Trump Critiques NYC Mayoral Candidate’s Plan to Close Rikers Island

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump expressed his disapproval on Thursday regarding New York City Democratic mayoral candidate Zoran Mamdani’s aim to shut down Rikers Island if he wins. He described the plan as “not good.”

During a mayoral debate on Wednesday, Mamdani reiterated his stance, stating, “I have mentioned this before, and I’ll say it again: Rikers Island must be closed. It’s a blemish on the city’s history, and the current administration has made it nearly impossible to meet the deadline for its closure.”

“I will do everything I can to meet that deadline,” he promised.

At a Homeland Security Select Committee event in the State Dining Hall, Trump was asked by Breitbart News about the implications of closing Rikers Island for public safety. Attorney General Pam Bondi shook her head disapprovingly at Mamdani’s leftist ideas.

“Well, it’s not good. I don’t think that’s a wise decision. But you need it,” Trump commented. “There are many individuals in New York City who shouldn’t be there. They arrived through an open border.”

“Honestly, I’m puzzled. New York City has always faced financial challenges. Yet, they spend $8 billion on people arriving out of nowhere, and nobody seems to object. Where did the money come from?” he continued.

Trump stated that prisons need to be “very fair and very safe,” while acknowledging the presence of “a lot of criminals.” He remarked, “There are numerous other criminals out there. I used to talk about this a lot, and people would claim, ‘Only good people come from abroad.’ I argued, ‘That’s simply not accurate.’ I wasn’t entirely sure back then, but with the borders opening up, millions began to arrive. Some of them make our criminals look like saints. That’s the only silver lining—they make our criminals seem decent in comparison.”

“They’re the most ruthless, the fiercest. There’s this group, Tren de Aragua, who are notorious. They mutilate individuals for contacting the police. ‘Did you call the police?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘They cut off his fingers so he can’t call again. Now, we’re going to cut off your hand because they took over his apartment in Colorado,’” Trump recounted.

He also labeled Governor Jared Polis of Colorado as “weak,” saying, “In Colorado, they’ve taken over towns, and their governor is ineffective. He doesn’t know what he’s doing, so he just turns a blind eye. But we’re working to remove them. They’re going back to numerous countries—not just Venezuela, but Venezuela will be one of them.”