New York state assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City, told reporters on Wednesday that he would not defund the police should he be elected—a contrast to previous statements made by the Democratic Socialist.
“I am not defunding the police. I am not running to defund the police,” he said after meeting with the family of Didarul Islam, 36, the New York City police officer of Bangladeshi descent, and husband and father of two, who was killed on Monday in the mass shooting at an office building in Midtown Manhattan.
The leading mayoral candidate has made several comments in the past that criticize law enforcement, as well as directly call for the defunding and dismantling of the New York City Police Department.
“We don’t need an investigation to know that the NYPD is racist, anti-queer and a major threat to public safety,” he wrote on social media in June 2020. “What we need is to #DefundTheNYPD. No to fake cuts—defund the police.”
Additionally, in a July 2020 thread debating then-New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s budget for the NYPD, Mamdani wrote: “None of these people are fit to lead. We need a Socialist city council to defund the police.”
In his statement to reporters on Wednesday, Mamdani described himself as a “candidate who is not fixed in time, one that learns and one that leads, and part of that means admitting as I have grown,” according to CNN.
The candidate said he will instead propose the creation of a “Department of Community Safety” that would respond to certain emergencies, such as those involving people experiencing mental-health crises, CNN reported.
