Illapa Sairitupac, the Democratic Socialists of America member who just won a New York City Assembly primary with Mayor Zohran Mamdani's endorsement, was arrested at least twice during protests, once at a 2021 climate demonstration and again this April after occupying Governor Kathy Hochul's office.
Sairitupac won the June 23 Democratic primary for the 65th Assembly District, which covers Chinatown and Lower Manhattan. He now heads toward the November general election as the district's presumptive next representative. His arrest record, detailed in a Washington Examiner investigation, raises pointed questions about the kind of candidates Mamdani is elevating, and what New York voters are getting in return.
The April arrest came after Sairitupac and 18 other people occupied Hochul's office. The Democratic Socialists of America posted footage showing Sairitupac inside the building holding a sign that read "Governor Hochul: our lives or your donors?" The video also captured him outside the building, restrained by police.
Sairitupac did not hide from the arrest. He posted about it on Bluesky:
"Last week, I was arrested while protesting Governor Hochul because she refuses to Tax the Rich and refuses to protect public services that working New Yorkers rely on, services that are being threatened by [President] Donald Trump's cuts. I won't stop fighting."
In the DSA-posted footage, he addressed a camera while police held him outside the governor's office building:
"The time is now. The stakes are way too high to sit it out. We've got to be confronting this, fighting for immigrants, fighting for our queer members... Tax the rich!"
The crowd around him chanted, "Billionaires, make them pay. We pay taxes. Why don't they?"
His first arrest came in the summer of 2021 at a climate protest, where he was detained. The Washington Examiner noted that both cases do not appear in New York's public court database, raising the question of whether charges were ever filed, quietly dropped, or handled through some other mechanism. Sairitupac's campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Mayor Mamdani endorsed Sairitupac in May, alongside other socialist candidates running in New York primaries. His endorsement statement framed the candidates in lofty terms.
"These leaders represent the very best of public service: a commitment to tackling challenges both large and small and a belief that government should work for everyone, not just the wealthy and well-connected."
The "very best of public service," in this case, includes a candidate arrested for illegally occupying a sitting governor's office. Mamdani's endorsement helped Sairitupac and other DSA-aligned candidates win their primaries. Mamdani-backed socialists toppled Democratic incumbents across multiple New York primaries, a pattern that has drawn sharp reactions from within the party itself.
Sairitupac had run for the same 65th District seat in 2022 and lost. This time, with the mayor's backing, he broke through.
The socialist wave has not gone unnoticed by Democrats outside New York's left flank. Senator John Fetterman publicly condemned the trend, and his criticism of the DSA-backed primary sweep reflected growing alarm among moderate Democrats about where the party is headed in the nation's largest city.
Sairitupac's connections extend beyond street protests and DSA organizing. In 2023, he spoke at an event on socialism held at the People's Forum building in New York City. The event appeared on the NYC DSA YouTube page.
The People's Forum has received funding from Neville Singham, whom the Washington Examiner described as a Chinese government-linked leftist donor. Singham is currently under a Department of Justice investigation over possible financial crimes. The Examiner did not establish a direct financial link between Singham and Sairitupac beyond his appearance at the People's Forum event. But the association, a would-be state legislator speaking at a venue bankrolled by a figure under federal investigation, is not the kind of résumé line most candidates advertise.
Whether Sairitupac had any deeper organizational or financial connection to Singham or the People's Forum remains an open question. His campaign's silence on the matter does not help clarify it.
One of the more striking details is the absence of Sairitupac's arrest cases from New York's public court database. Two arrests, zero visible court records. That gap could mean charges were never formally filed. It could mean they were dismissed or sealed. The Washington Examiner flagged the discrepancy but could not resolve it.
For voters in the 65th District, the question matters. A candidate who treats arrest as a badge of activist honor is making a statement about how he views the law. If the legal system quietly made those arrests disappear, voters deserve to know why, and whether the same leniency would extend to any ordinary New Yorker who walked into a government building and refused to leave.
New York Attorney General Letitia James has already clashed publicly with the Mamdani-backed slate after its primary sweep. The internal Democratic fight over the socialist surge is real, but so far the party establishment has failed to stop it at the ballot box.
Mamdani himself has shown a consistent willingness to defy legal and institutional norms. He has refused to enforce a Supreme Court ruling on deportation protections, placing himself in direct conflict with federal authority. His decision to drop plans for 580 new NYPD officers drew warnings from police unions about burnout and public safety.
Now he is putting his political capital behind a candidate whose primary qualification appears to be getting arrested while yelling about taxing the rich. Sairitupac is not an outlier in Mamdani's orbit. He is the model.
The DSA has been transparent about its goals. Its candidates do not pretend to be moderate Democrats running on kitchen-table issues. They are socialists who view protest arrests as credentials and government offices as targets for occupation. Mamdani's endorsement of Sairitupac was not a lapse in judgment. It was a statement of shared values.
Chinatown and Lower Manhattan deserve a representative who respects the institutions he wants to join. Instead, the 65th District is on track to send someone who got arrested storming the governor's office, and bragged about it online.
When getting handcuffed is your campaign highlight reel, voters should ask what you plan to do once you're the one sitting behind the desk.
