Zohran Mamdani (Image Source: X)
In a historic moment that left many on the left and right amused, US President Donald Trump not only praised New York city Mayor Elect Zohran Mamdani, but also publicly acknowledged being called a fascist by Mamdani. Trump said that he would be comfortable living in New York under the new mayor.
During a media interaction after their meeting, Trump, when asked about Zohran’s comment calling him a fascist, said, “That’s okay, you can just say it. It’s easier. It’s easier than explaining it, I don’t mind,” said Trump. The US President cut short Zohran Mamdani while he was trying to explaining his comment.
Aside from that, Trump surprusingly not only congratulated Mamdani, but said that he ran “an incredible” race to win. “The better he does the happier I am. There is no differnece in party, there is no differenc ein anything. We’re going to be helping him to make everybody’s dream come true,” stated the US President.
“We had a meeting today that actually surprised me. He wants to see no crime, he wants to see housing being built, he wants to rents coming down. Now we may diageee how we get there. The rent coming down… we’d like to see him ideally building a lot of additional housing. I expect to be helping him,” said US President Trump.
He also called Zohran Mamdani “a very rational man” when asked by a reporter if he was “next to a Jihadist”, given that was what the Republican Party had labelled him as during the election for the New York Mayor. The interaction took many by surprise on the internet, given that people were expecting a more combative meeting, and not something that would end on a seemingly positive note.
Zohran Mamdani scripted history as he emerged victorious in the closely-watched battle for New York City Mayor, becoming the first South Asian and Muslim to be elected to sit at the helm of the largest city in the US.
Mamdani, who is the son of Indian filmmaker Mira Nair and academic Mahmood Mamdani, won the NYC Mayoral election, getting 948,202 votes (50.6 per cent), with 83 per cent of the votes in.
He had been the front-runner in the NYC Mayoral election for months and on Tuesday defeated Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa and political heavyweight former New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo, who ran as an independent candidate and received US President Donald Trump’s endorsement only on the eve of the election.
Cuomo garnered 776,547 votes (41.3 per cent) while Sliwa got 137,030 votes.
The NYC Board of Elections said that two million votes were cast, for the first time since 1969, with check-ins in Manhattan at 444,439, followed by Bronx (187,399), Brooklyn (571,857), Queens (421,176) and Staten Island (123,827).
Mamdani had upset Cuomo in the Democratic primary race for New York City mayor and was declared victorious in June this year.
This post was last modified on November 22, 2025 7:41 am