Where Mamdani, Sliwa, Cuomo stand on crime: NYC mayor election breakdown

NEW YORK - The 2025 election for New York City's next mayor is three weeks away, and keeping the city safe is top of mind for many voters headed to the polls.

The race is down to three major candidates: Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and conservative activist and talk show host Curtis Sliwa.

Here's where the three candidates stand on addressing crime in New York. 

JUMP TO:

• Mamdani's views
• Cuomo's views
• Sliwa's views

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Zohran Mamdani on crime

What they're saying:

As mayor, Mamdani said he'd plan to create the Department of Community Safety to "prevent violence before it happens by prioritizing solutions which have consistently shown to improve safety," per his campaign website.

The department would be tasked with responding to mental health crises and combating homelessness.

Mamdani acknowledges that the police have a "critical role to play" in managing public safety, but that "right now, we’re relying on them to deal with the failures of our social safety net—which prevents them from doing their actual jobs." 

He plans to keep the NYPD officer headcount the same, but cut the department's overtime spending.

"What I am running on in this moment…is to deliver that public safety to New Yorkers," he said on Good Day New York. "And you deliver it by working with police officers, understanding them as partners in that." 

During a press conference with Sen. Elizabeth Warren earlier this year, Mamdani reiterated his stance, saying that "forced overtime" is a main contributor to officers leaving the department, and that he wants "to empower police officers to respond to serious crime and hire mental health professionals to respond to mental health calls."

Mamdani has also pledged to disband the NYPD's Strategic Response Group (SRG), one of the force's special operations units that "responds to citywide mobilizations, civil disorders, and major events with highly trained personnel and specialized equipment." He claims the unit "has cost taxpayers millions in lawsuit settlements + brutalized countless New Yorkers exercising their first amendment rights."

Andrew Cuomo on crime

Increasing the size of the NYPD to the size of its force 25 years ago is essential to ensuring New Yorkers and visitors feel safe, Cuomo's platform states—he plans to add 5,000 new police officers to the NYPD if elected. 

In order to "increase officer retention" and "boost morale" within the department, active and recently retired officers will also be offered bonuses. Officers will also redirect their focus to recidivists, who Cuomo claims are responsible for a "disproportionate share of crime." He's correct, according to the Journal of Criminal Justice.

Cuomo's platform also states the former governor's intention to "increase the permanent presence and deployment of NYPD and Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) officers" in subway stations across the city. He said his administration would work with District Attorneys to better address crime on subways, such as vandalism and drug use. 

The NYPD would also focus more on retail theft under a Cuomo administration. 

Curtis Sliwa on crime

Like Cuomo, Sliwa wants to hire several thousand additional NYPD officers to "restore law and order across NYC."

He additionally wants to do a better job "recruiting, retaining and promoting" existing police officers, as well as uplifting the "rank and file NYPD." 

"Have the transit police reassigned to actually patrolling up and down the moving trains the way they used to, to give you a feeling of relief," he said on Good Day New York. 

Sliwa wants to reinstate the Homeless Outreach Unit, as well, which he says will "help distinguish between those in need of services and those who pose a danger."

His platform also states his intention to reform internal oversight standards, address retail theft, crack down on illegal street racing, educate New Yorkers on crime prevention, support community safety partners and more. 

His 15-point plan can be read here. 

Why focus on crime?

Dig deeper:

Polls show that New Yorkers of all stripes are concerned about crime and public safety within the city. Before he dropped out of the mayoral race, current Mayor Eric Adams said that the city is "shattering crime record after crime record." According to the Citizens Budget Commission, however, just 42% of New Yorkers rate public safety in the city as "excellent" or "good," and those opinions vary widely by neighborhood.

Many New Yorkers say they feel unsafe despite the NYPD reporting the lowest number of shootings and homicides in recorded history from the beginning of January through the end of May of this year. 

This doesn't always stop the perception of danger, especially when New Yorkers face quality of life issues that impact their feeling of safety, like homelessness and trash. And high-profile crimes that garner national attention can create unease.

"When I see an increase in all complaints, but a decrease in specific crimes, I read that as the public responding to a sense of disorder in public spaces," said Fritz Umbach, an assistant professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice told Gothamist.