President Donald Trump and New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, two generational rivals on the opposite ends of the political spectrum, met in the Oval Office on Friday.
The meeting appeared to go well and the two were very complimentary of each other despite their past barbs.
‘I think you’re going to have, hopefully, a really great mayor. The better he does, the happier I am,’ Trump said after the private meeting. ‘I will say there’s no difference in party. There’s no difference in anything, and we’re going to be helping him to make everybody’s dream come true, having a strong and very safe New York.’
‘I congratulate him, and we talked about some things … like housing and getting housing built and food and prices and the price of oil,’ Trump added.
Mamdani, 34, a democratic socialist, was elected in a landslide result earlier this month. He is widely seen as a next generation leader of the Democratic party.
The result of the meeting could impact the US’s largest city in major ways.
And Trump noted how he believes the democratic socialist will surprise his critics.
‘I think he’s gonna surprise some conservative people, actually,’ Trump said after their meeting. ‘And some very liberal people he won’t surprise because they already like him.’
‘Some of his ideas are the same ones I have,’ the president said of Mamdani’s focus on affordability.
New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani met with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office on Friday. Trump congratulated the 34-year-old on his recent electoral victory
‘That’s ok, you can just say it.’ Trump said when asked about Mamdani calling the president a ‘fascist’ in the past
Trump repeatedly urged voters not to back the young progressive and endorsed former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on the eve of election day.
Despite calling Mamdani a ‘communist’ and a ‘lunatic,’ the president said Friday morning that he believed the meeting would be cordial.
The president even threatened to withhold some federal funds from the city if Zohran was elected, saying, ‘If Communist Candidate Zohran Mamdani wins the Election for Mayor of New York City, it is highly unlikely that I will be contributing Federal Funds, other than the very minimum as required, to my beloved first home.’
However, the president’s tone completely changed when the two met on Friday.
‘That’s ok, you can just say it.’ Trump said when asked about Mamdani calling the president a ‘fascist’ in the past.
Mamdani was expected to talk about Trump’s federal funding pledge during the meeting, along with other priorities for the progressive’s new administration, namely bringing down costs as inflation eats away at middle class earnings.
On Thursday, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt noted the weight of the meeting between the two rivals.
‘It speaks to the fact that President Trump is willing to meet with anyone and talk to anyone and to try to do what’s right on behalf of the American people whether they live in blue states or red states or blue cities — in a city that’s becoming much more left than I think this president ever anticipated in his many years of living in New York,’ she told reporters.
Mamdani said he spoked to the president about affordability and ICE operations in New York
Trump has also threatened to deploy the National Guard to New York to help address crime.
Though he has relentlessly gone after the young democratic socialist, the two do share commonalities.
Both have connections to New York City’s Queens neighborhood and have devoted followers.
In private, the president has even reportedly mentioned Mamdani’s political prowess, noting how the progressive is charismatic.
‘I know that for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, this meeting is between two very different candidates who they voted for, for the same reason,’ Mamdani said of the meeting.
‘They wanted a leader who would take on the cost-of-living crisis that makes it impossible for working people to afford living in the city.’
The mayor-elect has also reportedly sought council ahead of the meeting from top Democrats who have interacted with Trump.
