist who first gained notoriety for accosting then-Senator Jeff Flake in a Senate elevator during confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in 2018.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani's appointee, Ana María Archila, has been well-known on the left since she harassed Flake on an elevator ahead of Kavanaugh's confirmation vote. Now she will hold a role that involves interacting with the United Nations and handling diplomatic relations on New York City’s behalf. Archila does not have experience in diplomacy.
“What you are doing is allowing someone who actually violated a woman to sit on the Supreme Court,” Archila told Flake at the time. “This is not tolerable. You have children in your family. Think about them.”
Flake had announced just prior to the elevator incident that he had decided to vote in favor of Kavanaugh’s confirmation — but after being accosted for several minutes by Archila and a companion, Flake delayed Kavanaugh’s confirmation vote for a week so the FBI could investigate the spurious sexual assault allegations lodged against the nominee. Flake did ultimately vote to confirm Kavanaugh.
The incident led Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) to invite Archila as her guest to the 2019 State of the Union address.
But that was only the beginning of Archila's activism; she went on to run for New York lieutenant governor on a platform that included billions of dollars in giveaways to illegal immigrants.
While running for lieutenant governor in 2022, Archila supported the “Coverage4All” proposal to provide health insurance for illegal immigrants and also proposed expanding the Excluded Workers Fund, a pool of taxpayer funds that is available to illegal immigrants in New York who don’t qualify for welfare programs because of their immigration status. Other controversial positions included her support for a bill that would prohibit local and state law enforcement agencies from cooperating with ICE and her promises to create universal mail-in voting and end prosecutions for fare evasion.
Archila, who was a passionate supporter of the defund the police movement at its height in 2020, has also had several of her own run-ins with the law. She has been arrested at least three times while protesting, according to the Washington Free Beacon, including in 2022 when she was protesting with Linda Sarsour, a Palestinian activist who has a history of making antisemitic remarks.
Archila most recently served as co-chair of the Working Families Party. Under her leadership, the Working Families Party encouraged voters to cast an “uncommitted” blank ballot in the 2024 Democratic presidential primary in protest of President Biden’s support for Israel amid the war in Gaza. The party also considered supporting then-Assemblyman Mamdani’s bill in the state legislature that would have withheld state funds from New York–based nonprofits backing Israeli settlements and IDF activities.
"Through her leadership at the Working Families Party, she has helped lead a movement that puts working New Yorkers first and demands a government that does the same," Mamdani told Politico after he appointed Archila to the commissioner role. "She brings moral clarity and a deep commitment to the people who keep this city running. As commissioner of International Affairs, she'll continue to do the same as she ensures that the world continues to be welcome in the city we all call home."
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