These days it’s rare for politicians to withstand political pressure from their own side. So hats off to New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) for backing Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch amid demands from the Democratic Socialists of America to fire her.
As a candidate last year, Mamdani backed away from his 2020 calls to “defund” and “dismantle” the New York Police Department. But the DSA, which the mayor calls his “political home,” continues to advocate for the abolition of police and prisons.
Mamdani retained the moderate Tisch when he took office, in an encouraging show of maturity and pragmatism. Her tough-on-crime approach has helped drive down rates for everything from homicides to the petty offenses that worsen the quality of life. Now left-wing extremists are trying to take her down over a shooting involving Immigration and Customs Enforcement with which she had nothing to do.
In Manhattan last Thursday, an ICE officer shot Oscar Belgal, an illegal immigrant with a criminal record, after he allegedly refused to get out of his car and rammed it into two government vehicles. The suspect was wounded in the neck. It turned out his 5-year-old son was in the back seat.
The NYPD wasn’t involved in the immigration enforcement operation, which is consistent with city and state law. But local officers arrived after the shooting to secure the chaotic scene. That led to clashes with protesters.
Videos on social media show congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier being pushed to the ground during a melee involving NYPD officers. Chevalier, a DSA member, defeated Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D) in a June primary, no doubt mightily aided by Mamdani’s endorsement. She has spent the past several days saying Tisch needs to go, a position the DSA officially endorsed over the weekend.
Chevalier claims the NYPD’s response to the protest violated “the spirit, if not the letter” of the city’s sanctuary laws. Spirit doesn’t hold up in court, let alone justify firing the city’s top cop.
Mamdani is trying to thread a difficult needle. He promised that the city will review the shooting, the NYPD response to the protests and ICE’s use of a private parking lot as a staging area. Separately, the mayor announced on Monday that the department will conduct a top-to-bottom review of its use-of-force policy.
ICE’s sometimes dangerous and inhumane tactics are fueling unreasonable demands for abolishing the enforcement agency altogether. At the same time, ICE uses sanctuary laws as an excuse to launch aggressive enforcement operations in neighborhoods. The NYPD is generally barred from holding someone solely on a civil detainer request unless ICE presents a judicial warrant and the person has been convicted of a serious crime or is on a terror watch list.
Nevertheless, ICE’s track record on vehicle stops is troubling. Shooting multiple rounds into a car with a child in the back seat, even if officers didn’t know he was there, is worth investigating. All ICE agents need to receive proper training. It’s good that DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin promises to release body-camera footage from the New York shooting. That will help restore credibility for an agency that has too often made excuses for sloppy and unprofessional behavior.
Belgal seems like just the sort of uninvited guest that ICE should be trying to remove from the United States. He was arrested in 2023 for robbery and in 2025 for allegedly selling cocaine, fentanyl and crack cocaine to an undercover detective. To settle the first charge, he pleaded guilty to grand larceny and was sentenced to five years of probation. The Department of Homeland Security says Belgal has suspected gang ties, which he denies. It’s a good thing the ICE stop in Manhattan didn’t turn into a fatality, but the DSA should think twice about rallying around him — and demanding the police chief’s removal.
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