CNN’s Abby Phillip laid out some surprising policy overlaps between President Donald Trump and New York City Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic socialist.
On CNN’s Table for Five on Saturday, Phillip and her panel discussed Mamdani and his challenge to debate Trump. Mamdani asked for the debate following reports that Trump would offer an administration position to New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) in order to clear the way for Andrew Cuomo to take on Mamdani.
Phillip turned to a clip of Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) from earlier in the week in which he accused the administration of taking a “step towards socialism” over the decision to take a 10% stake in chipmaker Intel.
“I think it’s a big mistake to have government ownership of things and of course it’s a step towards socialism. What is worrisome is when you see the people supporting the president, just sort of saying, no, no this is good and it is good that the government should own. And that really worries me because I worry that the free market movement, the movement that was a big part of the Republican Party is being diminished over time,” Paul told CNBC.
“He’s talking about a lot of things that Trump has done lately that not just him, but several others have attributed to kind of a move towards socialism. And that has led to a lot
She then cut to a screen breaking down policy similarities between Trump and Mamdani.
“You have Trump offering tariff rebate checks, potentially, $1,000 baby accounts, big ticket infrastructure plans, subsidies for U.S. industries, buying into and getting stakes in those industries,” Phillip said. “And of course Mamdani has a lot of things… free child care, ownership of grocery stores, public transit, right control, etc. But he’s not alone, right? And according to Rand Paul, Trump is headed in that direction too.”
Watch above via CNN.