On Fox News, Zohran Mamdani speaks directly to Donald Trump

Zohran Mamdani has focused much of his general election campaign on railing against President Donald Trump’s policies – including his deportation agenda, federal funding cuts and wielding of the Justice Department against his enemies.

Though not directly, Mamdani and Trump have been in a kind of dialogue for months. Trump has vowed to withhold federal funds if Mamdani wins, falsely questioning his citizenship (he is a naturalized U.S. citizen) and incorrectly referring to him as a communist.

But Wednesday offered an opportunity for Mamdani to deliver a message directly to Trump via the network he reportedly closely watches: Fox News. And in doing so, Mamdani offered next to no criticism of the Republican president, except to suggest that the area where he and Trump share a stated goal – lowering the cost of living – is a promise Trump has so far broken.

“I just want to speak directly to the president,” Mamdani said, looking at the camera. “I will not be a mayor like Mayor Adams who will call you to figure out how to stay out of jail. I won’t be a disgraced governor like Andrew Cuomo, who will call on you to ask how to win this election. I can do those things on my own. I will, however, be a mayor who’s ready to speak at any time to lower the cost of living.”

(“It’s a lie,” Cuomo spokesperson Rich Azzopardi said of Mamdani’s suggestion that Cuomo and Trump collaborated. A spokesperson for Adams’ suspended campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.)

The roughly 20-minute interview with Martha MacCallum spanned Israel and Hamas, public safety, free buses and more. MacCallum took the opportunity to pepper Mamdani on a number of issues that irk moderates and conservatives, including a tweet in 2020 during the Black Lives Matter protests that called the NYPD “racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety.”

In response, Mamdani offered his broadest apology to date to NYPD officers. The New York Times Magazine reported earlier this week that Mamdani apologized in a closed-door meeting with about two dozen rank-and-file officers. “I apologized for the language that I used, and I spoke with them about the fact that I want to work with them,” Mamdani said of that meeting.

When pressed by MacCallum if he would make a “broad public apology” rather than one behind closed doors, Mamdani offered a brief one: “I’ll apologize to police officers right here.” 

Asked what made his thinking evolve, Mamdani said he grew up learning about police brutality and injustice, citing the Exonerated Five and the killing of Eric Garner. “Now what I know, having represented 100,000 people in Western Queens, is that to deliver that justice, you have to also deliver that safety. That means representing the men and women in the NYPD. It means representing the Black and brown New Yorkers who are victims of police brutality. It also means representing New Yorkers in my district who are surveilled on the basis of their faith.”