But on Thursday, Trump will return to his home city for the first time since becoming president.
He might not like what he finds. Despite having spent almost 70 years of his life in the Big Apple, stepping out on the town, cultivating and manipulating tabloid newspapers, and slapping his name on anything that didn’t move, he is widely unpopular in New York City.
Trump will be appearing with the Australian prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, aboard the USS Intrepid, an aircraft-carrier-turned-museum, in an event to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Battle of the Coral Sea – a naval battle waged by the US and Australia against Japan during the second world war.
But blocks away, thousands of people will be staging a mass protest against the president and his government.
“We want him to know, and we want the world to know, that Trump’s values are not New York values,” said Joe Dinkin, a director with the progressive Working Families party and one of the organizers of the demonstration.
“Trump has spent his first 100 days demonizing immigrants and Muslims and pushing a plan that would take healthcare away from millions of people,” Dinkin said. “We don’t want him to use a military setting, with New York City as a backdrop, as a kind of congratulatory press conference. We want the story to be about his real record.”
The president may well be expecting a hostile hometown reception.
