“I’m so torn because I would like to see the new mayor do well because I love New York. I really love New York. When I left New York for Washington, New York was doing really well, but there were some bad signs,” he told host Bret Baier in an interview with Fox News, going on to bash former Mayor Bill de Blasio, but saying Mamdani is worse.

“Look, for a thousand years, communism has not worked. Communism, or the concept of communism, has not worked. I tend to doubt it will work this time,” Trump added.

When asked about Mamdani’s victory speech, Trump gave a scathing review.

“I thought it was a very angry speech. Certainly angry toward me, and I think he should be nice to me. I’m sort of the one that has to approve a lot of things coming to him, so he’s off to a bad start,” the president said.

After Baier showed a clip of the speech, in which Mamdani taunted the president, addressing him directly and saying, “To get to any of us, you will have to get through all of us,” Trump said he was acting dangerously.

“It’s a very dangerous statement for him to make, actually. You talk about danger; I think it’s a very dangerous statement for him to make. He has to be a little bit respectful of Washington. Because if he’s not, he doesn’t have a chance of succeeding. And I want to make him succeed. I want to make the city succeed,” he added.

Regarding direct talks between the two, Trump said it would be more “appropriate” if Mamdani reached out first.

During the interview, Trump also gave a sober analysis of the Republican losses suffered during Tuesday’s elections. In contrast to his rhetoric after the results were announced, dismissing them as simply due to his absence from the ballot, the president adopted a sober tone on Wednesday.

Seemingly humbled, Trump said that Republicans had to do a better job with messaging, particularly on affordability and the economy.

EDITORIAL: VOTERS SEND TRUMP A COURSE CORRECTION MESSAGE

“The country is doing very well, but as Republicans, you have to talk about it because if you don’t talk about it … I saw [the Democrats] kept talking about affordability. Biden was a disaster with affordability. He had the highest inflation rate in the history of the country, but you have to talk about it. It’s no good if we do a great job and you don’t talk about it, and I don’t think they talk about it enough,” he said. 

“As a Republican, you have to let people know,” Trump added.