Ken Griffin Says New York ‘Doesn’t Welcome Success’ Under Mamdani
Billionaire suggests expansion will focus on Miami after mayor criticized $238 million home
- Citadel CEO Ken Griffin added to his criticism of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and suggested his investing firm Citadel would “double down” on Miami’s being the place for growth.
- Griffin said Mamdani’s policies are “triggering the trauma” he experienced in Chicago, citing concern about New York’s direction.
- Griffin told CNBC that “we probably will go through” with a building in New York City.
Billionaire Ken Griffin on Tuesday amplified his criticism of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and suggested his investing firm Citadel would “double down” on Miami’s being the place for growth instead of Manhattan.
“Mamdani is making it really clear: New York doesn’t welcome success,” Griffin, the founder and chief executive officer of Citadel, said at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills, Calif.
The mayor recently appeared in a video in front of a property Griffin purchased at 220 Central Park South in 2019 for roughly $238 million, a deal that set a record for the highest-priced home ever sold in the U.S.
“We’ve secured a pied-à-terre tax,” Mamdani said in the video, posted April 15. “This is an annual fee on luxury properties worth more than $5 million, whose owners don’t live full time in the city. Like for this penthouse, which hedge fund CEO Ken Griffin bought for $238 million.”
Griffin called the video “creepy and weird.” He alluded to alleged security risks, saying the video was “frightening,” and he mentioned that the CEO of UnitedHealthcare was fatally shot not far away.
“Anything that creates, like an agitation, in the extremist on either side of the aisle is a frightening dynamic,” he said, before condemning political violence and bringing up the recent assassination attempt on President Trump and other administration officials at a media dinner in Washington, D.C.
“I’ve had my differences with President Trump over the years—I’ve also had a lot of wins with him—but the idea that he has survived three assassination attempts is just incomprehensible,” Griffin said.
Joe Calvello, the mayor’s press secretary, responded with a statement saying Mamdani wants all New Yorkers to succeed.
“That includes business owners and entrepreneurs who create good-paying jobs and make this city the economic engine of America,” he said in the statement. “It also includes Ken Griffin, who is a major employer in our city and a powerful figure in our economy. That does not negate the fact, however, that our tax system is fundamentally broken.”
The statement added that the tax system “rewards extreme wealth while working people are pushed to the brink” and that the wealthiest New Yorkers must contribute “their fair share.”
In an email sent to employees on April 23, as first reported by The Wall Street Journal, Griffin’s chief operating officer raised the possibility that the firm might not move forward with a large new Midtown construction project to bolster its presence in New York.
Griffin said at the Milken conference that it is “still a point of discussion internally” whether Citadel will move forward with New York construction. “We went to Miami and revised our building plan to make it a bigger office building,” he said of construction of a 54-story tower in Florida that is under way.
The billionaire investor told CNBC that “we probably will go through with the building” in New York.
He is heavily invested in the development at 350 Park Ave. that he plans to build with Vornado Realty Trust, a publicly traded real-estate company. Citadel and its affiliate, Citadel Securities, would be the anchor tenants, occupying some 850,000 square feet.
In March, Griffin extended a $400 million loan to the project. He has also acquired a majority stake in a proposed development partnership, according to Vornado’s financial disclosures.
“Demolition began literally days ago, and we at Vornado are ready to go,” Steve Roth, Vornado’s chairman, said on a Tuesday earnings call. “Citadel has to be committed. They will be committed,” Roth said. Analysts at Evercore ISI wrote in a Tuesday note that they remained optimistic about the project’s development.
At the Milken conference, Griffin said Mamdani’s early tenure is forcing him to recall bad feelings he experienced in Chicago when Citadel was based there. He now spends much of his time in Miami after relocating Citadel there in 2022, citing frustration with Illinois policies and crime in Chicago.
“Looking at what Mamdani just did to me, and more broadly is doing to the City of New York, is triggering the trauma I went through in Chicago,” he said.
Mamdani, a Democratic socialist, pledged during his campaign to increase taxes on the city’s millionaires and corporations, although only the governor and state lawmakers have the power to make those changes.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, who met privately with Griffin last week, recently offered Mamdani support for his plan to raise taxes on luxury second homes to help plug the city’s budget deficit after initially expressing skepticism.
Griffin made clear his differences with Mamdani go well beyond the video of the outside of his 24,000-square-foot Manhattan penthouse.
The billionaire said he wants Citadel to be in a “state that embraces business,” before adding that he thinks New York is moving toward “redistributed handouts that leave people dependent on the government for their lives and their livelihoods.”
Griffin offered to purchase a copy of “Animal Farm” for every ninth-grade student in New York City. The George Orwell classic, recently made into a movie, is an allegory on the Russian Revolution and the early history of the Soviet Union.
“Mayor Mamdani, you ship me an email, get me the delivery address, I’ll get them shipped right away,” he said.