Mayor Mamdani steps back from pledge on total elimination of NYPD gang database

Josephine Stratman, New York Daily News on Apr 6, 2026

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NEW YORK — Mayor Zohran Mamdani inched further away from his campaign promise to ban the NYPD gang database on Monday, suggesting he could be open to reforming the database as opposed to abolishing it altogether.

The mayor on the campaign trail called the database a “vast dragnet” and said his administration wouldn’t use the database. But he has moderated that position since taking office.

“I’ve made my critiques of the database clear, and the NYPD has also implemented a number of reforms as per the recommendation that came through,” Mamdani said at an unrelated press conference on Monday. “And the implementation of those reforms, the results of that are part of the active discussion that we’re having.”

The reforms he referenced were announced in October 2025, and included changes such as notifying the parents and guardians of minors whose names are entered into the database of thousands of people suspected of being gang members.

Though the mayor’s criticism of the database continued after that report came out, the mayor has recently stood alongside police commissioner, Jessica Tisch as she has extolled the gang database and its help in preventing retaliation in situations involving gang violence.

That point has been highlighted recently by the tragic death of a seven-month old in Brooklyn.

“Are we going to set up for retaliation? Yes,” Tisch said of the possible fallout from the possibly gang-related shooting that left the little girl dead on Thursday. “We will look at the gang database, and that will help our deployment to prevent things like retaliatory shootings.”

The database contains thousands of names, including those of minors, that the police department suspects of being in a gang. The database has been criticized by civil rights groups and advocates as racially profiling young New Yorkers and adding them to the list for things like a passing comment on social media.

According to the police department, the database has helped go after violent gang members.

“I continue to have concerns about the vast dragnet and ways in which many New Yorkers are being put into that database,” Mamdani said in November, after the reforms had been announced.

The city’s Department of Investigation initially issued a report in 2023 that was the culmination of a five-year investigation into the database. The NYPD accepted over half of its 17 initial recommendations.

In October, the DOI issued more recommendations in a new report and applauded the police department for making “substantial improvements to its handling of the database.”

Tisch and Mamdani also stand opposed on the NYPD’s Strategic Response Group, a controversial unit that Mamdani pledged to disband during the campaign. Mamdani also pledged to keep the NYPD’s headcount flat, while Tisch has advocated for expanding it.

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