I Know Why Trump Loves Mamdani Because I Have Trump's Mind

Surprised that Trump seems enamored with a leftist mayor? I'm not, because my brain works like Trump's.

A long time ago I was talking to my psychologist at the time, and I was getting worked up about something—I forget what, probably something stupid—and he stopped me and said “I don’t want to offend you, but when you get really anxious about a topic you start talking exactly like Donald Trump.”

Luckily for him, I wasn’t offended. It was 2017 and I was well aware of Trump’s notorious perpetual-run-on-sentence way of speaking, with constant riffs and conversational side quests. I was already working on my now-infamous Trump impression, although I wasn’t doing it intentionally that day in therapy. I didn’t find Trump’s political actions funny, but I did find his personality and speech funny, and I had been studying Trump’s brain and worldview since his 2006 feud with Rosie O’Donnell (I wrote about that here). You could call me a scholar of apolitical Trump psychology at this point—such as his need to be the dom in any given relationship, rotating through various subs as he loses respect for them or they fail to be sufficiently loyal and supplicating.

Having spent lots of time thinking about the way Trump’s mind works, I struggle with really despising him as a politician, but knowing that if he had just stayed out of politics and gone the celeb gossip TV show host route, I’d like him. And I think on some level it’s because my mind works a lot like his. Even as a young (well, in comparison to Trump) liberal woman, my brain works very much the same way as his does, particularly when it comes to how badly I want people to like me, my desire to be a winner (with zero nuance, too—if I’m not a winner, I’m a loser) and how easily swayed I am by flattery.

So when Trump “inexplicably” mooned over leftist NYC mayor Zohran Mamdani in the White House, I immediately understood what was going on. People like Trump (and well, me) can have our good will unlocked in a very particular way—not just with flattery, but with flattery from a very unexpected person who should hate us. And if I dare say so myself, I don’t think it’s that unusual a phenomenon.