Mayor Zohran Mamdani told reporters Tuesday he has "no plans" to fire NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch — the kind of careful, non-committal language that gives a politician room to reverse course the moment the pressure gets hot enough.
Mamdani's far-left base, led by the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, has been demanding Tisch's removal since federal ICE agents shot and injured a man in the Bronx last week. The NYPD wasn't involved in the immigration operation, but officers responded to the protests that followed — and the confrontations turned violent. Police aggressively pushed Democratic congressional nominee Darializa Avila Chevalier to the ground, according to CNN. Chevalier, a Mamdani ally, has joined the calls for Tisch's ouster.
"Jessica Tisch is the police commissioner. I have no plans to change that," Mamdani said at a press conference in Queens ahead of a memorial service for fallen officers. He cited Tisch's "record of uprooting corruption from the upper echelons of the NYPD while lowering crime across our city."
The New York Post framed Mamdani's remarks as a direct rebuke of his "radical cronies." CNN noted that when pressed on whether he still had faith in Tisch, Mamdani walked away from the microphones. That walk-away matters. "No plans" is not a guarantee. It's the answer a politician gives when he needs the current arrangement today but wants the option to torch it tomorrow.
The numbers explain why Mamdani can't afford to dump Tisch right now: under her leadership, the city recorded the fewest murders in the first six months of any year in history, according to NYPD statistics released in July. That's not nothing for a mayor who has to face voters again.
But Mamdani is already making concessions to the anti-police flank. City Hall ordered the NYPD to review its use-of-force protocols the day before the memorial — a move the Post reported critics see as a crafty play to quiet his angry base. And Mamdani confirmed Tuesday he remains committed to disbanding the NYPD's Strategic Response Group, the elite unit that handles counter-terrorism, active shooters, and major civil disorder. His allies call the SRG a tool of suppression. His critics note that disbanding it means dismantling the city's rapid-response capability for the next terror attack or active shooter.
Mamdani and Tisch made their first joint appearance at the New York City Police Memorial in Lower Manhattan, where 42 officers' names were added to the wall — 41 of them 9/11 first responders who died from related illnesses, and Detective Didarul Islam, murdered by a gunman in a Midtown office building in July 2025. Tisch thanked Mamdani for attending. Neither showed visible tension.
New Yorkers have seen this playbook before. The socialist mayor needs the competent cop to keep crime down. The base needs a scalp. "No plans" is the gap between those two forces — and it won't hold forever.
