President Biden joined New York City Mayor Eric Adams on Thursday to discuss violent crime and rising gun violence in the city since the start of the pandemic, along with U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul.

Mayor Adams, a former police officer, ran a ‘tough on crime’ platform in his campaign for mayor.  Adams said on Thursday: “We’re going to stop gun trafficking from coming into our city, get illegal guns off the streets, and lock up those who carry them.”

The President said he is focused on combatting gun violence with a plan laid out by The White House, which includes additional funding to “put more cops on the beat,” more “investment in violence prevention and intervention” and more “help from the federal government to try to stop illegal gun traffickers.”  Said Biden: “The answer is not to defund the police, it’s to give you the tools the training the funding to be partners, to be protectors.” 

Adams has pointed to an influx of guns into cities as a catalyst to rising crime, especially after two NYPD officers were killed by a suspect with a stolen gun.  Last month Adams also introduced a “Blueprint to End Gun Violence,” which includes plans to revive a plainclothes anti-gun unit in the NYPD that was disbanded in 2020 and calls for more restrictive bail laws and an option to charge teenagers as adults in some gun cases.

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