Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX21) introduced the MAMDANI Act — Measures Against Marxism's Dangerous Adherents and Noxious Islamists. It would deport, denaturalize, or bar entry to any non-citizen who is a member of or advocates for socialism, communism, Marxism, or Islamic fundamentalism. It strips courts of the ability to review any determination under it. The acronym is named after Zohran Mamdani, the 112th Mayor of New York City, a democratic socialist who was naturalized in 2018 and sworn in this January. This is the second federal bill named "MAMDANI Act" in five months — Rep. Buddy Carter introduced a different one in November that would cut federal funds to NYC while Mamdani is mayor.

1. Islamic Fundamentalism Has a Dangerous Foothold In This Country (Chip Roy's case)

Sixty years of importing hostile ideologies. The tools we have aren't enough.

Chip Roy's argument is that ideology-based immigration restrictions already exist, and they should be sharpened. In his own framing to Breitbart: "Why do we continue to import people who hate us? Not just for the last six years, but for the last 60 years, our immigration system has been cynically used to disadvantage American workers' competitiveness in favor of mass-importing the third world." The bill's target — what Roy calls the "Red-Green Alliance" — is the overlap of socialist and Islamist political movements that he says have destroyed Europe.

The 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act already bars Communist Party members from naturalization, so this isn't new ground. The McCarran-Walter Act's anti-Communist provisions remain in the USCIS policy manual today. Roy's bill extends that framework — explicitly covering "advocacy," adding "Islamic fundamentalism," and removing judicial review to make enforcement faster. Whether one agrees with the policy, the constitutional template isn't invented; it's an updated version of a Cold War statute still on the books.

You can't deport a citizen — or a non-citizen living here — for speech.

The First Amendment protects speech for citizens and non-citizens alike inside the United States, and this bill targets speech directly. The "advocacy" language in Roy's bill means a non-citizen could be removed for writing, posting, printing, or distributing any material that advocates socialism or "Islamic fundamentalism." Supreme Court precedent has circumscribed ideology-based exclusion and deportation for decades — Bridges v. Wixon (1945) established the principle, most forcefully in Justice Murphy's concurrence, that non-citizens in the US have free-speech protections. A bill that removes them for protected speech is a bill that invites constitutional challenge on day one.

And it strips judicial review! The bill makes every deportation, denaturalization, or inadmissibility decision under its provisions final — no appeals, no court oversight. That is how you write a statute you know can't survive constitutional scrutiny: you make it unreviewable. Congress can't actually eliminate judicial review of constitutional claims, so the provision itself is likely unconstitutional even before the speech question is reached.

3. This Is Naked Anti-Muslim Targeting (Mamdani, CAIR, critics)

The acronym is the argument. They named a deportation bill after a Muslim mayor.

The bill's name is the first piece of evidence. "MAMDANI" — a Muslim South-Asian surname belonging to a sitting elected official — became a forced acronym for an anti-immigration bill. Zohran Mamdani is a naturalized US citizen, dual Uganda-US, sworn in as NYC's 112th mayor in January. Naming federal deportation legislation after him is not subtle, and the pattern around it isn't subtle either. Chip Roy has posted about Muslims, Islam, or "sharia law" at least 244 times since January — more than any other member of Congress.

"Red-Green Alliance" is an established right-wing anti-Muslim trope, not a neutral descriptor. The phrase circulates in European far-right discourse to describe an alleged tactical union between the left and Islamist movements. Roy used it in his own bill rollout. Augusta Free Press, a Virginia outlet, framed the bill bluntly: "Chip Roy introduces Mamdani Act, aimed at brown-skinned people." When the acronym, the author's public record, and the target population all point the same direction, the policy argument has to carry the bill on its own — and Roy's public framing doesn't try to.

4. McCarran-Walter Already Does This (immigration law historians)

The authority to deport communists has existed for 74 years. This bill is a message, not a mechanism.

The 1952 INA already makes members of the Communist Party deportable and inadmissible, and Republicans have already asked DOJ to apply it to Mamdani. The Internal Security Act of 1950 added communist-exclusion grounds to the Immigration Act of 1918, and the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952 expanded them. Al Jazeera reported in November 2025 that Reps. Andy Ogles and Randy Fine asked the Department of Justice to consider using existing INA provisions to denaturalize Mamdani. The actual new elements in Roy's bill are the "advocacy" expansion and the "Islamic fundamentalism" category — both of which are likely where the constitutional fights would happen.

The bill is not expected to pass in its current form, which makes it a signaling document. Roy is a House Freedom Caucus leader and a Trump ally. The function of the MAMDANI Act is to put a name to a legislative posture — ideological immigration control — and to force Democratic members to vote on an aggressively framed bill during a mayoral term where Mamdani has already been a target. That is how much of this Congress's messaging legislation is built. The policy is secondary to the vote record it creates.

Where This Lands

The bill is unlikely to pass, almost certainly unconstitutional in its current form, and explicitly named after a sitting American mayor. Whether it "matters" depends on which frame you care about. As law, it probably doesn't — McCarran-Walter already exists and the courts have circumscribed ideology-based deportation. As politics, it might, by perhaps normalizing the idea that elected officials can be targeted by federal statute for their ideology. Where this lands depends on whether the Supreme Court ever sees it — and whether Democrats treat the vote record it creates as a weapon or a trap.

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