Donald Trump and Zohran Mamdani set for high-stakes Oval Office face-off

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Donald Trump will host Zahran Mamdani at the White House on Friday for a high-level meeting between the US President and the mayor-elect of New York City.

This will be the first time that the two men meet after months of exchanging harsh criticism from afar, and it could determine the nature of the relationship between Trump and the mayor of his city during the remainder of his presidency.

Trump, 79, repeatedly attacked Mamdani, a 34-year-old Democratic socialist who earlier this month completed his improbable rise from little-known state Assembly member to elected mayor of the nation’s largest city.

Mamdani’s engaging and savvy social media campaign, which focused relentlessly on improving affordability, appealed to young voters in particular. More than two million New Yorkers cast their votes in the mayoral elections, the largest turnout in a mayoral race since 1969.

But Mamdani has also proven divisive, and his economic proposals and foreign policy stances have divided the Democratic establishment and drawn the ire of Trump and Republicans.

“The communist mayor of New York City, Zahran “Kwame” Mamdani, has requested a meeting,” Trump wrote in a social media post on Wednesday evening. “We have agreed that this meeting will be held in the Oval Office on Friday, November 21. More details later!”

Trump, a longtime New Yorker who officially changed his residency to Florida six years ago, has repeatedly described Mamdani as a communist. In the run-up to this month’s municipal elections, the president threatened to withhold federal funds from New York City if Mamdani was elected.

He also gave an eleventh-hour endorsement of Mamdani’s main challenger, former Democratic New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who ran as an independent.

But Mamdani — who campaigned on promises to freeze rent on rent-stabilized apartments and offer free public busing and child care for children under 5 — was quick to back down, vowing to stand up to Trump when he becomes mayor in January.

He has pledged that the New York Police Department, under his watch, would refuse to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, as its agents conduct immigration raids in that city.

In a fiery election night speech, Mamdani addressed the president directly, saying: “Donald Trump, since I know you’re watching…I have four words for you: Speak up!”

“If anyone can show a nation betrayed by Donald Trump how to defeat him, it’s the city that gave birth to him,” he added.

But Mamdani said on Thursday that he was looking for common ground with the president.

“My team has reached out to the White House because I will work with anyone to make this city accessible to everyone,” he said in New York. “I intend to make clear to President Trump that I will work with him on any agenda that benefits New Yorkers.”

He added: “I am not worried about this meeting. I consider this meeting an opportunity to present my case.”

The White House provided few details about Friday’s meeting. “It speaks volumes that tomorrow a communist will come to the White House, because this is the one the Democratic Party elected as mayor of the largest city in the country,” press secretary Carolyn Leavitt said Thursday.

“President Trump is willing to meet with anyone and talk to anyone and try to do what is right on behalf of the American people,” she said, adding that New York City “has become much more left-wing than I think this president ever expected.”