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NEW YORK CITY — The 2026 Met Gala kicked off tonight at the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art under a cloud of protest, celebrity no-shows and a $10 million billionaire sponsorship that has turned fashion's biggest night into the most polarizing edition in the gala's 78-year history.

Jeff Bezos and his wife Lauren Sánchez Bezos are bankrolling this year's spectacle in what insiders are calling the largest individual financial commitment in Met Gala history. The roughly $10 million underwriting deal — first reported earlier this spring — has unleashed a citywide backlash, a viral "Boycott the Bezos Met Gala" poster campaign across Manhattan, and the highest-profile mayoral snub the event has ever seen.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani Skips A Decades-Old Tradition

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani — sworn in earlier this year on a platform built around housing affordability and a frontal critique of the billionaire class — confirmed last week that he and his wife, artist Rama Duwaji, would not be attending. The decision broke a tradition that has held in some form since the Koch administration, with mayors of every political stripe walking the carpet alongside Anna Wintour and her chosen co-chairs.

"My focus this year is on affordability and making the most expensive city in the United States affordable for the people who actually live here," Mamdani said in a statement. "I'm not going to spend an evening at a $100,000-a-seat fundraiser celebrating a man whose company is being investigated by my own administration."

The reference is to a New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection probe — opened in March — into Amazon delivery practices in the five boroughs. Mamdani's transition team has also been openly critical of Amazon's reported cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on data-sharing requests.

Beyoncé Returns To The Carpet After A Decade Away

Despite the political static, the marquee draw on Monday night was the return of Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, walking the Met steps for the first time since 2016. The "Cowboy Carter" superstar is one of four official co-chairs alongside Nicole Kidman, Venus Williams and Wintour herself, and she arrived to the loudest reception of the night, dressed in a custom Tyler Mitchell-shot ensemble that organizers had previewed only with the most cryptic of teasers.

Kim Kardashian, Halle Berry, Katy Perry, Cardi B and Pedro Pascal were among the early arrivals working the museum's grand staircase under the Costume Institute's "Costume Art" theme — a dress code that explicitly invited interpretations of "fashion as art" and pushed designers toward the most architectural pieces of the year.