WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Friday warmly welcomed one of America’s most powerful self-described democratic socialists to the Oval Office, saying he hopes New York Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani has a “great” term that builds a safer and more affordable Big Apple — after harshly criticizing him for months.

“The better he does, the happier I am. I will say there’s no difference in party. There’s no difference in anything,” Trump told reporters while seated behind the Resolute Desk with Mamdani standing beside him. “And we’re going to be helping him to make everybody’s dream come true, to having a strong and very safe New York. And congratulations, Mr. Mayor.”

Trump said some of his views of Mamdani have changed and expressed confidence the Democrat could do “a very good job.” He said the bulk of their private conversation had focused on keeping New York safe. And in a sign of how the views of populist politicians on the left and right can touch, like a horseshoe, the president later added, “Some of his ideas really are the same ideas that I have.”

Mamdani and Trump repeatedly did not take reporters’ bait when questioned about their past disagreements.

When the mayor-elect was asked if he still viewed Trump as a “fascist,” the president interjected by telling Mamdani, “That’s OK. You can just say yes. That’s easier. It’s easier than explaining.”

Mamdani said he and the president were “very clear about our positions and our views.”

“What I really appreciate about the president is the meeting that we had focused not on places of disagreement, which there are many, and also focused on the shared purpose that we have in serving New Yorkers,” Mamdani said after meeting with the Queens-born president for about a half hour.

The civil, and surreal, Oval Office scene came after a mayoral campaign that saw Trump slam the 34-year-old Democrat as a “communist” and threaten to withhold federal funds from the city if he was elected. The president even urged New Yorkers on the eve of the election to vote for former Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Mamdani prevailed, though, to become the first Asian American and first Muslim elected New York City’s chief executive.

Republicans have responded to his win by continuing to tie vulnerable Democrats across the country to his progressive policy stances, a sign the new mayor could be a top bogeyman for the GOP in 2026.

On Friday, Trump espoused a different view. “I met with a man who was a very rational person,” he said, before later explaining away his past rhetoric: “You say things sometimes in a campaign.”

The duo met hours after the White House pushed back on a report that Cabinet changes are coming as the second Trump administration nears the one-year mark.

According to CNN, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Energy Secretary Chris Wright are among the Cabinet officials who could be pushed out.

But, in a social media post, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the article “100% Fake News” and said “the White House repeatedly told this to CNN in the strongest possible terms.”

“The truth is: President Trump could not be happier with his Cabinet,” she said.

While Trump’s first term was marked by a steady stream of Cabinet and senior White House staff departures, his second stint in office has so far been more stable. During his first term, Trump once shrugged off the staff turnover by saying, “Everyone sort of leaves.”

Mamdani’s mayoral victory was part of a slew of Democratic successes in the off-year elections earlier this month, which saw the party win key governors races in Virginia and New Jersey, score a big redistricting victory in California and triumph in state and local races across the country. Like the other winning Democratic candidates, Mamdani’s campaign focused on the topic of affordability, arguing that things had become too expensive for Americans.

In the days after the elections, Trump blamed his own party for not talking enough about still-high prices and what they were doing to pare them down. But it was not long before the president appeared to change his tune, calling the affordability issue a “con job” created by Democrats. He also claimed that prices were “way down” across the board, despite Bureau of Labor Statistics data showing otherwise.

Mamdani was born in Uganda to Indian-origin parents — filmmaker Mira Nair and academic Mahmood Mamdani — and moved to the U.S. when he was 7 years old. He is set to be sworn in on Jan. 1 as New York City’s 111th chief executive. More than 2 million ballots were cast in the election, the highest in a Big Apple mayoral race since 1969, according to the New York City Board of Elections.

As part of a progressive platform aimed at tackling his city’s affordability crisis, Mamdani vowed, among other things, to implement a temporary rent freeze, make public buses free and launch a city-run grocery store pilot program. To pay for these and other programs, he’s proposed raising income taxes on wealthy residents and hiking the corporate tax rate, ideas critics in both parties have called naive and say will prove ineffective.

Trump, though, has ample reason to create at least a workable relationship with the youthful mayor-elect. The president’s family business organization still has properties — including Trump Tower — in the city.

And it was not the first time this week that questions were raised about the intersection of Trump’s family’s business and his political maneuvering.

“We’re seeing the complete merger of Trump’s business interests with U.S. diplomacy and military policy,” Robert Weissman, co-president of the left-leaning Public Citizen, said in a Tuesday statement after Trump hosted Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Washington. That visit, which featured a black-tie dinner and an investment event Wednesday, came amid reports that the Trump Organization was pursuing what could be a lucrative real estate deal with the Saudi government.

But with the 2026 midterm elections just around the corner, one GOP strategist with ties to Trump world said the president wanting to get a closer look at the progressive New York mayor-elect could just be down to politics.

“Look, Mamdani is going to be good for Trump,” the GOP strategist said in a recent telephone interview. “Him winning in New York helps Republicans in competitive (House) districts tie Democrat candidates to Mamdani and that crowd on the far left.”

(Victor Feldman contributed to this report.)

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