Fmr NYC police commissioner Bill Bratton on crime spike: Eric Adams is 'the right man at the right time'
Bill Bratton, who served two terms as NYC Police Commissioner, argued that, despite his hopes for new mayor Eric Adams, he is ‘not sure’ the rest of the political establishment in NY will help get the job done.
An unearthed video of newly-minted New York City Mayor Eric Adams shows him using a racial slur in a talk on policing.
The 2019 video shows Adams speaking to a crowd at the Harlem Business Alliance about his rise through the ranks of the New York Police Department (NYPD).
While speaking to the crowd, Adams uses a racial slur to refer to the White officers he outperformed as he grew his career as a police officer.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams speaks during a news conference in the Brooklyn borough of New York, Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)
"Every day in the police department, I kicked those crackers’ a--, man," Adams said in the video reviewed by Fox News Digital. "I was unbelievable in the police department."
"I became a sergeant, a lieutenant, and a captain, you know the story," Adams also said. "Some people oversell it trying to reinvent me, but the reality is: what I was then is who I am now."
Adams was asked about his use of the slur at a Friday press conference, prompting him to apologize.
"Should not have been used. Someone asked me a question using that comment and, playing on that word, I responded in that comment," Adams said. "But clearly it is a comment that should not be used, and I apologize not only to those who heard it, but to New Yorkers because they should expect more from me and that was inappropriate."
New York Police Benevolent Association president Patrick Lynch addressed the mayor's previous comments in a Friday statement, saying "whenever a controversial video of a police officer surfaces online, we ask for fairness instead of a rush to outrage."
"We will apply the same standard here. We have spoken with Mayor Adams about this video," Lynch continued. "We have spent far too many hours together in hospital emergency rooms these past few weeks, and we've worked together for decades before that."
"A few seconds of video will not define our relationship," he added. "We have a lot of work to do together to support our members on the streets."
The video’s unearthing comes a month after Adams was sworn in as mayor of the Big Apple, replacing widely-panned former Mayor Bill de Blasio.
Adams took a hard stance against his party’s "demonizing" of law enforcement in July, pointing out that few of his fellow Democrats "have ever been part of law enforcement."
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Crime has spiked across America since Adams’ inauguration in January, and New York City has been anything but spared.
Two NYPD officers were killed in the line of duty last month amid the crime spike.
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