{"id":2232055,"date":"2026-01-12T19:49:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T19:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2232055"},"modified":"2026-01-12T19:49:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T19:49:10","slug":"zohran-mamdani-taps-ex-councilman-rafael-espinal-as-nycs-entertainment-boss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/zohran-mamdani-taps-ex-councilman-rafael-espinal-as-nycs-entertainment-boss\/","title":{"rendered":"Zohran Mamdani taps ex-councilman Rafael Espinal as NYC&#8217;s entertainment boss"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Ex-City Councilman <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2020\/01\/26\/brooklyn-councilman-rafael-espinal-nyc-nightlife-champion-resigns\/\">Rafael Espinal<\/a> \u2014 who led the repeal of New York City\u2019s antiquated dancing ban at nightlife venues \u2014 was named by Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Monday to lead the Big Apple\u2019s entertainment outreach.<\/p>\n<p>Espinal, 41, was appointed as the next commissioner of the Mayor\u2019s Office of Media and Entertainment, tasked with luring film and TV productions to the city  and growing the industry locally through various initiatives. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cMOME does incredible, often unseen work,\u201d Mamdani said at a press conference in Brooklyn, flanked by Council Speaker Julie Menin, who ran the office under Mayor Bill de Blasio.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>The former councilman will lead the Mayor\u2019s Office of Media and Entertainment.  <span class=\"credit\">Michael Nigro for NY Post<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cMost productions that are filmed in the city interact with this agency. And I was struck by Rafael\u2019s passion for this specific work and the importance that it holds for New Yorkers across the five boroughs.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Espinal, a progressive Brooklyn lawmaker, was known as a defender of the city\u2019s bar and club scene as the architect of the bill ending the city\u2019s 1926 Cabaret Law, which was <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2017\/11\/27\/de-blasio-signs-bill-to-officially-overturn-nyc-dancing-ban\/\">signed by de Blasio<\/a> in 2017.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"single__inline-module aligncenter wp-block-nypost-editor-primary-tag\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>The law, which was initially intended to prevent interracial mingling in Harlem, had long been attacked by the nightlife industry for creating a nearly impossible and pricey licensing process to legally allow dancing \u2014 essentially<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2017\/10\/30\/city-council-will-repeal-nycs-infamous-dancing-ban\/\"> leading to a ban that lasted for nearly a hundred years<\/a>.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Mamdani made the announcement with Council Speaker Julie Menin.  <span class=\"credit\">Michael Nigro for NY Post<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Espinal resigned from his position in the 37th Council District in 2020 to take a job with the Freelancers Union, which he has led for the last five years. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs commissioner, I\u2019ll work to keep New York the creative capital of the world, not just a place where great work gets made, but a place where the people who make that work can actually live in,\u201d Espinal said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTo do that, I\u2019ll prioritize partnership with the amazing labor unions, with the industries and partners in the state, to secure and expand good-paying union jobs, and to strengthen the ecosystem that makes the city the global standard,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Espinal was appointed by Mamdani to head MOME on Monday.  <span class=\"credit\">Michael Nigro for NY Post<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The office also handles press credentials and the city\u2019s broadcast network and media production, NYC Media.<\/p>\n<p>The creative industry employs more than 325,000 people in the city and generates more than $150 billion in revenue each year.<\/p>\n<p>Espinal, also a former state assemblyman, was the only councilmember to back Democratic socialist Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) in the 2016 presidential primary.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source celebrity.land \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ex-City Councilman Rafael Espinal \u2014 who led the repeal of New York City\u2019s antiquated dancing ban at nightlife venues \u2014 was named by Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Monday to lead the Big Apple\u2019s entertainment outreach. Espinal, 41, was appointed as the next commissioner of the Mayor\u2019s Office of Media and Entertainment, tasked with luring film [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2232056,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[370742,24470,21799,23032,25879,37798,369632],"class_list":["post-2232055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-cabaret","tag-dancing","tag-film","tag-media","tag-metro","tag-us-news","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Zohran-Mamdani-taps-ex-councilman-Rafael-Espinal-as-NYCs-entertainment-boss.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2232055","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2232055"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2232055\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2232057,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2232055\/revisions\/2232057"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2232056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2232055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2232055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2232055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}