What Mamdani and Trump have in common
Each has proven that voters will overlook major flaws if they think a candidate will address affordability problems.
President Trump calls Zohran Mamdani a “communist” and says he’ll slash federal funding for New York City now that the upstart Democrat has becomes the city’s next mayor. Mamdani uses Trump as his own foil, saying he’ll stand up to Trump’s immigration raids and other affronts on Democratic cities better than anybody else could.
The MAGA Republican and the socialist Democrat seem to be diametric opposites. Yet Mamdani won the New York City mayor’s race by borrowing a theme from Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign: living costs are too high and it’s time for somebody to try something new.
Trump won in 2024 by blasting incumbent Democrat Kamala Harris for inflation that peaked at 9% during the Biden-Harris administration and was still vexing voters late last year. Voters bought it. High prices were the top concern for half of all Trump voters in 2024, and possibly the main issue putting Trump over the top.
Economic concerns were so powerful among voters in 2024 that they overlooked Trump’s considerable baggage. He was a convicted felon under investigation for other possible crimes. He had already lost once, in 2020, and at 78 he would be the oldest person ever to begin a presidential term.
Mamdani has his own liabilities as a 34-year-old Muslim who has never had a managerial job, until now. New Yorkers worry about his lack of experience, and even supporters cringe at some of his prior positions, such as defunding the police and legalizing prostitution. His wishy-wash musings on “globalizing the intifada”—a phrase that connotes violence against Jews—should be high on the DON’T list for any politician running in a place like New York, with powerful Jewish interests.
Affordability concerns top all of that. Mamdani has been laser-focused on the high cost of housing, food, child care and transportation since before most people ever knew who he was. When a reporter tried to bait him into responding to a recent Trump insult, Mamdani answered, “My focus is on the cost-of-living crisis, bud.”
It certainly helps that Mamdani is a charismatic and clever social-media darling who tromps all around the five boroughs talking to New Yorkers. But that wouldn’t matter much if he weren’t hammering the one issue voters care most about.
The simple message for all politicians is that affordability is the defining issue of our time, and that voters will overlook a lot if they think a candidate might get costs down and living standards up. The recent analysis of Democratic woes, “Deciding to Win,” is getting a lot of attention because it pins the Democratic wipeout in 2024 on a failure to heed that tenet. “Democrats need to … focus our policy agenda and our messaging on an economic program centered on lowering costs,” the paper concludes.
There’s a lesson for politicians, too: You better deliver. Trump won on economic issues in 2024, but he’s been losing that edge in 2025. Inflation has jumped from 2.3% in April—the lowest level in four years—to 3%, as Trump’s tariffs raise the cost of imports and push prices up. The man who campaigned against rising costs in 2024 said earlier this year that he “couldn’t care less” if carmakers raise prices because of his tariffs. Trump’s approval rating on the economy has dropped from 49% in January to 39% now, and that’s with stock prices at record highs. Voters who wanted Trump to lower living costs are now saying that he isn’t getting the job done.
Mamdani will face an equally tough time moving the needle on affordability in ways voters will give him credit for. There’s not a lot a mayor can do to lower costs in the first place. Food is a national commodity, with prices typically set far outside any city’s boundaries. Mamdani has plans to freeze rents and make buses free, which are things he might be able to control. But those are still complex undertakings bound by red tape that’s more like chain mail. He’ll also need tax hikes to come up with new funding to address some affordability issues, something that might not fly.
Mamdani and Trump have both proved that voters will reward candidates who embrace their concerns about affordability. Next, we need politicians who can actually do something about it. It’s Mamdani’s turn in the dunk tank.