4 hours ago
1
Mr. Adams, who was elected on a law-and-order campaign message, is seeking to portray Zohran Mamdani, this year’s Democratic nominee, as weak on crime.
July 17, 2025, 4:14 p.m. ET
Four years ago, Eric Adams used a law-and-order campaign message to help propel himself into City Hall. On Thursday, many of those responsible for law and order in New York City came together to try to keep him there.
Thirteen law enforcement unions endorsed Mayor Adams’s third-party bid for re-election, filling the steps of City Hall in a show of support. The participants were not in uniform, but held aloft signs displaying the seals or badges of their unions. Others waved American flags. One person held a handwritten sign: “Make Adams Great Again.”
Mr. Adams’s leadership of the Police Department has been turbulent.
He cycled through three police commissioners before Jessica Tisch’s appointment in November, the first mayor to have that many in a single term since the 1930s. On Wednesday, one of those former commissioners filed a lawsuit accusing Mr. Adams and top police officials of running the Police Department like a criminal enterprise.
The mayor, however, has tried to focus attention on the city’s receding crime numbers as a rallying point to bolster his bid for a second term, and as an argument against the candidacy of Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee and a democratic socialist. Mr. Adams argued that Mr. Mamdani’s progressive policies will hurt businesses and make the city less safe.
“I know the prerequisite to our prosperity is public safety,” Mr. Adams, a Democrat, said on Thursday. “I know the answer to dealing with law enforcement is not opening the doors to 7,400 violent criminals and letting them out of Rikers Island. I know it makes no sense to tell police officers that they should not respond to domestic violence incidents.”
Crime in the city has been dropping steadily from the levels seen during the pandemic, according to Police Department data. In the first half of 2025, major crime in the city fell by 6 percent compared with the same period last year. Murders dropped by 23 percent; the city recorded the fewest shooting victims for the first half of any year since 1994; and the subway system had its fewest robberies since 2007 and its safest six-month period since 2010, the police said.
The core of Mr. Mamdani’s public safety proposals hews to progressive policies that call for reducing poverty and addressing mental health as a way to help prevent crime.
In April, Mr. Mamdani released a 17-page public safety plan that proposed creating a separate Department of Community Safety, with a budget of about $1 billion, as a parallel entity to the Police Department. He has not called for hiring more officers. The department has a budget of about $6.3 billion for fiscal year 2026, according to city data.
Benny Boscio Jr., president of the Corrections Officers’ Benevolent Association, characterized the “progressive, left-wing policies” of former Mayor Bill de Blasio as an “epic failure” for the city and warned that Mr. Mamdani wanted to repeat them.
“It’s quite evident that the Democratic nominee for mayor is seeking to bring back the same failed political ideology that created those reckless policies,” Mr. Boscio said.
Other labor groups that endorsed Mr. Adams on Thursday included unions representing New York City detectives, sergeants, lieutenants, captains and probation officers. The city’s largest police union, the Police Benevolent Association, has not endorsed the mayor. That union will most likely make a decision about an endorsement in the fall, a spokesman said.
Jeffrey Lerner, a spokesman for Mr. Mamdani, said it was the current mayor who had created a reckless environment for law enforcement.
“I don’t suppose his endorsements today included any number of former N.Y.P.D. officials who have filed lawsuits against Adams over rampant corruption,” Mr. Lerner said. “Zohran’s comprehensive public safety plan will allow cops to tackle major crimes rather than fending off a corrupt mayor.”
Asked about the lawsuit by Thomas G. Donlon, the former police commissioner, Mr. Adams called Mr. Donlon a “frivolous, disgruntled employee.”
Mr. Mamdani can expect to answer questions about statements he made before he was a mayoral candidate, including his suggestion that the Police Department should be defunded, and to be portrayed by his opponents as “soft on crime,” said John Mollenkopf, a professor of political science who runs the Center for Urban Research at the CUNY Graduate Center.
Indeed, Mr. Mamdani has spent time trying to build bridges with his critics. Last week, he sought to assuage the concerns of the city’s business leaders and some of his more powerful Democratic allies by saying he is open to keeping Ms. Tisch as the city’s police commissioner if he wins in November.
Ms. Tisch, a billionaire heiress who has worked as a public servant in New York City for nearly two decades, has called for stricter criminal justice policies and has created units to crack down on quality-of-life crimes. In recent weeks, as the general election heats up, Ms. Tisch has seemed to throw her support behind her boss, praising Mr. Adams’s leadership and support of the Police Department. Many union leaders at Thursday’s event agreed.
“Let’s be honest: The economic engine of the city is driven by public safety,” said Louis Turco, president of the Lieutenants Benevolent Association. “Tourists will not come here if they don’t feel safe. Businesses won’t be here if their employees feel unsafe leaving subway.”
Maia Coleman contributed reporting.
Jeffery C. Mays is a Times reporter covering politics with a focus on New York City Hall.
Hurubie Meko is a Times reporter covering criminal justice in New York, with a focus on the Manhattan district attorney's office and state courts.
