Put the NYPD back in charge to fix Mamdanis press-credentials mess

City Council Speaker Julie Menin and her colleagues deserve credit for tackling City Hall’s press-credentialing chaos, but their proposal misses the true fix: Hand the task back to the NYPD.Council action follows the fiasco of Team Mamdani issuing press passes to a trio of ghoulish Luigi Mangione fangirls with no real apparent qualifications — passes they continued to use because the laws rightly make it difficult to rescind credentials to minimize political interference with reporters.Yet the bill aims more at making it easier to “un-credential” journalists, when the real problem is who’s doing the initial screening.The NYPD long issued city press credentials, which grant journalists access across emergency lines and to government events, until then-Mayor Bill de Blasio joined the council in shifting the task to the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment in the wake of the anti-policing spasms of the 2020 George Floyd protests.It was plainly political fellow-travelers at Mamdani’s media office who opted to privilege the sicko supporters of the confessed killer of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

Overall, the Columbia Journalism Review reports, the “new media” content creators and influencers welcomed by City Hall embrace “partiality to a greater extent than mainstream journalists.”Menin rightly warns that issuing credentials without proper vetting “presents real journalistic, public safety, and logistical concerns,” but her reform doesn’t focus on that issue.If she truly wants “a thoughtful process,” best just put the NYPD back in charge.

It’ll ensure a process that’s apolitical, nonpartisan and not overly influenced by any mayor’s politics.Subscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter! Please provide a valid email.

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A city press pass is a privilege — one Mamdani’s mob of ...