Adalberto Rodriguez wasn’t someone who paid much attention to politics — until President Donald Trump faced a criminal trial in New York City last year.
Rodriguez, a 30-year-old who lives in Brooklyn, felt he saw similarities between his own legal troubles and what he believed was “political lawfare” Trump dealt with in his city. Soon, he was all-in on Trump, attending rallies in the Bronx and Philadelphia and at Madison Square Garden. He proudly voted for Trump in 2024.
This year, Rodriguez became enthralled with another New York City political figure on the rise: Zohran Mamdani, now the mayor-elect.
“I pray for these two guys specifically,” Rodriguez said in an interview. “And that’s pretty much the first time in my life I’ve ever had such a level of excitement towards any politician. It’s funny, because a lot of people think that I’m joking or trolling or trying to stir the pot. I get that all the time. I know it’s going to sound silly, but it actually is the opposite.”
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.
The affordability overlap
In an interview with NBC News, Mamdani said he mentioned the exit polling stat to the president at their November meeting to explain how both men had made appeals to some of the same voters. Mamdani also highlighted a campaign video he shot right after Trump’s victory — and soon after launching his own bid — in which he spoke with voters in the Bronx and Queens about why they voted for the president.
“I told the president that while our campaign began on Oct. 23, there were far more people who learned of us after his victory because of the video that we shared, where I went to two of the neighborhoods that saw the largest swings towards him in the election,” Mamdani said. “And I asked New Yorkers who they voted for and why, and the vast majority of the New Yorkers that I spoke to voted for the president. And when I asked them why, they came back to cost of living, cost of living, cost of living.”
“And I told the president that one of my focuses had been, in the campaign was how to win these voters back, and chief among them was not just young men, but also Asian voters, immigrant voters,” Mamdani continued. “There were so many obituaries being written about the Democratic Party’s ability to engage with these voters or win them ever again. And when I asked these voters what it would take to come back, they told me it was a focus on an economic agenda.”
Mamdani said the lessons he took away from those exchanges served as a “through line in our entire campaign,” adding that he made the case to Trump that affordability “would continue to be my focus” in office.
In front of the cameras, Trump ultimately praised Mamdani as “a very rational person” who “really wants to see New York be great again.” Reached after the meeting, a senior White House official said the discussion “couldn’t have gone better!”
But as operatives and political leaders on the progressive left and the MAGA right seek to nationalize Mamdani’s image for the midterm elections and beyond, Republicans didn’t express worry that Trump was throwing a wrench in their plans. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said he thinks Trump “ought to be open to meet with anybody,” while Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said he felt the confab was “what I’d call a courtesy meeting.”
“I don’t think he’s going to become too close with him,” added Cornyn, who’s facing re-election in Texas.
But Mamdani recently had another discussion with the president. The mayor-elect told NY1’s “Inside City Hall” last week that the two men had “spoken briefly” since their initial meeting.
Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., told NBC News he was surprised the meeting last month between the two men was as “collegial” as it was, chalking it up to how much the president “cares about New York City.”
As for Trump-Mamdani voters, Hoeven said he believed they were spurred by concerns over affordability.”
“In the case of President Trump, his policies really will help with affordability,” Hoeven said. “And I think some of them are hoping Mamdani’s will because he says they will. But they won’t.”
‘Just had a vibe that they will get along’
Cost of living was front of mind for Rodriguez, who said that although he cast a ballot for Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, he did not feel “represented or seen” by political leaders aside from Trump and Mamdani, both of whom rose to power as antiestablishment outsiders from Queens.
But so far in Trump’s first year in office in his second term, Rodriguez says he’s yet to have his economic concerns addressed by the president. Rodriguez also described Trump’s handling of the release of information surrounding the late convicted sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein to be “absurd.”
“It’s a situation where I’m still hanging in there,” Rodriguez said of his support for Trump. “I mean, being realistic, because I am a realistic person, I feel like the numbers aren’t showing. Much hasn’t really changed. … I’m still riding with him, because I’m giving him the chance.”
Rodriguez acknowledged that “it takes time for the effects” of Trump’s agenda “to kick in,” but, he added, “it’s not really seeming like a lot is going on.”
“I heard that he’s going to go around the country trying to explain to voters … what they’re doing,” he said, noting that the recent disruption of food stamps during the government shutdown hit him directly. “That was one of the times I was personally affected. You’ve got to look at yourself and be like, wait a minute, this is really not what I voted for. But like I said, I’m still hanging in there. I’m not sure what it’ll take for me to completely sever ties. I still think there’s a shot that a lot could be done.”
On Mamdani, Rodriguez said he first caught wind of his candidacy when former classmates were engaging with the 34-year-old’s content on social media. And what really garnered his attention was seeing Mamdani earlier this year confront Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, in Albany, which Rodriguez said showed “this guy’s got balls.” He wants to see Mamdani achieve his agenda on housing, child care and free bus service.
Recalling the Oval Office meeting between the president and the mayor-elect, Rodriguez said he enjoyed when the two men discussed rate hikes by Consolidated Edison, the utility company in New York City.
“From the Oval Office meeting alone, I saw the Queens in them both,” he said, adding, “I just had a vibe that they will get along.”
Ron Barba, an actor and stock trader who went viral in the run-up to Election Day for sporting a “MAGA for Mamdani” T-shirt at campaign events, backed Mamdani after supporting Trump in 2020 and 2024. He described himself as a “reluctant” Trump voter last year who was worried the president was at least partially responsible for further dividing the country, though he said he “could not stand” then-Vice President Kamala Harris.
“I was going to vote for Robert Kennedy because he was in the middle at the time,” Barba said. “But then all of a sudden, he shifted over to the right and went to Trump. And so then I said, ‘Well, now I have no one that I really want, so I’m just going to vote for Trump again.’ And immediately, about three months in, I was like, ‘Here we go again with the fighting.’”
“So I was looking for someone new,” Barba said. “I didn’t realize that I was, but I was looking for someone new. And when Zohran won in the primary mayoral election, I started to research him, and I fell in love with him. … I love an underdog.”
Both Barba and Rodriguez expressed a desire for the country to be more united — and they see a Mamdani partnership with Trump as something that could bridge divides.
Where Trump and Mamdani go from here
For his part, Mamdani has said that while he is open to working with Trump on cost-of-living issues, he said he expressed deep concerns about increased immigration enforcement in the city. And in an interview with NBC News’ “Meet the Press” following his meeting with Trump last month, Mamdani said he still believes the president is a “fascist” and a “despot.”
A former White House official, granted anonymity to speak candidly about the meeting, said the two hit it off as well as they did “because they have no reason to beef right now.”
“There’s no friction point, but there will be eventually,” this person said. “POTUS was really nice to Biden during their transition [meeting]. I’m not holding my breath thinking they’re going to be bros for the coming years.”
Social media users ran wild online when, one day after the two men met in the Oval Office, the president was seen on the White House grounds wearing an overcoat with a large red scarf, prompting comparisons with Mamdani’s style.
“We did not discuss style,” Mamdani told NBC News. “We kept our conversation to cost of living, by and large.”
Still, Mamdani has felt a newfound warmth and “increased openness” from his onetime opponents “not simply since the meeting itself, but also since the election.”
“For everyone’s different set of opinions on the competing visions for this city, New Yorkers also understand themselves as being New Yorkers and are therefore committed to the success of that city and I’ve been heartened by that,” he said.
Mamdani added that he spoke with Trump about Barba, who was wearing his “MAGA for Mamdani” shirt at his Forest Hills rally in October.
“There are many New Yorkers for whom their question is less how you describe your politics, and it’s more of, ‘Does your politics include me in it?’” Mamdani said. “And the inclusion is not just of a sense of self, but rather of the struggle that that person is facing.”
For Rodriguez, he’s hopeful that Trump’s meeting with Mamdani might mark a new, less-heated chapter in politics.
“I would love more unity,” he said. “No more fighting, please.”