By Jonathan Allen and Maria Tsvetkova
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Jessica Tisch, the New York City police commissioner who has overseen a drop in violent crime under outgoing Mayor Eric Adams, has agreed to remain in the post under newly elected Zohran Mamdani, who recently apologized for his past criticisms of the department.
Although Mamdani said during his campaign that he would like to retain Tisch, it was uncertain until their joint announcement on Wednesday whether Tisch would agree to serve under a mayor who has expounded progressive critiques on policing and the criminal justice system.
Earlier this year, Mamdani, a 34-year-old Democratic state lawmaker and democratic socialist, publicly apologized to the city’s police officers for his past public comments in which he described some of the department’s officers as racist and a threat to public safety.
On Wednesday, Mamdani and Tisch announced they were in agreement on fundamental issues and would prioritize continuity for the city of more than 8 million people, the country’s biggest, where murders and shootings have dropped sharply under Tisch’s first year in the job.
“I have admired her work cracking down on corruption in the upper echelons of the police department, driving down crime in New York City, and standing up for New Yorkers in the face of authoritarianism,” Mamdani, who was elected on November 4, said in a statement.
Tisch, 44, was appointed police commissioner in November 2024 by Adams, the fourth person to oversee the nation’s largest police department in an 18-month span, as Adams and members of his inner circle faced criminal investigations into allegations of corruption. She was previously the sanitation commissioner.
Tisch said in a statement that she and Mamdani “share many of the same public safety goals for New York City: lowering crime, making communities safer, rooting out corruption, and giving our officers the tools, support, and resources they need to carry out their noble work.”
In contrast to some of her predecessors, Tisch has won the support of a number of New York’s Democratic elected officials. The Police Benevolent Association, the NYPD’s main labor union, approved of her decision to stay, while the New York Civil Liberties Union, which has successfully sued to end unconstitutional police practices, also offered words of support.
The mayor and his police commissioner come from contrasting backgrounds. Mamdani will be the city’s first Muslim mayor. Tisch is the first Jewish woman to lead the New York Police Department. Mamdani, the son of a college professor and a filmmaker, has been sharply critical of the city’s wealthy elite, while the commissioner is an heir of the billionaire Tisch family, which made its fortune with the Loews Corp and owns a 50% stake in the National Football League’s New York Giants franchise.
MAMDANI CALLED FOR POLICE DEFUNDING IN 2020
During his election campaign, Mamdani publicly apologized to police officers for his past criticisms, in particular for calling on social media in 2020 for the department to be defunded for being “racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety.”
Disavowing his past calls for defunding, Mamdani pledged to maintain the current number of police officers after he is sworn in on January 1, even as Adams announced funding for 5,000 additional police officers last month. Mamdani also pledged to create a new Department of Community Safety to deploy mental health experts and social workers to some calls currently handled by armed police officers.
U.S. President Donald Trump, a Republican and a native New Yorker who falsely denigrated Mamdani as a communist, has said he would try to punish New Yorkers if they voted for him, issuing legally shaky threats to withhold federal funds. But this week, Trump said he would consider meeting with Mamdani.
Tisch’s decision was announced a day after Trump’s border czar Tom Homan promised to ramp up federal immigration enforcement efforts in New York City.
Tisch has emphasized to officers that so-called New York “sanctuary” laws forbid them from assisting in arrests or other enforcement of civil immigration law, although the NYPD routinely works with federal officers in enforcing criminal laws.
(Reporting by Maria Tsvetkova and Jonathan Allen; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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