The FBI has opened a federal terrorism investigation after two homemade explosive devices were ignited outside Gracie Mansion — the official residence of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani — during dueling protests on Saturday afternoon.
Two young men from Pennsylvania are in custody, and federal terrorism charges are expected.
The incident unfolded against a volatile backdrop: a small anti-Islam protest organized by Jake Lang, a pardoned January 6 rioter turned far-right provocateur, drew roughly 20 supporters and more than 100 counter-protesters to the Upper East Side mansion where Mamdani, the city’s first Muslim mayor, lives with his wife.
What Happened Outside Gracie Mansion
According to NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch, 18-year-old Emir Balat of Langhorne, Pennsylvania, was seen lighting and throwing a device toward a police barrier.
The device struck the barrier and extinguished itself just feet from officers.
Balat then allegedly retrieved a second device from 19-year-old Ibrahim Kayumi of Newton, Pennsylvania, lit it, and ran with it before dropping it on the ground.
What authorities initially suspected might be smoke bombs turned out to be something far more dangerous.
After preliminary analysis, the NYPD Bomb Squad determined the devices were improvised explosive devices — IEDs — capable of causing serious injury or death.
Law enforcement sources described the construction in disturbing detail: sports drink bottles filled with explosive material, placed inside glass jars and surrounded by nuts, bolts, and screws designed to act as shrapnel.
The fuses were connected to M80-type fireworks.
Two sources told CBS News the devices contained TATP — triacetone triperoxide — a highly volatile explosive compound that has been used in terrorist attacks around the world.
On Sunday, a third suspicious device was found in a vehicle parked about three blocks from Gracie Mansion, prompting evacuations while the Bomb Squad assessed the threat.
Embed from Getty ImagesThe Far-Right Provocation That Sparked it All
The protest that drew the counter-demonstrators — and ultimately the suspects — was organized by Jake Lang, a figure who has become one of the most visible and inflammatory provocateurs in far-right circles since President Trump pardoned him and more than 1,500 other January 6 defendants in early 2025.
Lang had been jailed for four years on charges of assaulting a police officer with a baseball bat during the Capitol riot.
Since his pardon, he has embarked on a nationwide campaign of anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant demonstrations that have repeatedly turned confrontational.
In November 2025, he attempted to burn a Quran in Dearborn, Michigan. In January 2026, he led an anti-Somali rally in Minneapolis where counter-protesters chased him from the scene. In February, he was arrested and charged with a felony for destroying an anti-ICE sculpture at the Minnesota State Capitol.
Just last week, he was charged with threatening a police officer at a January 6 anniversary event, telling the officer he should be “put down like a dead dog.”
Lang, who describes himself as a white supremacist and is nominally running for U.S. Senate in Florida, organized Saturday’s demonstration as an anti-“Islamification” protest specifically targeting Mamdani — a democratic socialist of Ugandan-Indian heritage who made history as New York City’s first Muslim and first Asian American mayor after defeating Andrew Cuomo in the 2025 Democratic primary.
The targeting of Mamdani’s home was deliberate and personal. Lang brought a goat on a leash to the demonstration — an apparent attempt at anti-Muslim provocation.
Two Crises Colliding
What makes this story so deeply troubling is that it sits at the intersection of two dangers: the escalating pattern of far-right provocation that Trump’s January 6 pardons have emboldened, and the specter of retaliatory violence that such provocation can inspire.
Balat and Kayumi, according to law enforcement sources, told investigators they were angered by Lang’s anti-Islam protest and came to confront it.
Both men reportedly told investigators they had watched ISIS videos, and authorities are now examining whether either was inspired by extremist messaging.
Investigators are also scrutinizing the overseas travel histories of both suspects — Balat traveled to Istanbul for several months in 2025, while Kayumi visited Istanbul and Saudi Arabia in 2024.
Videos from the scene show Balat allegedly yelling “Allahu Akbar” as he threw the first device.
The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force has taken the lead in the investigation, and search warrants were expected to be executed in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Mayor Mamdani Responds
In a statement Sunday, Mamdani condemned both the provocation and the violence that followed.
He called Lang’s protest “rooted in bigotry and racism” and said it has no place in New York City.
Without naming the bombing suspects, he called the use of explosive devices “reprehensible and the antithesis of who we are.”
Mamdani and his wife were reported safe during the incident, though a mayoral spokesperson noted the events were “a stark reminder of the threats they both face regularly.”
Commissioner Tisch praised the officers who responded, noting they ran toward the smoking devices rather than away from them.
The Bigger Picture
The violence outside Gracie Mansion is a grim illustration of the cycle that unchecked extremism can produce.
A pardoned insurrectionist who openly espouses white supremacist ideology travels the country staging deliberately inflammatory anti-Muslim demonstrations.
It’s worth asking how the country arrived at a moment where a man convicted of assaulting police at the Capitol walks free to organize hate rallies outside the home of a sitting mayor, while the FBI investigates whether two teenagers were radicalized in response.
Six people were arrested in total on Saturday — the two bombing suspects, one person accused of pepper-spraying counter-protesters, and three others on disorderly conduct charges.
No injuries were reported, though law enforcement sources say the fragmentation-packed IEDs could have killed or maimed numerous people.
The investigation is ongoing.
