Trump flips Dems' 'affordability' script, turning buzzword into MAGA material as Mamdani visit looms

By Fox News · Fox News

"Affordability" was the hot-button word on the 2025 campaign trail, as Democrats separated themselves from the Biden-era economy and lobbed attacks on President Donald Trump for current cost-of-living woes. And on Friday, the main champion of the "affordability" platform in the 2025 election cycle, socialist New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani , will travel to the White House for his first meeting with Trump. The socialist candidate, who was relatively unknown until his primary defeat against former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, hammered home during his campaign that his policies would ease New Yorkers' notoriously high housing prices, cut food costs and bring down the cost of living overall — including by hiking taxes on the wealthy and corporations to bridge the financial gap. LIZ PEEK: WHY EVERY 'AFFORDABLE' PROMISE FROM DEMOCRATS ENDS UP COSTING YOU MORE "I know that for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, this meeting is between two very different candidates who they voted for, for the same reason," Mamdani said Thursday about his meeting with Trump. "They wanted a leader who would take on the cost-of-living crisis. That makes it impossible for working people to afford living in this city." A winning economic strategy is nothing new to the president, however, considering his first administration and 2024 election platform focused on pulling the U.S. out of an economic hole. And Trump is making moves to lay claim over the word "affordability" while taking shots at the Biden administration's record on prices. "The word is affordable and affordable. It should be our word, not theirs," Trump said Monday evening during McDonald’s Impact Summit 2025 in Washington. "Because the Democrats got up in affordability, the front of it. And they don't say that they had the worst inflation in history, the highest energy prices in history. Everything was the worst. What? The great ad is lying. They say affordability. This stuff was all much more expensive." The White House to…