{"id":148639,"date":"2026-02-28T22:37:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T22:37:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/148639\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T22:37:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T22:37:07","slug":"mamdani-on-wrong-side-of-snowball-fight-with-police","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/148639\/","title":{"rendered":"Mamdani on wrong side of \u2018snowball fight\u2019 with police"},"content":{"rendered":"

If this city was like it used to be, like it\u2019s supposed to be, then the fracas that erupted in Washington Square Park<\/a> last week would have been nothing more than the simple snowball fight that Mayor Mamdani said it was.<\/p>\n

But it wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Because if what happened in Washington Square Park had been a simple snowball fight like Mamdani said it was, then the police officers who were being pelted with snow and ice would have been tossing snowballs back, and having fun.<\/p>\n

But they weren\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was not just a \u2018snowball fight,\u2019\u201d Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Hendry said in a statement. \u201cThis was an assault \u2014 by adults throwing chunks of ice and rocks \u2014 that landed two police officers in the hospital with head and face injuries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Police arrested one of four snowball bandits caught on camera clobbering the cops with snow.<\/p>\n

Even if Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg refused to charge him with anything more than a misdemeanor<\/a>, New Yorkers were justified in their outrage over yet another attack on the city\u2019s so-called Finest.<\/p>\n

\"NewNew York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a news conference in Morningside Heights in New York, Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2026. (AP Photo\/Yuki Iwamura)<\/p>\n

Critics were also right to shovel scorn upon Mamdani for making light of the incident.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the videos that I\u2019ve seen, it looked like kids at a snowball fight,\u201d he said on social media.<\/p>\n

Except that the perpetrators hurling the frozen projectiles looked hardly like any kids.<\/p>\n

In fact, the man arrested, Gusmane Coulibaly, is 27. The three others sought by police are described as being around 18 to 20 years old.<\/p>\n

The incident was just as ugly as one in 2019, when cops were doused with water in the middle of a heatwave while trying to make an arrest. One cop was even hit in the head with a bucket.<\/p>\n

Equally ugly was an attack on cops near a Times Square migrant shelter in 2024. The police officers pummeled that day were trying to make a lawful arrest.<\/p>\n

In the latest instance, the snowball fight could have been handled better on both sides. This would have been a much nicer story if the cops had been in on it to start, instead of storming in to try to break things up when the gathering got out of hand.<\/p>\n

The same way we see cops dancing at the West Indian Day Parade,<\/a> how endearing would it have been to see cops joining in the fun, tossing a few harmless snowballs at Washington Square Park, and taking a few in return?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s called community policing. Done right, it can go a long way.<\/p>\n

But instead of throwing snowballs with the cops, the unruly mob began throwing them at the cops. The police, meanwhile, showed admirable restraint.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to be very clear,\u201d Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch wrote on social media the day of the fight. \u201cThe behavior depicted is disgraceful, and it is criminal.\u201d<\/p>\n

February is mercifully over. The month and the one before it brought with them at least 20 deaths related to the snow and bitter cold,<\/a> all on Mamdani\u2019s watch.<\/p>\n

Spring is just around the corner, and no one could be happier about that than the unlikely mayor of New York City.<\/p>\n

Mamdani, only two months into the job, has promised big things for the Big Apple. He probably didn\u2019t count on distractions like trash collection<\/a> and snowball fights.<\/p>\n

But any mayor could have told him. It comes with the job.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If this city was like it used to be, like it\u2019s supposed to be, then the fracas that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":143526,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[85,267,75,84,83,9,24,264,10,12,63,299],"class_list":["post-148639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-county","tag-new-york-news","tag-news","tag-nyc","tag-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148639"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148639\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/143526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}