Bill de Blasio with his family in New York
The leading candidate for New York mayor told a group of Muslim supporters Wednesday that he will put a stop to broad police spying on their communities if he is elected.
Bill de Blasio, the Democratic nominee in the Nov. 5 election, said during a rally in Brooklyn that New York Police Department surveillance would only be authorized to follow up on specific leads. He also said he would hire a new inspector general for surveillance, CBS reports.
The NYPD has conducted widespread surveillance of entire Muslim neighborhoods in New York and secretly labeled entire mosques as terrorism organizations, according to the Associated Press. Such a designation allows police to spy on members of the Muslim community without specific evidence of wrongdoing.
De Blasio, who holds a wide lead over Republican nominee Joe Lhota, repeated a refrain he used when he said he would curb the NYPD’s controversial stop-and-frisk policy: that he wanted to restore trust between police officers and the communities they serve.
“Not only are we going to be safe, but we’re going to be safe in a manner that is, again, consistent with out values and our constitution,” he said.
[CBS]