Trump Takes Aim at Mamdani’s NYC Pied-à-Terre Tax

Good evening. In a televised interview with Real America's Voice, President Trump coyly played along with the suggestion that he could declare a national security emergency to force the adoption of his desired election restrictions, including voter ID requirements, proof of citizenship for voter registration and a limit to mail-in ballots. "Let me just say that stranger things have happened, OK?" Trump said. "I'll leave it at that." There's no indication yet that Trump will act along those lines, but his comment adds to concerns that he might try to exert control over the November midterms.\n\nHere's what else we're watching.

Trump Takes Aim at Mamdani's NYC Pied-à-Terre Tax

President Trump made it clear Tuesday that he opposes Mayor Zohran Mamdani's new tax on second homes in New York City, saying on his social media platform that he is exploring whether the federal government can intervene to block it.

Passed by the New York legislature in May with the backing of Mamdani and New York State Gov. Kathy Hochul, the so-called pied-a-terre tax would apply to certain second homes located inside New York City, with the proceeds going toward a variety of local programs, including education and public safety.

"I am looking to see if the Federal Government has any legal right to avert this disaster, before it is too late, for the millions of people who cherish New York and want to see it thrive, as opposed to becoming a filthy, crime ridden, decrepit place of mockery and scorn," Trump wrote.

The president, who is likely to have to pay the tax when enacted, claimed that the "dangerous political 'experiment' in New York will destroy what was once a great City and State." He added that "Financial, and then Social, RUIN, is a 100% certainty." He also linked the property tax to congestion pricing, a fee imposed on cars entering lower Manhattan that he said was the work of "Radical Left Jihadists."

A judge briefly blocked the New York tax on Monday. Wayne Ozzi, a state judge in Staten Island, ordered the city to withdraw its list of nearly 1 million properties that were potentially subject to the tax, and to halt any enforcement actions ahead of a hearing scheduled for August 31.

Speaking to reporters Monday, Mamdani said the city would defend the tax in court. In the meantime, given the city's appeal, the tax rollout is allowed to continue.

"We are confident in our position," Mamdani said. "And that is a confidence coming from both the legality of the City's actions as well as the importance of a surcharge on secondary homes worth more than $5 million, a surcharge that will help fund safer streets, that will help fund stronger schools, and it will help fund the city that New Yorkers deserve."

Trump Slams Report Finding Costly Troop Deployments Haven't Reduced Urban Crime

President Trump lashed out angrily Monday night at a report published by the Center for American Progress (CAP), a liberal think tank, that said that his National Guard deployments to U.S. cities have largely failed to reduce crime even as it could cost taxpayers more than $1.7 billion.

The report was published nearly a month ago, but in a 10:31 p.m. post on his social media site last night, Trump attacked its author, Chandler Hall, the associate director for public safety at CAP. Why the delayed response? Hall had appeared on C-Span earlier in the day and detailed the report's findings that violent crime and murder were already declining in cities where Trump sent or threatened to send National Guard troops. The report argued that the pre-existing trends were more than likely to continue without any of Trump's actions.

"I think it's unfortunate that the president is continuing to still choose to boast that these deployments, these very costly interventions, are showing any results to try to convince voters that they should sign on for more of these kinds of interventions and federal overreach, when again, there's no proof that they have any effect," Hall said on C-Span.

Responding on Truth Social, Trump challenged Hall and the report's findings.

"Chandler Hall, representing, on Television, the foolish Center for American Lack of Progress, stated that adding the National Guard to Cities, including our now Great Again, Washington, D.C., had 'NO impact on Crime.' How crazy is that," he wrote.

Trump called the CAP report "just another Radical Left SCAM" and, true to his playbook, threatened to bring a lawsuit against the think tank and, potentially, some of its donors. He included a long list of individuals and companies, from George Soros and Bill Gates to Google, Apple, Bank of America, Walmart and more.

"Liars, at this level, must be held accountable!" he wrote before signing off.

What about Washington, D.C.? The National Guard deployment and broader federal crackdown on crime in the nation's capital started exactly one year ago and was recently extended through January 2029, with the extended mission estimated to cost an additional $1.4 billion. Trump has repeatedly touted the results of the deployment and claimed that he has eliminated crime in Washington and made it "one of the safest" places in the United States and capitals in the world. But a new analysis by The Washington Post concludes that Trump's claims "oversimplify and overstate the impact of the federal intervention."

Jeff Asher, a crime data analyst, told the Post that rates of violent crime have been falling across the country since peaking in 2023.

"If you want to argue that there was an additional decline on top of that due to all these interventions, you could plausibly make that argument," Asher told the Post. "But you can't make the argument that the intervention caused that decline or even was a major factor in those trends turning over."

The Post reports that another analysis conducted by Thaddeus Johnson, an assistant professor at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University, found that property crimes and auto thefts had fallen to levels lower than expected, but the picture from the troop surge on violent crimes was somewhat mixed.

"One would be hard-pressed to say that it didn't play a role," Johnson told the Post, "but you would also be hard-pressed to say it was the only or primary reason why we've seen reductions."

Quote of the Day

"The second-term President Trump appears to have much less regard for the other branches of the federal government than the first-term one did."

• David Super, a professor at Georgetown Law, as quoted in a Washington Post article detailing the ways in which Trump has continued to pursue his agenda by looking for ways around Supreme Court rulings that went against him.

"The president has introduced new tariffs, renewed efforts to fire Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook and issued new executive orders to limit birthright citizenship," the Post's Julian Mark writes. "While experts said the moves do not signal outright defiance of the high court, they nonetheless push the limits of the rulings that Trump lost earlier this summer."

In the case of the tariffs and the effort to fire Cook, Supreme Court justices themselves have also outlined ways that Trump could pursue his desired goals within the bounds of the law.

Yet while some previous presidents have looked for ways to work around unfavorable Supreme Court decisions, Super told the Post that Trump's approach stands out: "Most presidents treated Supreme Court rulings as dispositive of the issues involved rather than as technical documents to be evaded."

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Fiscal News Roundup

• Contradicting Public Statements, Trump Took Secret Flight From Turkey Amid Iranian Threat – Washington Post
• Deficit Will Be $200B More Than Initially Anticipated: CBO Projection – The Hill
• Government Fights Trade Judge's Order for Tariff Refunds to All Importers – Associated Press
• A Group of Centrist Senators Sees a Window to Overhaul Social Security – NOTUS
• Hegseth Pushes for Pentagon Funding During Renaming of Military Base After Lindsey Graham – CNN
• Trump Turns National Parks Into Piggybank – Scott MacFarlane, Substack
• Ex-ICE Agent's Group Awarded $158 Million to Represent Migrant Children – Washington Post
• FAA Hires 2,000+ Gamers to Be Air Traffic Controllers – The Hill
• Judge Finds Kennedy Center Owes Musician $250,000 in Legal Fees – NBC News
• Avenger Surface-to-Air Missile System Protected Trump While Golfing – TWZ
• Trump Media Company Announces a Massive Loss and New Turnaround Effort – The Hill

Views and Analysis

• When America's Budget Will Break, Disastrously – Washington Post Editorial Board
• 3 Headlines That Explain America's Debt Situation – Neil Irwin, Axios
• Trump Refuses to Back Down as Supreme Court Blocks Major Policies – Julian Mark, Washington Post
• Trump's Vaccine Order Puts Parents In a Bind – Lisa Jarvis, Bloomberg
• Warsh Has Deeper Problems Than a Rocky Start at the Fed – Bill Dudley, Bloomberg
• The California Left and the Wealth Tax – Harold Meyerson, American Prospect
• An MIT Economist Exposes Liberalism's Self-Inflicted Wounds – Julia R. Cartwright, Washington Post
• The Closing of the U.S. Economy's K-Shaped Gap – Courtenay Brown, Axios
• The Data Center Backlash Is Building – Amber Phillips, Washington Post
• Fact Check: Trump Makes Numerous False and Misleading Claims About Vaccines and Autism – Daniel Dale, CNN
• 'Embarrassing': Five Writers on Which Trump Appointee Has Surprised Them Most – Washington Post