President Trump urged Republican voters in New York City late Monday to cross party lines and support Andrew Cuomo for mayor as part of an 11th hour bid to stop Democratic front-runner Zohran Mamdani from taking over the reins at City Hall.
“Whether you personally like Andrew Cuomo or not, you really have no choice. You must vote for him, and hope he does a fantastic job. He is capable of it,” Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform just over 12 hours before New Yorkers were set to head to the polls for Tuesday’s mayoral election.
The Republican president’s words of support come as Cuomo, who’s running as an independent candidate and trailing Mamdani by double digits in most polls, has in the final days of the race focused heavily on trying to appeal to GOP voters to cut into Sliwa’s margin.
Cuomo, a life-long registered Democrat, has pleaded with local Republicans to support him and not “waste” their vote on GOP mayoral nominee Curtis Sliwa, who has polled in third place, generally with around 15% support.
In his Truth Social post, Trump echoed the same theme, writing that, “a vote for Curtis Sliwa (who looks much better without the beret!) is a vote for Mamdani.”
Asked for a response to Trump’s jab, Sliwa focused on previous comments the president has made about Cuomo.
“Even the president said Andrew Cuomo handled COVID horribly, destroyed New York, and was a total loser, and now Cuomo wants another shot at this city?” Sliwa, who has steadfastly refused to drop out of the race, told the Daily News. “The people will decide and they’ll reject him again because New Yorkers won’t be bullied back into the past.”
In his Truth Social post, the president also went on extensive tear against Mamdani, writing that he’d create a “Total Economic and Social Disaster” for the city before reiterating a threat to strip New York of federal funding if Mamdani wins.
“It is highly unlikely that I will be contributing Federal Funds, other than the very minimum as required, to my beloved first home, because of the fact that, as a Communist, this once great City has ZERO chance of success, or even survival!” he wrote. “It can only get worse with a Communist at the helm, and I don’t want to send, as President, good money after bad.”
Mamdani is a democratic socialist.
Minutes after Trump’s tweet, Cuomo appeared on billionaire Republican businessman John Catsimatidis’ 77ABC radio show and said “the president is right” to label a vote for Sliwa pointless.
“Now it’s going to be up to the Republicans, and I hope they listen to the president,” Cuomo told Catsimatidis, who’s a major donor to Trump.
Throughout this year’s mayoral campaign, Cuomo has said he wouldn’t accept a mayoral endorsement from Trump. After Cuomo’s radio show appearance, his spokesman Rich Azzopardi said the ex-governor’s comments regarding the impact of a Sliwa vote didn’t amount to accepting Trump’s support.
Mamdani, speaking to reporters at a canvassing launch in Queens, said Trump’s support for Cuomo didn’t surprise him, citing the fact that a number of wealthy Trump donors have lined up behind Cuomo.
“I did not, however, anticipate Andrew Cuomo going from being Donald Trump’s puppet to being so nakedly his parrot. What he has said in these last few days, these are words that should shock the conscience of New Yorkers,” Mamdani said, pointing specifically to a comment Cuomo made on television over the weekend about how he believes demographic “diversity can be a weakness” in society.
Trump is widely disliked in overwhelmingly Democratic New York City, and it could be a politically risky move for Cuomo to be seen as too closely associated with the divisive commander-in-chief.
At the same time, Trump remains influential with Republicans across the country, including in New York, and his last-minute offer of support for Cuomo could help him make inroads with GOP voters.
Voting was set to start at 6 a.m. Tuesday and continue through 9 p.m. More than 730,000 New Yorkers have already voted early prior to Tuesday.
