Several longtime civic leaders are criticizing Boston City Council District 7 candidate Said Ahmed over a recent Instagram post, which they say misleadingly and incorrectly implies they’ve endorsed his political campaign.
Ahmed uploaded a series of three photos to his public Instagram account on Sept. 29, which featured himself with several prominent and influential community members. “Honored to have the support of key community leaders in District 7,” Ahmed wrote in the caption. “Their dedication and hard work inspire my vision to keep building and making our district the best in Boston. Listening and learning from them is what makes this work possible.”
Ahmed deleted the post from his Instagram on Friday after three of the men pictured with Ahmed in the post told the Globe they never agreed to support or endorse Ahmed in his bid to represent District 7.
“For the picture to be used as a suggestion of a political endorsement was misleading and surprising to me and many others who were in that photo,” said Rev. Willie Bodrick II, who appears in one of the photos and is the senior pastor of the historic Twelfth Baptist Church in Roxbury.
Ahmed told the Globe he did not intend to be misleading or convey that all the men pictured in the post had endorsed him. He emphasized that he was referring only to Keith McDermott, the former director of the Reggie Lewis Track and Athletic Center, and Robert Lewis Jr., the president of the Boys and Girls Clubs of Boston.
Ahmed said both have endorsed and donated to his campaign. State campaign finance records show McDermott contributed $100 to Ahmed’s campaign in February. Ahmed said Lewis donated to his campaign this month.
“They have been mentoring me,” Ahmed said. “They are supporting me, and I have their support and confidence 100 percent, but if someone else in that image reached out to [the Globe], I wanted to apologize that they are included in the picture.”
The photos at issue were taken at an apolitical event for the Boys and Girls Club months before Ahmed posted them, Bodrick said.
“It was really a celebration of Black history in a moment where many of us wanted to centralize and celebrate the history of our community in Roxbury,” Bodrick said of the event.
Bodrick said he has not yet endorsed a candidate in the race, and has been fielding calls from people who saw the post and were “taken aback” by it.
“I’m thankful for the great relationships I have in community, because folks knew that they could call me and ask, ‘Was this true?’, and I operate in integrity and honesty, and I could tell them that wasn’t true,” he said.
Joseph Feaster Jr., who appears in two of the photos, said he, too, was surprised by the post and took offense to what he saw as an implication in the caption that he is backing Ahmed in the race.
“If you want to ask me for my support, that’s one thing, but when you infer that I’m supporting you, I know that’s a problem for me,” said Feaster, an attorney with decades of experience as a civic leader in Boston, including as former chair of the city’s Board of Appeals, and current chair of the city’s reparations task force.
He emphasized that he is supporting Reverend Miniard Culpepper, an attorney and pastor who, along with Ahmed, advanced from September’s preliminary election in the race to represent District 7 on the council.
Bruce Bickerstaff, who also appears in one of the photos, called the post and the caption “upsetting.”
“It’s disingenuous at best, and totally untrue,” said Bickerstaff, a longtime Roxbury resident and former member of the city’s Zoning Board of Appeals.
He said he sees the post as an inappropriate and “disconcerting” misstep for a candidate running for public office.
“It decries that the approach is not honest or sincere, and if that is the way that he feels that he has to comport himself, it’s worrying,” Bickerstaff said. “I would not be in support of him in any fashion or form.”
Ahmed was also recently accused of harassment by another District 7 candidate, as well as a Healey administration official, who filed two police reports about Ahmed’s alleged behavior during early voting in the lead-up to Boston’s preliminary municipal election in September. A municipal court judge later terminated the harassment prevention order the official had requested against Ahmed.
Ahmed, a former track star and current coach who previously ran a failed campaign for the State House, was the top vote getter in the District 7 race in September’s preliminary election, with Culpepper coming in second. Third-place finisher Mavrick Afonso formally requested a recount in the race, but it did not ultimately change the outcome of which candidates will advance to November’s general election.
The District 7 council race drew the most crowded field of candidates of any race on the ballot, with eleven candidates vying to replace disgraced former councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson in the preliminary election. The seat is the only open position on the November ballot.
Niki Griswold can be reached at niki.griswold@globe.com. Follow her @nikigriswold.