New York’s leaders are nervous VS the possibility of Trump sending in the National Guard into New York City

Pic.: AI from publics

New York is quietly preparing for a Donald Trump takeover of the country’s largest city, POLITICO notes.

A wide range of New York’s most prominent civic leaders have for weeks been meeting behind the scenes to plan for the possibility of Trump sending in the National Guard or any other federal agents into New York City, according to multiple top elected officials.

Alarmed at what Trump may do in response to Zohran Mamdani’s election as New York City mayor, Gov. Kathy Hochul has devised a virtual war room and convened a series of conversations with law enforcement, business officials and activist groups to stop or at least mitigate any federal incursion.

“The goal is to prevent, and if we can’t prevent, then hopefully we can delay,” said Jackie Bray, the state’s homeland security and emergency services director, who’s Hochul’s point person on the preparations. “And if something happens, we then have to manage. All three scenarios have real planning behind them.”

The extent of the planning and coalition-building, which has not previously been reported, is meant to deny Trump any pretext to dispatch the National Guard or active-duty troops to the city.

New York leaders have for months been watching Trump’s deployment of the National Guard, ICE agents and uniformed military into other cities and braced for similar efforts in the president’s hometown. Hochul has developed an on-and-off rapport with Trump, who takes an intense interest in New York, but has told people she is concerned about the president using Mamdani’s election as his opening to effectively federalize the city.

Hochul assured the groups that any protests they staged would be protected by state and city law enforcement, but she said they had to try to maintain control and keep people from provoking police and effectively clearing the way for Trump’s intervention.

The governor also organized a meeting of business leaders late last month, and is planning another next week, with a related objective: forging a united front across ideological lines to prevent a Trump takeover from happening at all.

But Hochul and her allies recognize they have to act even more aggressively on the PR front now that Mamdani has been elected.

They’re planning an expansive push in November and December to keep federal agents out of the city, an effort that will also include the voices of clergy and veterans.

“Those who have served understand how deeply wrong and unconstitutional it is to deploy troops against U.S. citizens,” Rep. Pat Ryan, an upstate New York Democrat and Army veteran who has been involved with the planning, told. “We want to make sure New Yorkers hear from those who have served.”

Ryan also emphasized America’s founding tradition of not being made to quarter troops, calling such efforts “un-American” and vowing to issue a “patriotic call” ahead of the country’s 250th anniversary next year.

The planners have also begun to engage faith leaders and will step that effort up this month. Ryan has already spoken to the Rev. Al Sharpton, who was enthusiastic about a preemptive campaign and suggested holding a message event at the Statue of Liberty.

The governor directed Bray to engage with her California counterparts and ask them what they wish they would have known in the weeks before Trump’s incursion. Then, once ICE stepped up its detention of suspected illegal migrants in Chicago, Hochul officials stepped up their planning. They set up a virtual war room in which aides across state departments in Albany and New York have daily discussions and then began reaching out to non-governmental officials.

What’s less clear is the role Mamdani will play, particularly closer to his inauguration on January 1. Hochul officials have had initial conversations with the mayor-elect’s transition team but have largely been coordinating with the city’s police and emergency leaders, who are still technically part of the Adams administration.

The governor pressed Mamdani to pledge to retain Tisch as police commissioner and privately urged him to resist his most expansive ambitions in 2026, when she’s on the ballot and a number of New York House races could determine control of Congress.

Mamdani did vow to keep Tisch — who’s more likely to stay in her post if the city is forced into a Trump-created crisis — but his fiery victory speech has raised doubts about just how much he’ll temper his progressive agenda.

The president has threatened to send less federal money to Mamdani’s New York but has so far resisted the aggressive ICE deployment he’s unleashed on Chicago.

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