US President Donald Trump praised New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani after their first meeting in the Oval Office Friday, as they downplayed their ideological differences and focused on common ground — affordability.
“I think you’re going to have a really great mayor,” Trump said. “I want him to do a great job and I will help him do a great job.”
The “lovefest” — as political pundits described the encounter — came after both men spent months bashing each other; Trump, who had threatened to cut off federal funding to New York City if the democratic socialist won, said Friday he would be happy to live there now.
He also ran interference for Mamdani when the mayor-elect was asked about calling Trump a “fascist,” with the president saying, “You can just say yes. I don’t mind.”
Despite “wildly different visions,” both figures have benefited from portraying themselves as political outsiders and opponents of a corrupt system, Semafor’s editor-in-chief Ben Smith wrote in a recent column.