New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani is reportedly already at odds with his own police commissioner, Jessica Tisch, after signaling he will reject plans to expand the NYPD, despite the commissioner’s repeated warnings that current staffing levels are dangerously inadequate.
Mamdani, who just five years ago called to defund the police while serving in the state assembly, now insists he supports maintaining NYPD funding — but refuses to grow the force beyond its budgeted 35,000 officers.
On NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday, Mamdani praised Tisch and defended his decision to retain her.
“The reason I made the decision to retain commissioner Tisch is because of the importance of outcomes,” Mamdani said. He credited her with “rooting out corruption while lowering crime” and argued the NYPD can maintain public safety “with the officers we have.”
But Tisch has made clear those successes came “against all odds.”
“The crime reductions we saw last year were achieved against all odds and are entirely attributable to the hard work and grit of New York’s finest,” Tisch said earlier this year. “The deck has been completely stacked against our cops.”
Tisch has repeatedly warned that low staffing levels — combined with a justice system she says “prioritizes offenders over victims” — have left officers stretched thin and undermined long-term crime prevention. Her plan calls for hiring 5,000 additional officers to reach a 40,000-member NYPD by FY2029, a proposal supported by outgoing Mayor Eric Adams.
Mamdani is rejecting that.
“I think the number we’ve had budgeted of 35,000 officers is a sufficient number,” he said. Instead, he wants to offload tens of thousands of mental-health and homelessness-related calls onto a new “Department of Community Safety,” arguing NYPD officers should focus only on “serious crimes.”
The NYPD currently responds to 200,000 mental-health calls each year, a point Mamdani used to defend shrinking police responsibilities. But critics say this approach ignores the city’s surge in violent recidivism.
Tisch stresses that lasting progress requires fixing the law, not shrinking the force.
“The key driving factor is the revolving door of our criminal justice system, created in large part by legislative changes that took effect in 2020,” she warned.
She has highlighted repeated cases of criminals cycling through the system: including a career offender accused of robbing a Queens deli at gunpoint and shooting both an officer and bystander — all while having 17 prior arrests, many committed while on lifetime parole.
“Imagine how disheartening it is for our cops to be out there arresting the same people for the same crimes in the same neighborhoods day after day,” Tisch said.
While Mamdani and Tisch diverge sharply on police staffing, the Trump administration signaled it supports at least one part of his decision — keeping Tisch as commissioner.
“We are really reassured that [Mamdani has] kept the police commissioner,” Trump economic adviser Kevin Hassett said. “In previous administrations in New York, we have seen law and order really go South.”
But tensions remain clear: Tisch wants more officers to fight crime. Mamdani wants fewer officers handling fewer responsibilities. The stakes could not be higher for a city still grappling with recidivism, a strained police force, and deep public concern over safety.
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