New York City police officers will continue to do their jobs, but their feelings of betrayal by Mayor Bill de Blasio will likely have a chilling effect on how aggressive they are in trying to thwart crimes before they occur, former New York Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik said Monday on
Newsmax TV's "America’s Forum."
"When the mayor of the city doesn't have your back or when the mayor of the city looks and appears like he's not supporting you or that the city would not indemnify you should you have any sort of problem during the course of your work, your duties, a lot of those cops are not going to be as aggressive to go out there and police as they've done in the past," Kerik said.
Story continues below video
Note: Watch Newsmax TV now on DIRECTV Ch. 349 and DISH Ch. 223
Get Newsmax TV on your cable system – Click Here Now
"They're not going to do a work stoppage, they're not going to do a slowdown, they're going to answer every radio run, every call, but those aggressive officers that will be out there looking for guns, stopping people, looking for drugs stopping people in an attempt to prevent violent crime from occurring they've got to be thinking about their job.
"They've got to be thinking about internal charges and criticism from the mayor. I don't know if they're going to be as aggressive doing their job as they've done in the past."
Anti-terrorism efforts shouldn’t be impacted, according to Kerik, since New York City has enormous resources and a terrorist task force made up of NYPD detectives, FBI agents and other federal agencies, including the New York State Police.
"Their ability to monitor and track and look at possible terror activities for New York City, around New York City are probably better than anywhere in the country and they're pretty much up on that stuff so hopefully that's going to remain the same, that vigilance is going to remain the same, those forces will stay intact and they can continue to protect New York City as they've done for the last 12-13 years since 9/11," he said.
The NYPD feels like the mayor threw them under the bus following the death of Eric Garner, who died last month while resisting arrest during a police chokehold, and the deaths of Officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu.
Last month, Kerik said on "America’s Forum" that police "feel that the mayor has abandoned them, called them racist, said publicly that they target the minority communities, they harass people that don't need to be harassed. This type of rhetoric has created this anti-cop,
racist rhetoric, which is a lie."
De Blasio has also said that he counseled his biracial son to be extra careful when dealing with police because of his ethnicity.
Kerik weighed in on a contingent of NYPD officers, who for the third time since the assassination of two uniformed officers on Dec. 20, have turned their backs on the mayor as he spoke. The first time it happened was at the funeral of Ramos, when thousands of officers turned around as the mayor delivered his eulogy.
They did it again when the mayor addressed a group of new cadets at a NYPD graduation ceremony, and again over the weekend
at the funeral for Ramos’ partner, Liu.
"Police officers feel that City Hall has turned their backs on them, and we have a right to have our opinion heard like everyone else that protests out in the city," NYPD Patrolmen's Benevolent Association president Patrick Lynch told Newsday Sunday following the service. "We did it respectfully out here in the street, not inside the church, not during the service."
Lynch had previously turned his back, in an act of protest, on de Blasio at the hospital on the day of the killings. He said Blasio had "blood on his hands."
While Kerik defended the officers’ constitutional right to protest, he said he didn’t agree with their decision to do so.
"I don't think the funeral for Liu or Ramos was the place to do it," he explained. "There will be other times where they can make their anger with the mayor known. They've been pretty clear already and I don't blame them. I just don't think that's the place for it."
He advised de Blasio "to do everything within his power to clean up … or fix that relationship between him and the police department or it's going to be a difficult time to come in the next year or so."
Related Stories:
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.