Democratic Socialists are pressing Mayor Zohran Mamdani to fire NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and expel ICE from New York, turning on their ally after a federal shooting during an immigration operation.
The New York Post reported that DSA-linked activists and the city’s DSA chapter escalated demands after a man was shot by federal law enforcement officers during an Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation on Thursday.
By Friday, the calls had spread across social media. By Saturday, the New York City chapter of the DSA put them in writing. Some posts left the mayor’s name out. Others put the blame squarely on him.
Mamdani, elected with heavy support from the city’s socialist and immigrant-rights left, now faces the predictable next step: comrades insisting he dismantle core policing units and treat federal immigration agents as an occupying force.
That pattern tracks other fights in which the mayor’s rhetoric has drawn sharp pushback, including DHS criticism over hostility tied to ICE operations.
On Saturday the New York City chapter of the DSA released a formal statement that named the mayor and left little room for half-measures.
The chapter said:
"We demand that Mayor Zohran Mamdani fire NYPD commissioner Jessica Tisch and use every power available to him to drive ICE out of New York City,"
It continued:
"We further demand the mayor abolish the NYPD’s Strategic Response Group and Community Response Team."
The Strategic Response Group, or SRG, is the NYPD unit that handles large protests and disorder. The Community Response Team is another specialized unit now on the same chopping block in socialist messaging.
A day earlier, DSA state senate candidate Illapa Sairitupac posted a graphic on X that read, “Abolish ICE, disband the SRG, fire Tisch.” The post did not name Mamdani.
Others did. Socialist congressional candidate Andrew Easton, running against Rep. Ritchie Torres in New York’s 15th District, posted on X on Sunday and aimed the accountability line at City Hall.
Easton wrote:
"Fire Tisch and disband the SRG, but the real responsibility lies with Mayor Zohran Mamdani. He must kick every ICE agent out of NYC,"
He added that Mamdani “was elected with the support of the immigrant rights movement and must be held accountable” and “must fully enforce Executive Order 13.”
The order itself is not spelled out in the available reporting, but Easton’s demand is clear: the mayor is expected to deliver the full sanctuary-style agenda his base wanted.
A Mamdani spokesperson pointed reporters to comments the mayor made Friday to the New York Times. Mamdani said Tisch “is the police commissioner, and there are no plans to change that.”
He also framed the federal operation in stark terms and promised a broad review.
Mamdani said:
"And I want to be very clear that our administration, alongside the commissioner, alongside the PD, will review all of the events of the last 24 hours, including ICE’s shooting, the police department’s response to that incident and the ensuing protest, the staging of ICE operations in privately owned parking lots, and every action the city can take to protect New Yorkers from ICE’s terror,"
Calling lawful federal enforcement “terror” is not neutral language. It matches the tone of the activists now demanding he fire his own police commissioner and empty the city of ICE agents.
The mayor’s record on charged foreign-policy statements has already fueled separate storms, from backlash over his October 7 remarks to fights about international courts.
The pressure did not stop at the mayor’s office. DSA voices also turned on City Council leaders over legislation aimed at the SRG.
The CURB Act seeks to stop the Strategic Response Group from interfering in the breakup of protests. Socialist council member and Mamdani ally Chi Osse said Public Safety Chair Oswald Feliz is blocking the bill from even getting a hearing.
In a Monday Instagram video, Osse said:
"The chair of the public safety committee, Council Member Oswald Feliz, is blocking the bill from a hearing, and no, he’s not a republican,"
Osse added, “It’s long overdue that we, the people, get a hearing,” and noted the Mamdani administration should have a chance to weigh in on the pending legislation.
DSA members have also attacked City Council Speaker Julie Menin, claiming she is halting legislation that would disband the SRG. Neither Feliz nor Menin is quoted responding in the reporting.
The sequence is familiar. Activists want specialized police units sidelined during protests. When council gatekeepers slow the bill, the same activists brand them obstacles, even when those gatekeepers are Democrats.
Mamdani’s broader political brand has invited similar collisions, including criticism from Bill Maher over his October 7 posture and ongoing arguments about how far left City Hall should drag national policy.
Thursday’s ICE operation and the shooting by federal officers supplied the spark. Friday’s posts and Mamdani’s own comments set the frame. Saturday’s DSA chapter statement made the demands official. Sunday and Monday brought the personal accountability messages aimed at the mayor and at council leaders.
What the public still does not have from this reporting is basic operational detail: the exact location of the shooting, the identity and condition of the man who was shot, or a full account of the ensuing protest. The available record is heavy on political demands and light on those facts.
Even so, the political meaning is not hard to read. A mayor lifted by the immigrant-rights and socialist left is now being told that keeping his police commissioner, tolerating ICE activity in the city, and leaving the SRG intact are betrayals.
Easton’s line makes the bargain explicit. Support from that movement, in this telling, is a debt. The payment is firing Tisch, disbanding specialized NYPD units, and kicking federal immigration agents out of New York.
Mamdani has so far refused the personnel demand. He has not refused the framing that treats ICE as a menace the city must “protect New Yorkers” from. That gap, holding the commissioner while echoing the movement’s language, is exactly where the pressure is landing.
His parallel fights on the national stage, including calls for the U.S. to join the ICC and pursue Netanyahu, show the same instinct: progressive maximalism first, institutional restraint second.
Voters who wanted competent policing and lawful immigration enforcement can see the trade on offer. The activists want the tools of order removed. The mayor is reviewing “every action” short of the one firings they keep demanding.
When the loudest voices in a governing coalition treat ICE agents as terrorists and NYPD specialty units as the enemy, the city does not get safer, it gets a loyalty test dressed up as justice.
