WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump branded the winner of New York City’s mayoral Democratic primary a “pure communist” in remarks that aired Sunday, an epithet the progressive candidate dismissed as political theatrics.
Zohran Mamdani’s shock win last week against a scandal-scarred political heavyweight resonated as a thunderclap within the party, and drew the ire of Trump and his collaborators, who accused Mamdani of being a radical extremist.
The Republican’s aggressive criticism of the self-described democratic socialist is sure to ramp up over the coming months as Trump’s party seeks to push Democrats away from the political center and frame them as too radical to win major US elections. “He’s pure communist” and a “radical leftist… lunatic,” Trump fumed on Fox News talk show “Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo.” “I think it’s very bad for New York,” added Trump, who grew up in the city and built his sprawling real estate business there.