New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani told President Donald Trump on Friday that New Yorkers want their tax dollars redirected from “endless wars” to addressing urgent needs at home.
“When I spoke to New Yorkers who voted for the president last November, on Hillside Avenue and Fordham Road, I asked them why. One of the answers was wars … and the other was the need to solve the cost of living crisis,” Mamdani said, standing next to Trump.
Asked about previous statements about U.S. involvement in Israel’s genocide in the Gaza Strip, Mamdani said, “I’ve talked about the Israeli government committing genocide, and I’ve talked about our government funding it.”
People Don’t Want More Wars
He highlighted growing social challenges, saying that New York “is a city where for the ninth consecutive year more than 100,000 school children are homeless.” He added, “There is a desperate need, not only to respect human rights, but also to fulfill the promises we have made.”
Mamdani said that many of the Trump voters he met, including a pharmacist in the Jamaica neighborhood of Queens, had lost a lot because of America’s military involvement around the world.
“People are tired of our tax dollars funding endless wars,” he said. “I also believe that we must fulfill our international obligations on human rights. Those rights are still being violated today.”
Calling the meeting with Trump “productive,” he added, “I appreciated the conversation with the president. It was a focused conversation about a place that we love and cherish – New York City.”
“We talked about rent, about the cost of food, about utilities. We talked about the different ways that people are being pushed out of the city,” Mamdani said.
