NEW YORK CITY — Hundreds of NYPD police officers turned their backs on left-wing Mayor Bill de Blasio when the Democrat spoke at a police funeral Tuesday — not the first time de Blasio has had the NYPD turn their backs on him in protest of his anti-cop actions.
Thousands of mourners gathered in the Bronx to pay tribute to Officer Miosotis Familia, who was assassinated as she sat in her police vehicle last week. De Blasio infuriated officers and New Yorkers alike when he flew out to Germany the next day to attend the G20 protests in Hamburg.
That anger was on display at the mother of three’s funeral, which took place at the World Changers Church in the Bronx. The New York Post reported that officers outside the church turned their backs as de Blasio’s eulogy was broadcast on screens.
Other officers chatted with one another and played with their phones during his eulogy, the Post reported.
However, the Mayor’s office dismissed the snub as a “bogus controversy.”
“A couple dozen people showed up to partake in a bogus controversy ginned up by the media and those looking to politicize Detective Familia’s death. That’s unfortunate,” a spokesman told The Post.
It isn’t the first time de Blasio has been snubbed by the NYPD. Officers turned their backs on de Blasio in 2015 at the funeral of Wenjian Liu, who was one of two officers murdered as they sat in their car.
NYPD representatives, as well as rank-and-file cops, were angered by a long list of what were perceived as anti-cop comments made by de Blasio, including one in which he talked about how he had to “train” his son on what to do if approached by cops, implying cops were racist.
“With Dante, very early on, we said, ‘Look, if a police officer stops you, do everything he tells you to do. Don’t move suddenly. Don’t reach for your cellphone,’” he said in 2014. “Because we knew, sadly, there’s a greater chance it might be misinterpreted if it was a young man of color.”
On Tuesday, NYPD union chief Ed Mullins told the New York Daily News that the bad blood between the mayor and the cops still exists.
“I talked with hundreds of cops today and they have about had it with the mayor and the police commissioner and their policies. They don’t feel that either one of them has their backs. It’s very hypocritical,” he said.
Adam Shaw is a Breitbart News politics reporter based in New York. Follow Adam on Twitter: @AdamShawNY
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