After months of public sparring, President Donald Trump and New York City Mayor-Elect Zohran Mamdani met face-to-face for the first time on Friday, and it appeared to go far more cordially than supporters of both men likely expected.
After a brief meeting Friday afternoon, reporters were brought into the Oval Office to find Trump seated at his desk and Mamdani standing at his side, the two smiling warmly as they talked about a productive meeting. While they both acknowledged deep policy differences, they both stressed that they had found common areas of agreement in areas like public safety and affordability, including goals of building more housing in New York City and addressing crime better.
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“I expect to be helping him, not hurting him,” Trump said. “A big help.”
“We agree on a lot more than I would have thought,” Trump added later. When asked if he’d be comfortable living again in New York City now that it’s led by Mamdani, Trump said that he would after Friday’s meeting.
Mamdani, a state assemblymember, shook up the Democratic establishment when he toppled former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the primary over the summer and bested him again in the general election earlier this month. The 34-year-old Democratic socialist hasn’t shied away from blasting Trump, particularly over the President’s hardline immigration policies. During the campaign, he vowed that he would be “Donald Trump’s worst nightmare” and would “Trump-proof” New York City.
Trump, meanwhile, has made repeated public attacks against Mamdani, falsely labeling him “a 100% Communist lunatic.” When asked how he responded to Mamdani’s promise to push back against immigration enforcement agents in the city, Trump replied, “We’ll have to arrest him.” The threat sparked outrage from Mamdani, who called it “an attack on our democracy” and “intimidation.”
The night before the general election, Trump endorsed Mamdani’s main opponent in the race, Cuomo. The President said that, if Mamdani won, he would consider withholding some federal funds from New York City.
But despite the two politicians’ open opposition toward one another, Mamdani revealed earlier this week that his team had asked Trump for a meeting. It’s “customary,” he told reporters on Thursday, for the mayor-elect of New York City to meet with the President “given the mutual reliance.”
“My team reached out because of a commitment that I made to New Yorkers that I would be willing to meet with anyone and everyone, so long as it was to the benefit of the 8.5 million people who call the city home and their struggle to afford the most expensive city in the United States of America,” he told MS NOW on Wednesday.
Trump had indicated that he was open to meeting with the incoming mayor, telling reporters on Sunday, “We want to see everything work out well for New York.” On Wednesday evening, he confirmed that he had agreed to meet later in the week—while again calling Mamdani a “communist.”
The post ‘I Expect to Be Helping Him’: Trump Admits to Being Charmed By Mamdani in First Face-to-Face Meeting appeared first on TIME.
