De Blasio’s Garner test

Blake Zeff

Bill de Blasio’s big vacation dilemma was supposed to be whether he could go to Italy while a potential LIRR strike was looming. But the truth was always that resolving that negotiation was Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s domain, and he was never going to let the trains stop running, especially in an election year.

Instead, the mayor ended up with a far more sensitive and fundamental test: The death of Eric Garner, the Staten Island man stopped by police, apparently placed in an illegal chokehold and all but left to die after saying he couldn't breathe.

Under Rudy Giuliani, black men like Abner Louima and Patrick Dorismond, both victims of unspeakable abuse by NYPD officers, became household names. Under Michael Bloomberg, the temperature (and rhetoric) cooled considerably, but the department’s stop-and-frisk policy targeted young black and Latino men, deeply dividing the city.

It was against this backdrop that candidate Bill de Blasio soared from obscurity to a dominating victory in the Democratic primary. Contrary to popular recollection, universal pre-K was not necessarily the signature campaign issue that catapulted the public advocate to City Hall. It was also the promise of a new day in the police department’s treatment of communities of color.

http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/city-hall/2014/07/8549373/de-blasios-garner-test