Pentagon tech board appointee allegedly called Mamdani ‘Islamist’

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WASHINGTON (TNND) — The Defense Department appointed 33 new members to the recently established Science, Technology and Innovation Board (STIB). One of the new appointees has been accused of making Islamophobic threats targeting the New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

On Wednesday, the Pentagon announced that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth named Shaun Maguire, a partner at Sequoia Capital, to the STIB along with 32 other appointees.

According to the announcement, the combination of the Defense Innovation Board and the Defense Science Board aims to bring “together top-tier talent that combines scientific and technical rigor with private-sector agility,” to serve “as a single, unified voice for innovation.”

Maguire has allegedly previously labeled Mamdani as an “Islamist” and attacked him on social media.

In July of last year, Maguire made a social media post accusing Mamdani — who is of Indian descent and born in Uganda — of coming “from a culture that lies about everything” to advance “his Islamist agenda.” The post came after it was reported that Mamdani marked himself as both “Asian” and “Black or African American” on a college application.

Following the post, more than 800 tech industry founders condemned Maguire’s comments in an open letter, calling it a “deliberate, inflammatory attack that promotes dangerous anti-Muslim stereotypes.”