NYC GOP mayoral candidate says decades of unarmed patrolling experience overtakes Democrats’ political game

As crime in New York City recedes to the crisis level seen in the 1970s, Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa argues that his decades of experience leading the unarmed patrol group the Guardian Angels have him. much better prepared than the Democratic opponent Eric Adams to fight the escalation of violence in the Big Apple a year after the start of the “defund police” movement.

President Biden included Adams, a retired NYPD captain and current Brooklyn Borough president, in a White House gun violence panel discussion this week – even though Adams barely won his Democratic primary and that there is still a general election in November, Sliwa told Fox News.

“For me, his invitation was purely political,” Sliwa said. “It’s almost like they’ve decided that we don’t want to hear from the Republican, even though in this arena Curtis Sliwa has more references than anyone who has attended this White House conference, especially Eric Adams.”

Sliwa, unlike the other roundtable participants, has a unique perspective as he is personally a victim of gun violence. He was shot five times in June 1992 by order of John Gotti Sr. to John Gotti Jr. and the Gambino crime family, and has therefore endured four federal trials.

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“I understand the issues of gun violence for going through it,” said Sliwa, who was previously hit by a special handgun .38. “You say ‘gun control, gun control’ because that’s always what comes out of these sessions. It wouldn’t have done anything to stop the shooter.”

Sliwa described a huge escalation in crime in the late 1970s as a result of a budget cut New York City was on the verge of a “fiscal collapse.” Fast forward to the present day after New York City first became the coronavirus zero point in the United States last year and then saw numerous ‘fundraising’ protests. The current rise in violence has also been largely attributed to the fact that the NYPD disbanded its plainclothes unit in June 2020.

A 17-year-old newspaper delivery boy at the time, Sliwa was recognized by President Nixon in the White House for his bravery after allegedly rescuing six people from a burning building on his way, the NY Daily News reported in 1971, according to the newspaper. archives. Sliwa was then honored by the New York City Sanitation Commissioner for forming a neighborhood clean-up team called the “Rock Brigade”.

Speaking to Fox News, Sliwa described how, as a night manager at a McDonald’s in the Bronx in the late 1970s, he then convinced his staff to start patrolling the subway line where they were going to work. because the uniformed officers were not patrolling the 4 train. , or what was called “the aggressor’s express”.

The Guardian Angels were an unarmed patrol that made arrests of citizens when necessary to prevent assaults, brawls and things that could lead to further violence, Sliwa said. Believing their work would earn them the Congressional Medal of Honor, Sliwa said he was surprised when then New York Mayor Ed Koch “vilified” them, calling the group “Hell’s Angels” vigilantes.

Police unions also had their members believing that our presence would affect their own job security, “so they started a period of harassment against us,” Sliwa said. As the Bronx burned and people evacuated, the gangs that took control of it also viewed their patrol as adversaries.

“No matter where we turned, if it wasn’t the gang members who were the problem for us, it was the police,” he said. “And yet all we were trying to do was keep people safe.”

In 1985, communities requested the services of guardian angels, as violence continued in parks and the metro system, but their relationship with the police remained strained. And the problem has not improved under the administration of another Democratic mayor, David Dinkins. It wasn’t until Rudy Giuliani became mayor that guardian angels were truly adopted.

Currently with around 200 volunteers, the Guardian Angels continue to patrol the subways, as the police often remain stationed on platforms or crossroads instead of patrolling moving trains. The watch was also requested by the Asian community to create patrols to combat the increase in hate crimes seen earlier this year in areas like Chinatown, Flushing, Queens and Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

Even what was once known as Manhattan’s upscale neighborhoods, such as the Upper East Side, Upper West Side, Chelsea, and Little Italy, have been asking the Guardian Angels for help in recent months, this which, according to Sliwa, has never been asked before in response. growing problems.

“I hold the mayor fully responsible for this because he brought a wrecking ball to our police department,” Sliwa said.

Sliwa argued that Mayor Bill de Blasio rejected federal COVID-19 support that could have been used to bolster the police department on two occasions, and Adams implied in remarks made at the White House that he didn’t Nor would necessarily use federal funding to hire more police officers if it did. mayor.

“You cannot be to rectify the crime problem if you do not accept help in hiring police officers. Without more police officers, none of this can be achieved,” Sliwa said. “Although Eric Adams claims to be law and order, how can he claim that title when he said to the president, ‘No?'”

Contacted by Fox News about the feature, a spokesperson for de Blasio said the mayor had never turned down federal funds for the NYPD.

“Curtis Sliwa is wrong. On most things really,” de Blasio’s press secretary Bill Neidhardt wrote in an email to Fox News. “New York City has never turned down federal COVID relief funds or federal law enforcement funds.”

Officers from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) are “housed directly at NYPD headquarters for shouting out loud,” Neidhardt continued. “Getting it wrong with a basic fact like this shows how irrelevant Curtis is.”

Sliwa said the NYPD currently has 4,000 of the 38,000 officers needed to function effectively, pointing out how the force has been depleted by massive early withdrawals in response to low morale and the recruitment of qualified officers elsewhere. De Blasio’s spokesperson did not recognize these figures.

“My response was that the city needs to take the money now, hire police officers, train them and get them out as quickly as possible on the streets, subways and parks because we are in a criminal emergency situation, and the only thing that is not covered here is the hiring of more police, ”Sliwa said.

As COVID-19 vaccines have become more widely available, many Manhattan-based corporate offices are faced with the decision to recall some or all of their staff around September. But as Biden’s Justice Department sends strike forces to New York and elsewhere to tackle gun trafficking, widespread violence in the city’s subway still poses a dangerous risk to commuters.

The metro system has homeless people using the underground area and trains for shelter, and emotionally disturbed people having psychotic episodes or struggling with drug or alcohol addiction often attack them. passengers, according to Sliwa. Gangs also roam the subways, often asking young recruits to attack women, slash people or push them past trains as a kind of initiation.

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“If you don’t fix these problems, you won’t be able to encourage people to go back to empty office buildings and work because they won’t want to take the risk,” he said.

Guardian angels also care for the homeless and those with emotional disorders, helping them find unlocked toilets or escorting them to get their medication or mental health care at the hospital, as Sliwa supports that the service is not provided by municipal or state agencies.

Fox News also reached out to Adams for comment, but did not receive a response until publication.