Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) issued a stark warning about the city’s future under mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, arguing that the socialist Democrat could become the most dangerous mayor in the city’s history if he follows through on plans to stop clearing homeless encampments.
Giuliani said Mamdani’s pledge to end sweeps of homeless camps would create a public safety nightmare and return New York to the chaos of the early 1990s.
“The city will be a disaster,” Giuliani told the New York Post, warning that Mamdani fundamentally misunderstands the homeless crisis.
Mamdani has vowed to halt the removal of homeless encampments across the city, a move Giuliani described as a ticking time bomb.
According to Giuliani, many individuals living on the streets suffer from severe mental illness, including paranoid schizophrenia, and isolation only worsens their condition.
“The thing paranoid schizophrenics need is contact,” Giuliani said. “The therapy is constant talking, constant bringing them out.”
Giuliani warned that allowing encampments to remain untouched will push vulnerable individuals further inward, increasing the risk of violence.
“The more they go inward, that’s how they go from being a relatively safe person that first goes into homelessness to a killer five weeks later or five months later,” he said.
He called Mamdani’s plan “possibly the most dangerous thing a New York mayor has ever done.”
Giuliani compared the looming situation to the crime-ravaged era under former Mayor David Dinkins, when violent crime exploded and the city teetered on collapse. Like Mamdani, Dinkins was a member of the Democratic Socialists of America.
Public opinion appears to be on Giuliani’s side.
An August AP-NORC and Harris poll found that 43 percent of Americans support clearing homeless encampments, compared to just 25 percent who oppose it.
The legal ground has also shifted. A 2024 Supreme Court decision ruled that cities are allowed to enforce bans on sleeping in public places.
Even prominent Democrats have acknowledged the dangers of unchecked encampments. California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and Boston Mayor Michelle Wu (D) have both backed policies that resulted in clearing homeless camps, as the New York Post reported.
Giuliani praised outgoing Mayor Eric Adams, saying he inherited a disaster from former Mayor Bill de Blasio but managed to stabilize the city.
“Adams has done a pretty good job,” Giuliani said, adding that New York is at least halfway back to where it was under him and former Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
“That is not bad when you consider he’s got a City Council that should be in Red China,” Giuliani added.
Giuliani commended Mamdani for keeping Jessica Tisch as NYPD commissioner but questioned how long that decision would last.
He argued that Mamdani faces enormous pressure from the Democratic Socialists of America and other far-left groups to implement policies that are soft on crime.
“Even if he wants to be reasonable, which I am not sure he does, they are going to bang him,” Giuliani said.
Now living in Palm Beach, Giuliani said he still visits New York frequently and recently attended the opera.
“It still looks pretty good,” he said. “But I’m really very concerned about what will happen next.”
