New York City’s Democrat mayoral primary winner Eric Adams on Sunday pushed back on the label of “anti-woke,” saying “some of us never went to sleep.”
In an interview on ABC News’ “This Week,” Adams, a former NYPD officer and current borough president in Brooklyn, said both Republicans and Democrats want a safe city.
“Some of us never went to sleep,” Adams said of his political approach, touting his “35-year record of fighting for reform, for public safety, a person who was arrested by police, assaulted by police, but also lost a child to gang violence.”
“I never went to sleep,” he continued, blasting “people who have finally realized these issues, believe they can call the entire democratic belief.”
“No matter if you're a Democrat or Republican, you don't want to be pushed on the subway tracks,” he added. “You don't want your 3-year-old baby being shot. No matter who you voted for, I'm going to make sure our economy returns and we're a safe city.”
He also warned subways have to be made safer or commuters won’t return to riding them.
“My accountants, my stock broker, they take the subway system. They don't want to ride the trains,” he said. “If we don't have a safe subway system, no one is going to ride them.”
In a separate interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Adams, a former NYPD officer, said he supports police reform "with an asterisk"
"We need to be clear on that,” he said of reform. “I don't believe a police officer who is carrying out his job within the manner which he was trained to do so should be open to a lawsuit."
He added that New York City voters want a "a pragmatic approach. We want to be safe.”
According to Adams, the best way to combat crime in New York City is by focusing on the inner city neighborhoods.
“We wade down stream and pull people out,” he told “This Week.”
“Thirty percent of our inmates in prison are dyslexic. We have foster care failure. We feed the crime in the city of New York. We must have an immediate response. We should create something like the joint terrorist task force.”
Adams told “State of the Union” the proliferation of hand guns needs to be “brought under control,” and praised President Joe Biden for not ignoring the crime in inner cities.
“It took this president to state that it is time for us to stop ignoring what is happening in the South Sides of Chicago, in the Brownsvilles [in Brooklyn] , in the Atlantas of our country.”
“We should have also focused on the handgun,” he added. “The numbers of those who are killed by handguns are astronomical. And if we don't start having real federal legislation, matched with states and cities, we're never going to get this crisis understand control."
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Fran Beyer ✉
Fran Beyer is a writer with Newsmax and covers national politics.
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