New York: Mamdani Surprises Couples at Marriage Bureau

An hour before Matthew Cruz and Molly McGhee were supposed to wed at the Manhattan Marriage Bureau last week, the couple realized that they had forgotten their marriage license.

Cue the panic. In 10-degree weather, Cruz, a 30-year-old audio engineer, furiously pedaled an electric CitiBike back to their apartment in Brooklyn. Ms. McGhee, 31, a novelist and creative writing professor, saw it as a small miracle when her fiancé returned with the document, moments before their 10:30 a.m. ceremony.

They made their way inside, only to be greeted by their second surprise of the day: Mayor Zohran Mamdani was there, and he wanted to officiate their wedding.

“Are you kidding me?” Ms. McGhee responded.

Neither one had ever met the mayor before, but they said yes. “It took me a full 45 seconds to get our rings out because I was shaking a little bit,” Cruz added.

Mr. Mamdani made an unexpected trip to the Manhattan Marriage Bureau last Thursday to officiate weddings for six New York City couples who had arrived for their scheduled appointments. The visit was an anniversary celebration of sorts for Mr. Mamdani, who had married the artist Rama Duwaji at the same city clerk’s office almost exactly one year earlier.

His turn as a municipal Cupid came as he navigated the city’s deadly cold snap and prepared to travel to Albany for the mayor’s annual budget pleas to lawmakers. It was kept under wraps until Saturday morning, when Mr. Mamdani’s office released a video on YouTube documenting the occasion to celebrate Valentine’s Day.

“I think it’s the best of New York,” Mr. Mamdani says in the video. “You see all these couples — so many different stories, so many different ages, so many different lives, and they’re all coming to get married.”

- Author: Callie Holtermann, The New York Times

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