Report: De Blasio’s Feud with NYPD May Cost NY ’16 DNC Convention

Ohio may host the 2016 Democratic National Convention because of New York Mayor Bill de Blasio’s feud with the NYPD and embrace of anti-police demonstrators.

According to a Columbus Dispatch report, Columbus “city officials and Democrats statewide said this week that the turmoil in New York City between Mayor Bill de Blasio and the NYPD union has all but spoiled that city’s shot at getting the convention.” One official even told the outlet that, “No way the DNC picks New York with all the issues going on there now.”

DNC officials reportedly will announce their selection this month, and the Dispatch reported that city officials believe that “it’s Columbus’ convention to lose” if it comes down to Philadelphia and Columbus.

When protesters disrupted the New York City and chanted that they wanted “dead cops now” after a grand jury did not indict the officer who put Eric Garner in a headlock/chokehold that led to his death, de Blasio never condemned the rhetoric. Soon after, NYPD officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos were executed in retaliation for Garners death.

NYPD officers turned their backs on de Blasio when he appeared at the hospital on the night Liu and Ramos were executed. They also booed and taunted him at an NYPD graduation ceremony and turned their backs on him again when de Blasio, after arriving hours late, spoke at Ramos’s memorial service.

Democrats may worry that a convention in New York could turn off Americans like their 1968 convention in Chicago. Richard Nixon’s 1968 presidential win was arguably assured when riots broke out during the convention in Chicago. The national audience that saw the breakdown in law and order started to associate Democrats in general with being on the wrong side of law-and-order issues. That label stuck to the party and helped  Republicans win elections across the country for a generation