New York City Mayor-Elect Zohran Mamdani’s long-time chief adviser Elle Bisgaard-Church reportedly wants to make huge changes to policing in the Big Apple.
Mamdani, who is a Democratic Socialist, won the mayoral race on November 4, per Breitbart News.
His long-time chief adviser reportedly led a campaign proposal to send social workers to address certain non-violent 911 calls across the city, Fox News reported Tuesday:
The heavily criticized proposal was drummed up by the Ivy League-educated, California-native Elle Bisgaard-Church, a relative political newcomer affiliated with the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). Bisgaard-Church was tapped by Mamdani Monday to once again be his chief adviser while running the helm at New York City’s City Hall after serving in the same post during his campaign and during his state assembly days.
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When developing the Department of Community Safety proposal, which aims to replace police officers with mental health professionals to deal with non-life-threatening emergencies with a focus on subway stations, Bisgaard-Church reportedly spoke to mental health experts, public safety officials from other cities and former New York City Police Department (NYPD) Chief of Department Rodney Harrison. The new department will cost approximately $1.1 billion, according to a campaign proposal on Mamadani’s website.
When it comes to law enforcement in the city, Mamdani has previously called to “dismantle” the New York City Police Department (NYPD) and expressed a desire to “defund the police,” Breitbart News reported in July.
The following month, the outlet pointed out that Mamdani was spending tens of thousands of dollars on private security during his campaign.
“The openly socialist state assemblyman and Democrat New York City mayoral candidate made three payments ranging from about $8,000 to around $13,000 to Advanced Security & Investigations in June and July, expenditure reports obtained by Fox News revealed,” the article read.
More recently in October, Mamdani suggested “mental health experts” should respond to crimes instead of police officers.
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