Zohran Mamdani Claps Back at Elon Musk Over Appointment of FDNY’s First Openly Gay Commissioner

After Elon Musk claimed lives would be lost, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani defended his appointment of veteran EMS leader Lillian Bonsignore, reframing experience, leadership and queer visibility at the helm of the FDNY.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Saturday forcefully defended his appointment of Lillian Bonsignore as commissioner of the Fire Department of New York, pushing back against criticism from billionaire tech executive Elon Musk, who claimed the selection put lives at risk.

Mamdani announced Bonsignore’s appointment during a Dec. 23 press conference, naming the 56-year-old FDNY veteran as the city’s next fire commissioner. Bonsignore, who spent 31 years in Emergency Medical Services before retiring in 2022, is the second woman and the first openly gay person to lead the department.

“The FDNY deserves a leader who cares about the work because she did it herself,” Mamdani said at the time. “She is the kind of leader I’m proud to have in my administration.”

Musk criticized the appointment in a Dec. 26 post on his social media platform X, responding to a comment noting that Bonsignore had never served as a firefighter. “People will die because of this,” Musk wrote. “Proven experience matters when lives are at stake.”

The remark drew swift rebuttal from Mamdani, who emphasized that EMS experience is central to the modern work of the FDNY. “Experience does matter,” Mamdani wrote in a Dec. 27 post on X, “which is why I appointed the person who spent more than 30 years at EMS. You know, the workforce that addresses at least 70% of all calls coming into FDNY.”

Bonsignore’s career within the department includes serving as chief of the FDNY’s EMS division from 2019 to 2022. She was the first woman to lead the division and the first woman to achieve the rank of four-star chief. Her tenure encompassed some of the most consequential moments in the city’s recent history, including the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a Dec. 23 statement to City & State New York, Mamdani praised Bonsignore’s leadership during the pandemic, calling it “calm, decisive and exactly the kind of leadership our city needs in moments of uncertainty.”

Public safety experts and city officials have long noted that EMS now constitutes the majority of the FDNY’s daily operations, responding to medical emergencies that far outnumber fire-related calls. Mamdani’s administration has framed the appointment as an acknowledgment of that reality, rather than a departure from tradition.

Bonsignore, speaking after accepting the nomination, underscored her familiarity with both the department and the communities it serves. “I know what the firefighters need, and I can translate that to this administration, who’s willing to listen,” she said in her remarks. “I know what EMS needs. I have been EMS for 30-plus years. And now you have a commissioner that could start an IV.”

Musk’s comments came amid broader political opposition to Mamdani from conservative figures and allies of former President Donald Trump, many of whom have criticized the mayor’s democratic socialist policy agenda. Mamdani, however, declined to personalize the dispute, instead returning repeatedly to Bonsignore’s record and qualifications.

The billionaire’s criticism also revived scrutiny of his own brief tenure leading the Trump-era Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, which ended after roughly four months amid widespread backlash over mass layoffs and cuts to federal aid programs. The department shuttered before completing its mandate.

For Mamdani, the contrast was implicit but pointed; leadership, he argued, is measured not by ideology or bravado but by sustained service under pressure.

Bonsignore will assume leadership of the FDNY at a time when the department faces staffing challenges, climate-driven emergencies and ongoing demands for equity within city agencies. Her appointment signals a shift toward recognizing EMS as a central pillar of public safety, not a secondary function.

Bonsignore’s appointment is historic because it breaks multiple barriers at once, elevating the first openly gay commissioner and only the second woman to lead the FDNY, while also affirming EMS professionals as essential leaders in public safety. At a moment when diversity in leadership is frequently politicized, the decision reframes experience, competence and care as the true measures of readiness. For LGBTQ+ New Yorkers and first responders alike, it marks a visible expansion of who is trusted to protect the city, and how leadership itself is defined.