Otterly absurd!
Dems have fallen so deep under Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s spell that they’re crediting him with the return of an otter to the Bronx River for the first time in about 100 years — despite the decades of work locals have put into restoring the waterway.
A North American river otter was spotted frolicking in the brush beside the Bronx River in June, the first time the animal has been seen in the borough in roughly a century, according to the Wildlife Conservation Society Bronx Zoo.
Mamdani’s legion of online fanboys quickly rushed to credit the socialist mayor for the small marine animal’s return to New York City.
“Under Mayor Zohran Mamdani, an otter has been spotted in the Bronx River for the first time in 100 years,” Democrats Deliver — a pro-Democratic social media group — posted on X.
“NYC is healing,” lefty Gen Z influencer Harry Sisson wrote while sharing their post.
Numerous other accounts weaseled their way in and posted news of the otter’s return juxtaposed with a grinning Mamdani.
“This man is so elite that the otters came back. The otters decided to otter after one century. 100 years. He will be NYC’s mayor for LIFE. Mamdani is a superhero and Allah’s favorite ” X account Erika thee graduate posted.
Longtime New York environmentalists were outraged that Mamdani’s superfans were attempting to steal credit for the otter’s return.
“As someone who has been a member of the WCS and a regular patron and supporter of the Bronx Zoo (where the otter was spotted) for years, I, personally, am more directly responsible for this otter’s return than Mamdani is. You people are weird,” Craig Mahoney posted on X.
Former New York City Councilman Robert Holden called the attempt to credit Mamdani for the mammal’s return “otterly ridiculous.”
“Typical communist ploy to take credit for anything good that happens even if they had nothing remotely to do with it,” said Holden, a Democrat from Queens.
Social media users were fast to mock Mamdani’s devotees, saying they must be otter their minds.
“There is a word for this. It is called apotheosis. It is when members of a cult believe their leader possesses divine powers that are, in fact, just naturally occurring phenomena,” Elica Le Bon posted on X.
But the Bronx River Alliance quickly threw cold freshwater on the love fest, telling The Post that the otter’s return was due to a decades-long effort, not the social media star mayor.
“The communities along the Bronx River have been fighting for over 50 years to bring the river back to life after decades of pollution and neglect,” Bronx River Association Outreach Manager Victoria Toro said.
She said that volunteers from the Bronx spent years physically removing piles of trash and debris that actively harmed wildlife from the river.
“People didn’t even know there was a river there because it was piled so high with trash,” she said, referring to the sorry state of the Bronx River for decades.
Much of the Bronx River was dammed up for years, Toro explained, as factories located along its banks flooded it with industrial waste — driving away marine life.
“This is the 25th anniversary of the Bronx River Alliance and we’re proud it coincides with the first spotting of an otter in 100 years,” she said.
River otters were once as common in New York City as squirrels or rats, but habitat destruction drove them out of the city.
