The Oval Office meeting between Mamdani and Trump last month turned heads, with some observers stunned at what a warm reception the right-wing Republican president gave to the democratic socialist mayor-to-be. But in New York City, this wasn’t so surprising to Rodriguez. And he wasn’t alone.
NBC News exit polling from the November vote showed 9% of 2024 Trump voters who showed up at the polls backed Mamdani, a phenomenon highlighted by one voter’s “MAGA for Mamdani” T-shirt that went viral in the run-up to Election Day. Trump himself was fascinated by the development, citing the statistic to reporters following his meeting with Mamdani.
“A lot of my voters actually voted for” Mamdani, Trump said. “One in 10, and I’m OK with that.”
Mamdani and his allies see their success winning over a segment of Trump voters as a sign of how other Democrats can win back parts of the electorate that spurned the party for Trump in 2024, including young men and immigrants who felt the party was unresponsive to their needs. But Republicans who spoke to NBC News said that while they were surprised by both the number of Trump-Mamdani voters and the congeniality of the president’s meeting with the mayor-elect, they did not feel as if Mamdani unlocked a road map to reconfigure the electorate.
Yes and no. This ultimately a desire for their elected representatives to just fucking do something, and both Trump and Mamdani promised to do things that will make their lives better. Obviously one of these is a grift, but that’s beside the point.
And yet this lesson will be completely lost to established DNC, and they will learn the wrong lesson again and move further to the right.
Meanwhile we’ll get another Trump who promises Great Things whereas Democrats will promise to keep things the same.
We desperately need a new political party that can push people who want change to vote progressive.
Realistically, there are two possible explanations for why the Democrats are so stubbornly useless:
It’s a big club and you ain’t in it.
You can’t get a man to understand something when his salary depends on not understanding it.
Either way the idea that they could “learn” anything fundamentally misunderstands why they do what they do. Their job isn’t to get into power; it’s to make sure you don’t get into power.