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While President Donald Trump held a lovefest for New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani in the Oval Office last week, the right flank of his party was promptly freaking out. “Wild to allow a jihadist communist to stand behind the president’s desk in the Oval Office,” Laura Loomer, conspiracy theorist and unofficial Trump adviser , lamented on X . She was not the only one lacing her criticism of Trump’s meeting with Mamdani with outright bigotry that targeted the mayor-elect’s Muslim faith. Prior to Trump’s meeting, Republicans had actually strategized around making Mamdani—and his Muslim background—a serious political target going forward.

The consequences

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