NYC's Influencer Program: What To Know

NEW YORK CITY— The New York City Council wanted answers Tuesday about Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s use of social media influencers, following a Columbia Journalism Review report released last month.

The Council asked questions about spending, campaign budgets, how influencers are selected and what disclosure rules apply.

Officials from the City’s public-engagement and records agencies testified, but did not claim to oversee influencer engagement.

Neither could answer basic questions about the influencer program, including how many influencers had worked with the Mayor’s office or City agencies and how much the City had spent.

“It’s incredibly disappointing and just outright ridiculous that we’re having a hearing on a very important topic, and no one who is able to talk about the meat and potatoes of this issue,” Minority Leader David Carr, a Staten Island Republican, said at the hearing.

Instead, the officials repeatedly directed questions about the influencer program to the administration’s communications department.

Brewer said the communications officials had been invited, but declined to testify.

Public Advocate Jumaane Williams also criticized the administration’s decision not to send communications officials.

“I have great respect for this administration, so it upsets me that they have me agreeing with Councilman Carr,” Williams said.

Williams said he did not know whether the administration had done anything wrong. But he said questions raised by recent reporting deserved answers from the officials overseeing the communications program.

“The right people should be here,” Williams said.

What Was City Hall Sending Influencers?

The Mamdani administration has built a network of more than 200 social media influencers to help promote city policies, programs and services, according to the report.

A Signal group called “NYC Creators Announcements,” run by Emilia Rowland, the Mayor’s Office director of new media and cultural communications, sends daily updates, talking points and video clips.

The group grew out of Creators4Zohran, an influencer network that supported Mamdani during his 2025 mayoral campaign.

CJR also reported that the influencers are not paid by the City simply for participating in the Signal group or for their coverage, although some creators are paid by city agencies for specific messaging campaigns.

Separately, at least one Signal chat operated by Rowland had been configured to automatically delete her messages after they were sent, according to the New York Times.

Chief Counsel Ramzi Kassem said City Hall took “immediate corrective action” after learning about the disappearing-message setting through news reporting.

Is Signal Allowed?

Signal itself is not banned under the City’s current policy, according to the Department of Records and Information Services.

The department’s 2025 policy treats instant messages as “transitory by default,” meaning they generally do not have to be retained, according to Commissioner Shawn(ta) Smith-Cruz, who testified at the hearing.

Messages about City decisions, actions or policies must be saved. Personal messages and basic logistics, such as setting up a meeting, generally do not.

Employees must move messages requiring preservation to a system where the City can store and access them.

Public Advocate Jumaane Williams asked whether deleting a message under the policy would violate City rules. Officials said it would not if the message qualified as temporary.

The issue became more pointed when Council members cited reporting that influencers received daily updates, talking points and video clips through Signal.

Councilman Eric Dinowitz asked whether those messages would qualify as records because they could relate to City policies and actions.

Smith-Cruz said they could not determine whether messages in a particular Signal conversation had been properly classified because the department does not monitor agencies’ active communications.

Instead, agencies train employees to determine which messages must be preserved, officials said.