While juvenile activists proclaim “All cops are bastards” and their ideological champions in Congress demand we “defund the police” and their blinkered friends in the press corps tell a story of a public that wants to be unpoliced, the voters of New York City just gave us a dose of reality.
We don’t know for sure that former police officer Eric Adams will eventually be declared the winner of the mayoral election, given New York’s slow vote-counting and its novel ranked-choice voting method. We also don’t know how Adams would govern the NYPD and whether he’d be effective in stopping the wave of violent crime.
We do have a very good guess, though, as to what the voters were saying when they gave him a commanding lead in Tuesday’s primary election: Violent crime is on the rise, and we need the police to protect us.
Notably, Maya Wiley, the George Soros-backed “defund the police” candidate in the race, trailed 9 points behind Adams.
The real revelation comes from looking at the election results at the local level, and comparing them to crime maps. The pattern is clear: The more violent crime affected you, the more likely it is that you voted for Eric Adams. The more you lived in a safe, wealthy neighborhood, the more likely it is that you voted for the “defund the police” candidate.
For instance, New York’s 73rd Precinct includes the Brooklyn neighborhoods of Ocean Hill and Brownsville. From April 2020 through April 2021, the people of the 73rd suffered 26 murders, 39 rapes, and 263 felony assaults among a population of less than 90,000.
Eric Adams won every election district in the 73rd Precinct, getting 80% in many of them.
Maya Wiley won stretches of Brooklyn, too, such as Greenpoint and South Slope. Those police precincts had one murder between the two of them. Wiley, who was endorsed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, won the wealthy white parts of AOC’s district and lost the Bronx portions.
“Defund the police” is a niche, luxury ideology, it turns out.
Reforming the police, and finding ways to prevent abuses such as the killing of George Floyd, has broad popularity. Adams, since his time in the NYPD, has been a vocal voice against police abuses. But while being anti-abuse, he’s always been pro-police. That distinguishes him from the liberal elites.
Only about 1 in 6 people actually want to defund fully and thus abolish the police department, according to a Gallup poll. That 15% just all happen to be elected Democrats or have regular appearances on cable news.
When Washington Examiner columnist Kristen Soltis Anderson asked New Yorkers if they would want to “defund the NYPD and spend that money on social workers instead,” the answers were split nearly 50-50. There’s a logic there. Why do police in big cities handle missing-person cases rather than specialized investigators?
When you move away from the abstract, however, and get closer to home, answers changed.
“Half of New York City voters said they want a larger police presence in their local area than exists,” Anderson explained, “and another 30% said to keep things as they are. Only 15% said they want a smaller police presence.”
About 40% of the city wants less money spent on the NYPD, but more officers in their own neighborhood.
That tells you something.
It also tells you something that Wiley’s home is protected by a private police force hired by her live-in boyfriend. “Cops laugh about it all the time,” one officer told the New York Post. “Cops know when they retire, they will get hired by someone like Wiley.”
“Defund the police” is a fun idea to hold when it has no consequences. When things get close to home, though, New Yorkers, like everyone else, want a cop on the beat.
