On Thursday morning, she was meeting with Gov. Kathy Hochul and the mayor-elect. In the evening, Zohran Mamdani’s incoming chief of staff and closest adviser Elle Bisgaard-Church made an appearance at a private event with New York City’s most powerful lobbying firm. Bisgaard-Church was among those honored at the “Women’s Thought Leader Reception” Thursday night, co-hosted by City & State and Kasirer.

The room was full of some 250 women power brokers in politics, government, business, advocacy and the arts. Kasirer, founded by Suri Kasirer and led by women, remains the top lobbyist in New York city by compensation, raking in more than $17 million in 2024.

Accepting her award, Bisgaard-Church told a story about when a visitor to Mamdani’s Assembly office mistook the male intern for M

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