President Trump hosted New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani (D) at the White House on Friday for what a closely watched meeting between two political rivals who have drawn comparisons in their populist appeals.
Mamdani met with Trump less than a month after winning his election to become the next mayor of New York City, despite frequent attacks from the president and his allies labeling him a “communist” and threatening to withhold funding if he implements progressive policies. Mamdani is a democratic socialist who campaigned on lowering the cost of living in the city.
Here are five things to watch when Trump and Mamdani come face-to-face.
Common ground on affordability?
Affordability is bound to come up, given Mamdani and Trump’s intense focus on the matter. Trump successfully campaigned on the issue in the 2024 presidential election, helping to deliver Republican wins up and down the ballot. However, the tables turned earlier this month, when Mamdani and other Democrats handily won on the issue in the off-year elections.
Mamdani said in an interview Thursday that he plans to raise the issue of inflation with the president during their meeting.
“Frankly, cost of living is something that I heard time and time again from New Yorkers about why they voted for Donald Trump. And this is something that has only continued in the last few months of this year, where we’re hearing about childcare concerns, rent concerns, ConEd concerns, even just getting on the bus, just $2.90, and just to make it clear to the president that this is what we’re talking about,” he told MS NOW.
Democrats’ success on the issue has clearly rattled Trump, who has called the party’s messaging on the matter “a con job.” The administration has also accused the Biden administration of starting the affordability crisis. Nonetheless, the president has amped up his messaging on the issue, removing a number of tariffs on goods last week and floated the idea of a 50-year mortgage.
Does Trump threaten NYC funding?
Trump spent months leading up to Mamdani’s election raising the prospect that he could use federal funding for New York City as a bargaining chip to keep the next mayor in line.
“It’s going to be hard for me as the president to give a lot of money to New York,” Trump said of the incoming mayor of his native city days before the election. “Because if you have a communist running New York, all you’re doing is wasting the money you’re sending there.”
Mamdani had pushed back on threats to the city’s funding and vowed to fight any restrictions in court. The mayor-elect will likely have the opportunity Friday to plead his case directly to Trump for why funding should flow freely.
The White House in October had announced it was pausing roughly $18 billion in funding for major transportation projects in the city “to ensure funding is not flowing based on unconstitutional DEI [diversity, equity, and inclusion] principles.”
New York state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli’s proposed budget for fiscal 2026 included $7.4 billion in federal government funding.
Do cooler heads prevail after a bitter campaign?
Trump spent the duration of the New York City mayoral campaign deriding Mamdani as a “communist” and warning against his election, to the point that Trump urged voters to back former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), a longtime Democratic rival of his, on Election Day.
Mamdani did not focus his campaign on resisting or opposing Trump, but he was not afraid to push back against the president on the trail, and he called Trump out in his victory speech forcefully on election night.
In a sign of what may be to come, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Wednesday that the meeting showed Trump’s willingness to meet with anyone, even as she attacked Mamdani again as a “communist.”
Mamdani told reporters in New York on Wednesday that he will be “ready for whatever happens.”
Does Mamdani emerge as a foil?
Throughout Mamdani’s campaign, Republicans and White House allies suggested there could be a silver lining if the democratic socialist was successful: that he could become a valuable foil to hold up as the new face of the Democratic Party ahead of next year’s midterms.
Friday’s meeting could cast a spotlight on how much Trump intends to embrace that strategy and whether he intends to tie Mamdani to the national Democratic Party.
The president said days after the election that he was “torn” about whether Mamdani’s election could be politically useful.
“You know, I’m so torn, because I would like to see the new mayor do well, because I love New York. I really love New York,” Trump told Fox News anchor Bret Baier.
Mamdani has argued there could be room for common ground, and he has even suggested that he and Trump appeal to many of the same voters.
“I know that for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, this meeting is between two very different candidates who they voted for the same reason,” Mamdani said Thursday. “They wanted a leader who would take on the cost of living crisis that makes it impossible for working people to afford living in this city.”
How much does Trump embrace his former hometown?
Trump left New York City in 2019 to make Florida his permanent residence, claiming he had been treated badly by Democratic leaders in the city and state.
“Now the Democrats are so extreme that Miami will soon be the refuge for those fleeing communism in New York City. They flee,” Trump said speaking to a crowd in Miami earlier this month.
“When I left New York for the White House, it was good, except we had the telltale signs of trouble because we had a guy named de Blasio,” Trump said, referring to the city’s former Mayor Bill De Blasio (D).
However, the president has spoken fondly of his native New York City, saying he wants it to do well.
“We want to see everything work out well for New York,” Trump told reporters Sunday after revealing Mamdani had reached out for a meeting.
But Thursday, Leavitt swiped at Mamdani and the city during the White House press briefing.
“It speaks volumes that tomorrow we have a communist coming to the White House because that’s who the Democrat Party elected as the mayor of the largest city in the country,” Leavitt said.
“I think it’s very telling, but I also think it speaks to the fact that President Trump is willing to meet with anyone and talk to anyone and to try to do what is right on behalf of the American people, whether they live in blue states or red states or blue cities and a city that is coming much more left than this president ever anticipated in his many years of living in New York himself,” she said.
While New York City is a liberal bastion, Trump and Republicans made notable gains in the Empire State in the 2022 midterms and the 2024 presidential election.