New York City Mayor Eric Adams says he believes last week’s mayoral election loss of Lori Lightfoot in Chicago could have implications for the entire country as a whole describing it as ‘a warning sign’.
Adams campaigned heavily on issues of public safety and combating rising crime with his unique perspective garnered from time working in law enforcement.
‘I think it is a warning sign to the country. Eric Adams has been talking about public safety not only on the campaign trail, but for the next year,’ the mayor began.
‘I showed up at crime scenes. I knew what New Yorkers were saying. And I saw it all over the country. I think, if anything, it is really stating that this is what I have been talking about. America, we have to be safe,’ he told CNN on Sunday.
During his campaign, Adams emphasized how public safety was not just a political issue, but a fundamental necessity for the prosperity of American cities.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams says Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s reelection loss is a warning sign for the entire country, not just Democratic mayors
Democrat Mayor Lori Lightfoot lost her re-election bid over criticisms of her soft-on-crime approach amid a steady spike in violence. Pictured: Lightfoot at her election night rally on February 28
‘Mayors, we are closer. We’re closest to the problem. We are focused on public safety because people want to be safe,’ he said.
Adams called public safety a ‘prerequisite to prosperity’ in American cities. He said that mayors should be able to see the impact of crime first hand and work with law enforcement officials and community leaders to find solutions.
But Adams has faced criticism from some Democrats who argue that his rhetoric on crime hurts the party and plays into the hands of Republicans.
Adams responded to this criticism by pointing out that the concerns of everyday working-class people cannot be ignored.
Adams stressed how he claims to have witnessed firsthand the fear and anxiety that many New Yorkers feel about the rise in crime, and believes that their concerns must be taken seriously.
‘The polls were clear. New Yorkers felt unsafe, and the numbers showed that they were unsafe. if we want to ignore what the everyday public is stating, then that’s up to them. I’m on the subways. I walk the streets. I speak to everyday working-class people. And they were concerned about safety.
‘We have a recidivism problem in New York and far too many people, there’s about 2,000 people who are repeatedly catch, release, repeat in crimes. If we don’t take them off our streets, they’re going to continue to prey on innocent people.’
Last month NYPD revealed a 5.6 percent drop in major crimes for February compared to the same last year, including 10 fewer murders compared with 2022.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who was notoriously soft on crime scraped just 17 percent of the vote in the race for City Hall, forcing a run off between Paul Vallas, a former schools CEO and Brandon Johnson, a Cook County commissioner on April 4.
Lightfoot, the first black woman and first openly gay person to lead the city, won her first term in 2019 after promising to end decades of corruption and backroom dealing at City Hall.
But opponents blamed Lightfoot for an increase in crime that occurred in cities across the U.S. during the pandemic and criticized her as being a divisive, overly contentious leader.
As crime continued to soar through the last years of her term, Lightfoot was heavily criticized for promoting other matters than public safety, including a citywide karaoke contest and dancing in the street during a festival.
Speaking to supporters Tuesday night, Lightfoot called being Chicago’s mayor ‘the honor of a lifetime.’
‘Regardless of tonight’s outcome, we fought the right fights and we put this city on a better path,’ Lightfoot said. She told her fellow mayors around the country not to fear being bold.
Lightfoot first faced intense backlash after she joined calls from Democratic mayors in 2021 to cut the budget of police departments, a movement that also resulted in officers quitting the force and violent crime to spike.
The embattled mayor then committed to a U-turn, opting instead to ‘refund the police’ and hire more officers, but the move has done little to curb crime.
According to the Chicago Police Department’s latest report, rapes have shot up by 16 percent so far this year compared to the same time in 2022.
Robberies are also up 13 percent, with aggravated battery and burglaries both up 11 percent.
Theft in the windy city is up 31 percent, and vehicle thefts, specifically, have soared up 143 percent.
Homicides and shooting incidents were the only category to see decreases, falling by 18 percent and 8 percent, respectively.
While overall violent crime is up 52 percent from the same time last year, it’s up 102 percent when compared to 2021.
DailyMail
