New York (CNN) — New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani announced Wednesday that Jessica Tisch accepted his offer to stay at the helm of the nation’s largest police force.
The announcement secures the mayor-elect’s highest profile appointment as he prepares to take office in January.
It’s a significant compromise for both Tisch and Mamdani, who have expressed different views on policing and public safety. Mamdani, who has been previously critical of the police and once supported defunding the department, apologized to officers during his successful mayoral run. Tisch, known as an technocrat, has pushed to roll back criminal justice reforms and expand neighborhood policing.
“Leading this department is the greatest privilege of my life, and I am proud to continue doing it,” Tisch wrote in a letter to the NYPD that was obtained by CNN. “Now, do the Mayor-elect and I agree on everything? No, we don’t. But in speaking with him, it’s clear that we share broad and crucial priorities: the importance of public safety, the need to continue driving down crime, and the need to maintain stability and order across the department. We also agree that you deserve the city’s respect and support.”
For weeks, it remained unclear whether Tisch, who was appointed to the department by Mayor Eric Adams, would accept to stay in the role after Mamdani publicly committed to keeping her on the job during the last mayoral debate.
It was a final-hour effort by Mamdani and his campaign to show how much he was willing to compromise and appeal to city voters who remained skeptical about his campaign, particularly among older and more moderate Democrats.
Tisch abstained from commenting on the race for mayor or Mamdani’s politics during the campaign. Last week, Mamdani and Tisch held a meeting, but it remained unclear if he had secured a commitment. Gov. Kathy Hochul, one of the chief supporters of retaining Tisch, said she was confident Tisch would stay.
“I look forward to working with Commissioner Jessica Tisch to deliver genuine public safety in New York City. I have admired her work cracking down on corruption in the upper echelons of the police department, driving down crime in New York City, and standing up for New Yorkers in the face of authoritarianism,” Mamdani said in a statement. “Together, we will deliver a city where rank-and-file police officers and the communities they serve alike are safe, represented, and proud to call New York their home.”
Tisch, heiress to the Loews family fortune, is a career public servant who previously served as commissioner for the sanitation department and the city’s chief technology officer. She is highly regarded in government circles and was appointed to the job following a string of high-profile corruption scandals that rocked the department under Adams’ administration.
In the last year, Tisch has overseen a record drop in the city’s crime rate, a reduction in shootings and homicides, and an effort to remove thousands of illegal guns from city streets.
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