If New York City is indeed poised to hand over the keys to City Hall to Zohran Mamdani—a self-described democratic socialist and fierce anti-police ideologue—it won’t just be a shift in leadership. It will be a tectonic political gamble with public safety hanging in the balance. And Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is making it crystal clear: for NYPD officers, there’s another way. And it leads due south.
DeSantis’s warning, made during a recent appearance on Fox News, was equal parts recruitment pitch and political gut-punch. His message to law enforcement: “Do you really want to risk your life for a city led by someone who despises you?” It’s not rhetorical. It’s rooted in Mamdani’s own history of incendiary anti-police rhetoric.
Back in 2020, as cities across the U.S. convulsed with unrest and “defund the police” became a leftist mantra, Mamdani was among its most vocal cheerleaders. His tweets leave no ambiguity. “No, we want to defund the police,” he declared. “Defund it. Dismantle it.” He called the NYPD “racist, anti-queer, & a major threat to public safety.” At a time when cities were reeling from spikes in violent crime, Mamdani and his ideological cohort chose to vilify the institution tasked with stopping it.
Today, I joined Martha MacCallum on Fox News. pic.twitter.com/shacUmwYDl
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) October 28, 2025
But now, as the reality of potentially governing a city of 8 million people sets in, Mamdani’s public tone is shifting—if not softening, then at least muddying. The pivot is obvious: rebrand the radical as pragmatic. The problem is that the internet doesn’t forget, and neither do cops who spent years with targets on their backs—often while being defunded or demoralized by politicians like Mamdani.
Enter DeSantis with the counterpunch: a $5,000 signing bonus and an open invitation to NYPD officers who’ve had enough. It’s not just a policy—it’s a strategy. By aggressively recruiting disillusioned officers from Democrat-led cities, Florida isn’t just filling its own ranks. It’s drawing a contrast between governance models: one rooted in law and order, the other in what DeSantis calls “ballistic podiatry”—voters shooting themselves in the foot.
DeSantis isn’t merely critiquing Mamdani’s record. He’s forecasting the future. “If he is elected,” he said, “he’s going to make the de Blasio years look like the golden days.” And that’s no idle threat. Under de Blasio, New York saw morale among officers plummet, crime surge in key categories, and the beginnings of a political narrative that blamed law enforcement more than lawbreakers. A Mamdani administration, untethered from moderation, could accelerate all of it.
What’s more, DeSantis called out the broader trend. The migration from New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles to places like Florida hasn’t just been about taxes or weather—it’s been about safety. “Those leftist politicians turn their backs on the police, turn their backs on the rule of law, and then the citizens were the ones that paid the price,” he said.
The bottom line? If Mamdani becomes New York’s next mayor, the city will have made a conscious choice—not just about policy, but about priorities. And the consequences will be swift. Officers will leave. Crime will climb. Confidence will crater. And voters will be left to grapple with the fallout.
