New York Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday admonished former Mayor Rudy Giuliani for his repeated recent comments that "responsibility is on the black community" for reducing the necessity of police officers in their communities.
"I think he fundamentally misunderstands the reality," said de Blasio on ABC's This Week. "There is a problem here. There is a rift here that has to be overcome. You cannot look at the incident in Missouri; another incident in Cleveland, Ohio; and another incident in New York City all happening in the space of weeks and act like there's not a problem."
"There's something fundamental we have to get at here," de Blasio said, adding, "And it's not going to be helped by accusing either the community or the police of having bad intention or not doing their job. In fact, I think everyone is trying to do their job."
De Blasio's comments come at the end of a week of protests sparked by the decision of a grand jury not to indict the New York police officer responsible for the death of Eric Garner on Staten Island.
"I make it a point not to talk about any element of the judicial process per se," said de Blasio. "I'd talk about what we have to do to fix the relationship between police and the community... As an executive in public service, I think it's important to respect the judicial process."
[For more of this story, written by Allen McDuffee, go to http://www.theatlantic.com/pol...lity-on-race/383489/]
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