Escape From New York

This article first appeared in New English Review.

 In truth, New York City has never been one of my favorite towns. Maybe a lot of that has to do with me being born and raised in Los Angeles. Call it a conflict of cultures.

My own experiences in the Big Apple are pretty much limited to my career in the Drug Enforcement Administration. Though I was never stationed in New York City, I had many occasions to go there on cases and to testify in federal court, both in the Southern District of New York (Manhattan) and the Eastern District Court, located in Brooklyn. I never had a desire to go there on holiday.

It’s not that I feel any animosity toward New Yorkers. I had occasion to work with many agents who were New Yorkers, especially during my 5 years stationed in Milan, Italy (1982-1987). It’s true that many New Yorkers come across as brash and quick to speak their mind, which can put off people from other parts of the country. Once you get to know them, deep inside, they are like Americans from other regions of the US.

When 9-11 happened, I, like most any decent American, poured out my heart to the city, given the horrendous event that happened that day. We all came together, and, as the saying goes, we all became New Yorkers.

That brings me to the subject at hand. As expected, Zohran Mamdani was elected as mayor yesterday, and the reaction is being felt all over the country. Just two and a half decades after the attack on the Twin Towers by Al Qaida, New York has not just elected a Muslim mayor, but one who is clearly an Islamist, an extreme leftist, an anti-Semite, and a supporter of Hamas in the recent war in Gaza, precipitated by the horrendous attack against Israel on October 7, 2023.  In my view, it is a slap in the face for the victims and their families, not to mention the police and fire fighters who died heroically that day.

How could this have happened?

It is true that the city has suffered under poor leadership in recent years. The outgoing mayor, Eric Adams, has been nothing to write home about, and his predecessor, Bill de Blasio, was a horrible mayor, a cop-hater who, obviously, was detested by the NYPD due to his hostility to law enforcement. It is also true that Mamdani did not face strong opposition. After defeating the disgraced former governor, Andrew Cuomo, who inexplicably got it into his head that he wanted to be mayor, in the Democratic primary, and who then ran again in the general election as an independent, the only other candidate opposing Mamdani was Curtis Sliwa, of Guardian Angels fame. While I would have preferred to see Sliwa win the job, he clearly had no chance in a solidly blue city.

All that said, the voters in New York have made a disastrous choice knowing full well the baggage that Mamdani brought with him. They knew he wanted to make everything free in the city. They knew he was an anti-Semite, a supporter of “globalizing the intifada”, and a radical extremist. They also knew that he was buddy-buddy with the Islamist New York radical imam, Siraj Wahhaj, a despicable character, who once called America a “filthy garbage can” and who was connected to the so-called Blind Sheikh, Omar Abdel-Rahman, who in turn, orchestrated the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. Wahhaj even testified in his defense at the trial. And yet, in the face of all this, while supposedly responsible Democratic leaders, like Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, hid in the weeds, New York elected Mamdani as its next mayor.

So where do we go from here? How are we supposed to feel about this city, which some call the greatest city in the world, but yet is filled with serious problems, and is already a place where Jews don’t feel safe. Are we supposed to pray that they weather the storm?

Let me tell you how I feel.

If I were living in that city, I would get out as fast as I could put my house up for sale. If I had a business in that city, I would either sell it or move it lock, stock, and barrel out of the city. Look for a mass exodus out of New York. Watch the economy collapse. I fully expect that we will see mass retirements and resignations within the police department. What cop would want to work under a mayor who hates them? They already experienced that with de Blasio. Already, the city fire chief has announced his resignation.

Crime will now have a free hand, as if it doesn’t already. New York will proudly continue its role as a sanctuary city, and criminals who are arrested will be turned loose even faster than they have been under the last two administrations. Jews will be openly attacked on the streets and their synagogues and institutions will be also be attacked. Pro-Palestinian riots will increase in intensity, and yes, people will get injured or even killed. At the risk of hyperbole, I feel that New York City’s future will begin to resemble that old Kurt Russel movie, “Escape From New York”.  

There is no question that any semblance of a relationship between the Trump administration and the city will disappear. ICE will continue its operations in the city and be opposed in every way imaginable by Mamdani’s Administration. This will result in more violence whenever ICE launches an operation in the city. Whatever federal funding Trump can withhold from the city, he will withhold. And I don’t blame him.

In short, I think the city should not complain about whatever happens. I do feel bad for those people who strongly opposed Mamdani, but I would also urge them to leave. They are now outnumbered, and life is going to get much worse for them, especially if they are Jewish. In that vein, I have nothing but contempt for those liberal Jews who actually supported Mamdani and voted for him.  As for those voters who voted for this creep, I feel no sympathy for what is to come.  The city of New York has made its bed, and now can lie in it. Sorry, but that’s how I feel.