Transgender rabbi with alleged ties to Iran campaigns for New York mayoral candidate

A group of social justice rabbis, including a transgender rabbi who reportedly rubbed shoulders with Iran’s president and was kicked out of the Biden White House for hijacking the event to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, headlined an ad aimed at urging Jews to get Zohran out and vote in the final days before New York’s mayoral election.

Rabbi Abby Stein, who is transgender, was one of four rabbis featured in the Jews for Zohran ad shared on social media by Jews for Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ), which was accused by the head of the Anti-Defamation League oc being “out of touch”.

Other rabbis who spoke in the ad included Emily Cohen, Miriam Grossman and Rachel Goldenberg.

“As Jews, rabbis and New Yorkers, we believe everyone deserves to prosper. Zohran agrees,” they say in the ad.

NYC RABBI Warns that ZOHRAN MAMDANI “POSES A DANGER” TO THE SECURITY OF THE JEWISH COMMUNITY

Four progressive rabbis headline an ad calling on Jewish voters to support New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani. (Getty Images)

Stein co-wrote an article in Autostraddle after a 2024 Pride Month event at the White House under former President Joe Biden in which she and another protester, a former White House staffer, described the incident in which she hijacked Jill Biden’s speech to shout about a ceasefire in Gaza. Both men were eventually escorted from the event.

Stein has also been criticized for her affiliation with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian during the United Nations General Assembly in October 2024. Stein reportedly attended the event, broadcast on Iranian state television, alongside several Iranian officials, such as Pezeshkian, just days before Tehran launched hundreds of missiles at Israel amid the country’s Gaza offensive.

Other attendees at the event included members of the Haredi ultra-Orthodox group Neturei Karta, whose members oppose the existence of an Israeli state.

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Other rabbis in Mamdani’s ad include Cohen, whose official biography on the Manhattan West End synagogue’s website says his professional experience “ranges from making challah with preschoolers to accompanying teenagers on nature hikes to developing curriculum for adults on Judaism and social justice.”

Cohen has also written about her social justice efforts online, including during the George Floyd riots in 2020, when she recounted how she stood between protesters and police during a demonstration in the hope that the officers’ “racism and sexism” would prevent them from lashing out at anyone.

Grossman, another left-wing social justice activist, has said in sermons that “Jewish texts and traditions permit and sometimes even require abortion” and that “not all pregnant people are necessarily women.” Meanwhile, in a blog post about the Dakota Access Pipeline, Grossman complains that indigenous communities have “suffered (and persisted)” under centuries of “environmental racism.”

Supporters of Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani gather in front of 30 Rock in New York on October 16, 2025. (Fox News Digital/Deirdre Heavey)

Rabbi Goldenberg of the Queens area, the fourth rabbi featured in the Mamdani ad, can also be found online in videos of his New York-based activism or in blog posts. In an online op-ed, Grossman explains how the Jewish community should be more open to the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, which many pro-Israel critics have accused of being anti-Semitic.

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Goldenberg is the founder of Malkhut, which says its goal is to build a “progressive Jewish spiritual community” that practices “ecstatic, musical, contemplative prayer, mindfulness meditation through a Jewish lens, study of Jewish sources, and social justice work.”