President Donald Trump raged against New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Thursday after the mayor announced a new tax on very wealthy part-time residents of the city.

“When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich,” Mamdani said in a video he posted to social media on Wednesday. “Well, today, we’re taxing the rich.”

Mamdani elaborated on the city’s first tax on pieds-à-terre, which are dwellings owned by individuals who do not live in the city most of the time. The plan is backed by New York Governor Kathy Hochul (D), who hopes the new tax will close a $5.4 billion fiscal gap through the next fiscal year.

The mayor explained:

This is an annual fee on luxury properties worth more than $5 million, whose owners do not live full-time in the city, like for this penthouse, which hedge fund CEO Ken Griffin bought for $238 million. This pied-à-terre tax is specifically designed for the richest of the rich, those who store their wealth in New York City real estate, but who don’t actually live. But even so, they’re able to reap the huge financial rewards of owning property in, dare I say, the greatest city in the world. And most of the time, these units are sitting empty, since again, they don’t actually live here. This is a fundamentally unfair system that hurts working New Yorkers. Now, it’s coming to an end. This tax will raise at least $500 million dollars directly for the city. It’ll help fund things like free childcare, cleaner streets, and safer neighborhoods.

The video was set to music that sounded much like the score from HBO’s Succession, the hit show about a wealthy family of amoral media moguls.

On Thursday, Trump, the longtime real estate tycoon, slammed Mamdani, posting on Truth Social:

Sadly, Mayor Mamdani is DESTROYING New York! It has no chance! The United States of America should not contribute to its failure. It will only get WORSE. The TAX, TAX, TAX Policies are SO WRONG. People are fleeing. They must change their ways, AND FAST. History has proven, THIS “STUFF” JUST DOESN’T WORK. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DJT

Trump’s post represented quite the about-face. In November, Mamdani, then the mayor-elect, visited the president in the Oval Office in what many deemed a “love fest” between the two.

When a reporter asked Mamdani if he still believes Trump is a fascist, the mayor started to answer, but was immediately interrupted.

“That’s ok, you can just say yes,” the president told him.

“Ok, alright,” Mamdani said.

“It’s easier than explaining it,” Trump said while laughing and slapping Mamdani’s arm.

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