New York became the first state to declare a disaster emergency on gun violence on Tuesday.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced an executive order at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City in response to gun violence that he said is leading to rising crime rates throughout the state and causing people to want to stay home even in a “post-COVID” era with lifted restrictions.
“[Permanent work-from-home] would be devastating for the economy. People have to want to come back to work, … [but] they’re not coming back unless they feel safe. … The place that should step up and address it is the state of New York,” Cuomo said.
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His executive order outlines several steps aimed at curbing gun violence: treating gun violence as a public health emergency, using data to target hot spots, encouraging positive engagement to at-risk youth, breaking the cycle of escalating violence, and getting illegal guns off the streets.
Cuomo took a swipe at former President Donald Trump during his remarks, saying he had a “vision of a border war” with a “magic border wall” that would allow migrants to pass while stopping the flow of illegal guns, 74% of which Cuomo said come from out of state.
“Here’s my vision. It just came to me. Picture the border. We build a wall. We build a tall, big, a beautiful wall, and we have the wall [that] goes for miles, and we have a little gold leaf up at the top of the wall, [a] little, gold, shiny leaf, and then we put a big name across the wall, and the name is five letters. Do you know the name?” he said. “I can see it. Can you see it? ‘C-U-O-M-O.’ And it’s a magic wall. People can pass, but illegal guns cannot pass. It’s a magic wall. That’s what we need here in New York, and that’s what we have needed.”
The United States is contending with a large surge of migrants traversing its southern border. U.S. Customs and Border Protection encountered 180,034 migrants along the southwest border in May 2021, and reports indicate that an unprecedented 117,000 migrant children will enter the U.S. by the end of the year. The most recent border surge saw the arrival of 80,000 unaccompanied minors at the southern border in 2019.
The governor also said his executive order will create the first office in the U.S. to address gun violence within New York’s Department of Health, arguing the rise in shootings amounts to a “public health emergency.”
“We went from one epidemic to another epidemic. We went from COVID to the epidemic of gun violence,” Cuomo said. “More people are dying of gun violence than of COVID.”
Cuomo told his Manhattan audience it was “time for us to reimagine policing,” analogizing the relationship between officers and suspects to that between a hammer and a nail.
“We need to restore the relationship between the community and the police. That is clear, and it is time to do it. It’s time to do it. The community demands it,” he said, saying his long-term solution to gun violence is to offer “community-based services.”
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Crime rates have been on the rise throughout New York City. The city has experienced 217 murders year-to-date as of Sunday, an 8.5% change from last year’s year-to-date figure and a 42.8% change from 2019, according to the New York Police Department.
The holiday weekend proved especially deadly in other parts of the country. At least 104 Chicagoans were shot from Friday to Monday, 19 of whom were killed, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.
