Uncommon Knowledge: Mamdani and MTG, Two Sides of the Sam...

...

By Newsweek StaffShareNewsweek is a Trust Project member

The sound bite of the week was anti-ideological, for once. In the Oval Office, President Donald Trump leaned toward New York’s mayor-elect, Zohran Mamdani, and said, “We have to get Con Edison to start lowering the rates.” Mamdani didn’t hedge. “Absolutely,” he replied. Trump later added the kicker: “The better he does, the happier I am… There’s no difference in party.” The socialist and the Republican president both framed the “really good, very productive meeting” as a pact to make life cheaper.

Hours later, Marjorie Taylor Greene—once MAGA’s loudest House microphone—announced she is quitting Congress on January 5, 2026, saying, “I refuse to be a ‘battered wife.’” She tied her split with Trump to policy breaks, which have notably included health-care costs, as well as the Epstein files. “Grocery prices remain high… energy prices are high… affordability is a problem,” she told CNN this month. Cynics noted she herself will clear the five-year threshold for a modest deferred congressional pension.

It means that Mamdani (on the populist left) and MTG (on the populist right) were singing the same hymn, on the same day, on the crisis voters rank above all others—make it cheaper—even if their sheet music for how to do it wildly differs. Affordability has become a common cause.

Common Knowledge

From the left, Mamdani has been explicit. In his victory speech: “Central to that vision will be the most ambitious agenda to tackle the cost-of-living crisis…freeze the rents…make buses fast and free, and deliver universal childcare.” At the White House, he called it “a productive meeting…focused…on the need to deliver affordability to New Yorkers,” adding, “We spoke about rent…groceries…utilities.”

From the right, Greene has been similar on the refrain, if not the remedy. On CNN, pressed on Trump’s claim that prices were easing, she answered: “No. I go to the grocery store myself. Grocery prices remain high…Energy prices are high…So, affordability is a problem.” She also torched her own leadership for failing to present a health-care plan as subsidies neared expiration: “I demanded to know…what the Republican plan for health care is…[he] refused to give one… I’m absolutely disgusted.”

Trump, for his part, agreed with New York’s socialist on the same issues: “We’ve just had a…very productive meeting…we want this city…to do very well…The better he does, the happier I am,” he told reporters, before zeroing in on Con Edison.

Even Democrats who loathe MTG noticed the affordability convergence. On Morning Joe this week, Willie Geist told Hakeem Jeffries: “It’s not just Democrats… it’s Republicans. Marjorie Taylor Greene chief among them” pressing to preserve the ACA subsidies; Jeffries agreed the push was bipartisan. And on Fox News Sunday in October, Representative Ro Khanna said flatly: “I agree with Marjorie Taylor Greene. The health care system is broken.”

Uncommon Knowledge

When voters say “affordability,” they mean the monthly bills that squeeze them in stubborn, compounding ways. That is why Mamdani and MTG—opposites in almost every other respect—can sound uncannily alike.

The health-care time bomb that animates Greene against Trump is real. KFF’s latest modeling projects that if Congress lets the enhanced ACA tax credits expire, average marketplace premium payments more than double from $888 in 2025 to $1,904 in 2026. The driver is both premium growth and a rule change that raises what families must pay toward a benchmark plan.

For Mamdani, the pressing issue is bills in his city. Trump and Mamdani chose a common culprit: Con Edison. Even if the regulatory mechanics are complex, the signal is clear—use federal and city leverage to shave recurring costs. It’s the same impetus behind Mamdani’s pledge to “freeze the rents…make buses fast and free,” though his method (tax the rich; socialize more costs) collides with conservative principles.

Greene’s affordability politics are both different and the same. She contradicted Trump’s “prices are down” messaging: “I go to the grocery store myself…affordability is a problem.” Then she blasted her own speaker for refusing to show his caucus a plan as the subsidy cliff neared—sarcastically quipping she’d need a SCIF to see it. Her resignation video made the rupture personal but the demands are unmistakable: a demand for cheaper basics and more transparency, culminating in the Epstein files push.

One final irony underscores the point. Months ago, on The Tucker Carlson Show, Greene startled media watchers by praising Mamdani’s debate moment about not grandstanding abroad as mayor: “Well, he gave the right answer…he’s talking to them on their level…‘They’re still poor. They can’t afford life.’” That line—however back-handed—captures the new politics precisely.

It’s not that a democratic socialist and a MAGA warrior agree on governance. They don’t. It’s that Americans have imposed a new litmus test. Mamdani wants to meet it by expanding the public role. Greene wanted to get there by forcing her party to avoid detonating family budgets. Trump is the man caught in the middle.

If you’re enjoying Uncommon Knowledge, please share. If you have suggestions for future editions or feedback, email [email protected]. We want to hear your voice.

Request Reprint & LicensingSubmit CorrectionView Editorial & AI Guidelines