WEBVTT - The Staten Island Problem - Part 1: The Mayor vs. the Borough President 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.600 Then, Matti Haaffer here, before we get into this episode, 0:00:02.680 --> 0:00:04.280 I wanted to let you know that you can hear 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:08.000 all episodes of Revisionist History The Staten Island problem ad 0:00:08.000 --> 0:00:11.680 free right now. By signing up for Pushkin Plus. You'll 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:15.000 also get bonus episodes, full audiobooks, and other binges from 0:00:15.000 --> 0:00:18.560 your favorite Pushkin hosts and authors. Plus, your support helps 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:21.439 independent shows like us continue making the stories you love. 0:00:22.000 --> 0:00:25.040 Sign up and save on the Revisionist History Show page 0:00:25.040 --> 0:00:28.720 on Apple Podcasts or at pushkin dot fm slash plus. 0:00:29.280 --> 0:00:32.199 Use the code R twenty five for twenty five percent 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:36.479 off an annual subscription. All right, let's get into the series. 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:42.280 A while back, my colleague Benaedaf Haffrey came to me 0:00:42.360 --> 0:00:45.760 with a story about a strange little island that no 0:00:45.880 --> 0:00:52.239 outsider every visits, forgotten, overlooked, reached by boat across an 0:00:52.280 --> 0:00:55.840 expanse of turbulent water, where the locals practice their own 0:00:55.960 --> 0:01:00.400 unique customs, engage in their own strange variety of politics, 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:05.520 and where incredibly, everything that is happening currently in America 0:01:06.360 --> 0:01:14.399 already happened long ago Staten Island. And so today we 0:01:14.480 --> 0:01:17.920 bring you a new series, The Staten Island problem in it. 0:01:18.080 --> 0:01:20.160 Ben is going to take us back in time to 0:01:20.240 --> 0:01:23.320 the nineteen nineties, when a young real estate scion named 0:01:23.319 --> 0:01:26.960 Donald Trump was chasing models in downtown nightclubs, when the 0:01:27.000 --> 0:01:30.240 subways were covered in graffiti, and when the homicide epidemic 0:01:30.280 --> 0:01:35.200 was at its peak and Staten Island decided enough already. 0:01:36.120 --> 0:01:38.840 Ben will share what he's discovered deep in the distant 0:01:38.880 --> 0:01:42.039 corners of New York's archives and tell the story of 0:01:42.040 --> 0:01:46.200 a civil war within the Five Boroughs, a secessionist movement, 0:01:46.880 --> 0:01:51.040 the rise of Rudy Giuliani, the Wu Tang clan, and 0:01:51.120 --> 0:01:54.520 ultimately a parable for what we're all living through right now. 0:01:55.400 --> 0:01:58.240 How a country that thought it was united comes apart. 0:01:59.120 --> 0:02:03.200 What was it? Hemingway? One set of bankruptcy. It happens 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:08.720 two ways, gradually, and then suddenly. I promise you that 0:02:08.800 --> 0:02:10.960 at every turn in this bizarre story, you will say 0:02:11.000 --> 0:02:15.880 to yourself, I didn't know that, and then oh, that's 0:02:15.919 --> 0:02:19.280 how we got to where we are today. This is 0:02:19.320 --> 0:02:22.440 the first of what will be five episodes. You can 0:02:22.480 --> 0:02:24.840 expect new ones in your feet every week, or you 0:02:24.840 --> 0:02:27.840 can subscribe to push kid Plus and binge the whole series. 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:28.600 Right now. 0:02:31.040 --> 0:02:34.959 Over to Ben, Let me say up top that I 0:02:35.000 --> 0:02:37.919 am not from Staten Island, though many people I spoke 0:02:37.960 --> 0:02:40.359 to for the serious scene to think I am. I'm 0:02:40.360 --> 0:02:42.799 from Boston. But when I was a kid, I used 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:45.440 to dream about moving to New York. I used to 0:02:45.480 --> 0:02:48.840 watch Fantasia two thousand all the time. Well, actually, just 0:02:48.880 --> 0:02:51.920 this one sequence about New York City set to George 0:02:51.960 --> 0:02:56.120 Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. It opens as the clarinet plays 0:02:56.160 --> 0:03:01.160 that iconic du and a pensil draws in the skyline 0:03:01.200 --> 0:03:04.040 of New York City, and the whole thing is just 0:03:04.160 --> 0:03:07.880 romantic and idealized in hyperkinetic I fell in love with 0:03:07.919 --> 0:03:11.239 the idea of this place. I used to draw that skyline. 0:03:11.560 --> 0:03:13.480 I used to ride my bike around with a tape 0:03:13.480 --> 0:03:17.840 player bungee to the rack, listening to Gershwin, thinking about 0:03:17.840 --> 0:03:22.720 my first apartment where I live, what I'd do? Who 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:25.000 cares that the cartoon was set in the Great Depression. 0:03:26.320 --> 0:03:30.119 I was a total dufis, But in all my reveries 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:33.160 I never thought about the most remote part of New 0:03:33.240 --> 0:03:38.280 York City, Staten Island. New York is made up of 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:40.520 five burroughs, each of which is like its own little 0:03:40.560 --> 0:03:44.520 city queens. The Bronx, Manhattan, Brooklyn, where I live now, 0:03:45.000 --> 0:03:48.200 and then the farthest away and smallest at least by population, 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:52.520 Staten Island. And as I've come to learn, Staten Island 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:54.760 is a kind of uncomfortable fact of New York City. 0:03:55.360 --> 0:03:58.400 It's the butt of the joke always. I mean, listen 0:03:58.440 --> 0:03:59.920 to this recent Mayor oal debate. 0:04:00.680 --> 0:04:01.840 I'll start with you, mus Adams. 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:04.200 Which borough have you spent the least amount of time. 0:04:04.000 --> 0:04:09.760 In Staten Island? Miss l A, Staten Island. 0:04:09.920 --> 0:04:13.119 Mister Lander, Stotton Island, Mister Mom, Donnie. 0:04:13.320 --> 0:04:16.920 The beacon of free transit, Staten Island, Mister Myrie, I'd 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:18.640 stan out, mister Stringer. 0:04:19.000 --> 0:04:20.680 I've been doing this, I've been everywhere. 0:04:23.560 --> 0:04:28.080 It was almost a sweet I learned about Staten Island 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:31.120 after I first moved to New York City. That summer, 0:04:31.279 --> 0:04:34.000 some friends invited me to a Staten Island Yankees game, 0:04:34.200 --> 0:04:37.040 their old minor league baseball team. When I looked up 0:04:37.080 --> 0:04:39.240 how to get there, I learned that I would have 0:04:39.279 --> 0:04:43.080 to take a subway to a ferry, a literal ship. 0:04:44.080 --> 0:04:47.400 I got on board. There was a bar, huge windows, 0:04:47.600 --> 0:04:50.719 twenty five thirty minute ride where you see the statue 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:54.240 of liberty out the right side, and then you just 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:59.440 keep going. The New York City skyline recedes into the distance, 0:05:00.240 --> 0:05:03.440 and then you land in a place that just is 0:05:03.480 --> 0:05:10.159 not New York City. New York City is all shoe 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:14.320 box apartments. Staten Island is single family homes. New York 0:05:14.320 --> 0:05:18.040 City is liberal, Staten Island is conservative. New York City 0:05:18.040 --> 0:05:21.080 at large is mostly people of color. Staten Island is 0:05:21.120 --> 0:05:24.680 mostly white. New York City is defined by its subway. 0:05:24.839 --> 0:05:28.200 Staten Island has a single, dinky railway, and everyone drives 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:32.080 a car Anyways. New York are words that convey prestige 0:05:32.160 --> 0:05:35.120 and power the world over, the center of finance, the 0:05:35.120 --> 0:05:37.760 center of media, the largest city in the country, the 0:05:37.880 --> 0:05:42.320 kind of place George Gershwin rhapsodizes. Meanwhile, a member of 0:05:42.360 --> 0:05:45.159 the College of Staten Island board of trustees told me 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:48.680 he once suggested they drop Staten Island from the name 0:05:48.720 --> 0:05:52.480 of the college because it made people take it less seriously. 0:05:54.040 --> 0:05:56.479 Once Staten Island was supposed to get the world's largest 0:05:56.520 --> 0:05:59.600 fairest wheel, it did not. You was supposed to get 0:05:59.600 --> 0:06:02.800 connected to New York subway. Once they broke ground on 0:06:02.839 --> 0:06:06.279 a tunnel, and that was the end of it. For 0:06:06.320 --> 0:06:10.120 all these reasons and more, Staten Island calls itself the 0:06:10.160 --> 0:06:14.680 forgotten borough, the least beloved, the most ignored. It was 0:06:14.720 --> 0:06:17.039 once the place where New York City put most of 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:22.240 its trash, literally the largest landfill on the planet. But 0:06:22.400 --> 0:06:26.200 starting in the late nineteen eighties, Staten Island had decided 0:06:26.640 --> 0:06:29.279 it didn't want to be dumped on anymore. It didn't 0:06:29.279 --> 0:06:32.960 want to be forgotten anymore. So it began a movement 0:06:33.120 --> 0:06:36.680 to secede from New York City, leave do its own thing, 0:06:36.800 --> 0:06:41.680 become an entirely different place, something that, if it happened, 0:06:42.560 --> 0:06:47.840 threatened to destroy New York. So why am I telling 0:06:47.880 --> 0:06:50.919 you this? Because it all seems so familiar to me. 0:06:51.680 --> 0:06:56.520 Every political arrangement includes some disgruntled minority, someone or some 0:06:56.680 --> 0:06:59.880 place that feels left out, forgotten, like they don't matter. 0:07:00.800 --> 0:07:03.960 I think that problem is at the very heart of 0:07:03.960 --> 0:07:07.760 what's going on in our country today. So I began 0:07:07.839 --> 0:07:16.040 to investigate the Staten Island problem. You're listening to Revisionist History. 0:07:16.200 --> 0:07:19.120 I'm Ben Mattahaffrey, and this is our series about an 0:07:19.120 --> 0:07:22.880 overlooked and misunderstood movement in the nineteen nineties to break 0:07:22.960 --> 0:07:27.360 up the largest and greatest city in the country. This summer, 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:30.680 the United States is celebrating the anniversary of its founding 0:07:30.800 --> 0:07:33.920 by an act of secession, e quibble over taxes and 0:07:33.960 --> 0:07:37.960 representation that defied an empire and created a country which 0:07:37.960 --> 0:07:41.800 has altered the course of human history. All of which 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:44.040 is to say, I think it's the right time to 0:07:44.080 --> 0:07:47.520 ask what do you do when that democracy looks like 0:07:47.560 --> 0:07:53.800 it's about to fall apart? This is the Staten Island Problem, 0:07:53.960 --> 0:08:07.280 Episode one, the Mayor versus the borough President. To start, 0:08:07.520 --> 0:08:09.120 I've got to take you back in time to the 0:08:09.160 --> 0:08:10.800 New York City of long ago. 0:08:12.000 --> 0:08:15.600 When I moved here for the Washington Post. I got 0:08:15.640 --> 0:08:20.680 hardship pay really yeah, like it was not compared to Washington, DC. Yes, 0:08:21.560 --> 0:08:24.960 I got a special cost of limit allowance, which was 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:28.600 essentially like take a cab compensation for the fact I 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:29.640 was going to a hell hole. 0:08:30.480 --> 0:08:33.320 Local reporter Malcolm Gladwell was on the scene in that era. 0:08:33.920 --> 0:08:35.679 Was that the Washington Post and I had been there 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:42.280 since eighty six thirty seven, and the New York Bureau 0:08:43.640 --> 0:08:47.560 I had an opening. The bure chief was leaving, and 0:08:47.720 --> 0:08:49.720 I applied. As it turns out, I was the only 0:08:49.760 --> 0:08:50.560 person who. 0:08:50.440 --> 0:08:52.920 Applied how many people worked at the Washington Post, probably 0:08:52.960 --> 0:08:56.360 a thousand reporters. Nobody wanted the person who wanted to 0:08:56.360 --> 0:08:58.000 be the bureau chief of New York City. 0:08:58.440 --> 0:09:01.959 Nobody but me. He wanted the job. It was the 0:09:02.000 --> 0:09:04.440 sweetest set up in the world. You had, like, you know, 0:09:04.480 --> 0:09:06.720 a credit card, you could put anything you wanted on it. 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:10.480 You had like an assistant, You had an un lovely 0:09:10.480 --> 0:09:11.800 office in the newsweek building. 0:09:12.320 --> 0:09:14.080 I don't know why, but I was like. 0:09:14.120 --> 0:09:17.120 I want that job, such a good job, so much fun. 0:09:17.360 --> 0:09:19.679 But no, the perception was why we didn't want want 0:09:19.679 --> 0:09:21.480 to go to New York the place that you that 0:09:21.559 --> 0:09:25.559 you left. You didn't voluntarily voluntarily go there. 0:09:29.559 --> 0:09:31.360 This was the version of New York that a man 0:09:31.440 --> 0:09:33.880 named David Dinkins was going to run as mayor. 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:44.200 He was, by temperament, a conciliator, a pleaser, a guy 0:09:44.240 --> 0:09:49.280 who wanted to make peace among different constituencies, and kind 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:55.360 of represented in his body and his pastor and his 0:09:55.559 --> 0:10:01.480 affect kind of he really did appeal to people's better angels. 0:10:01.880 --> 0:10:04.800 He really was that. Marcia Smith was a high ranking 0:10:04.800 --> 0:10:08.560 official in the Dinkins administration. She'd first started working with 0:10:08.600 --> 0:10:11.360 him back when he was campaigning for Manhattan Borough President. 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:14.560 The borough president is like the mayor of each borough. 0:10:15.760 --> 0:10:19.800 As it happened, the whole policy unit in the Borough 0:10:19.800 --> 0:10:23.120 President's office was all women. He used to call us cupkicks. 0:10:24.320 --> 0:10:27.040 She'd watched his rise to become the first black mayor 0:10:27.120 --> 0:10:29.120 of the city in nineteen eighty nine. 0:10:29.320 --> 0:10:31.560 The election of David Dinkin's Remember this was on the 0:10:31.600 --> 0:10:34.760 heels of black mayors being elected in other major cities. 0:10:35.000 --> 0:10:37.720 But this was like New York was like last. But 0:10:37.880 --> 0:10:41.800 it was a very optimistic moment. This was a big moment. 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:44.520 I felt it as very hopeful. I could also feel, 0:10:44.640 --> 0:10:49.839 of course, the skepticism that felt like there was a 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:50.680 lot at stake. 0:10:51.120 --> 0:10:53.480 A lot of eyes on you guys, a lot of eyes. 0:10:54.960 --> 0:10:59.440 But contrary to most people who become mayor, Dinkins hadn't 0:10:59.440 --> 0:11:03.200 really wanted the job, and. 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:08.160 He shied away from the idea of running from mayor, 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:10.360 and he was convinced to run for mayor. 0:11:11.200 --> 0:11:15.280 Ruth Messenger became Manhattan Borough President after Dinkins. Around the 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:18.880 same time, the city became majority minority, more people of 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:22.679 color than white people. Those demographics were why people thought 0:11:22.720 --> 0:11:23.800 Dinkins should run. 0:11:24.480 --> 0:11:29.720 But here's a Blackborough President with some knowledge of state 0:11:29.760 --> 0:11:34.000 government and city government. For sure, perfect candidate for mayor. 0:11:35.000 --> 0:11:40.199 And I promised you that he was pushed to make 0:11:40.240 --> 0:11:40.920 that decision. 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:45.320 Dinkins was a lifelong New Yorker. He grew up shuttling 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:47.600 between his mom's place in the city and his dad's 0:11:47.600 --> 0:11:50.400 in New Jersey. His parents had split when he was young. 0:11:51.360 --> 0:11:53.760 His father was a barber, his mom was a maid. 0:11:54.440 --> 0:11:56.200 When he grew up, he went to college at Howard 0:11:56.280 --> 0:12:00.680 University and met his wife. Her father was Harlem political royalty, 0:12:01.720 --> 0:12:06.800 and that's at the course of Dinkins's life. Dinkins died 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:08.680 in twenty twenty. So I spent a lot of time 0:12:08.720 --> 0:12:12.200 talking to people about him, and everybody had a Dinkins story, 0:12:12.720 --> 0:12:15.880 most of them about how fastidious he was. He would 0:12:15.960 --> 0:12:19.360 shower multiple times a day. He was often in tennis whites. 0:12:19.800 --> 0:12:22.560 A lawyer named Richard Emery remembered going to his office 0:12:22.559 --> 0:12:24.959 to ask him questions for an affidavit in a case. 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:27.840 Once they were in the bowels of the municipal building, 0:12:29.000 --> 0:12:29.560 and all. 0:12:29.440 --> 0:12:32.080 Of a sudden, David Dinkins gets up from behind the 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:37.720 desk and he takes his pants off. I think his 0:12:37.920 --> 0:12:43.760 jacket was still on, and he had garters and boxer trousers, 0:12:44.800 --> 0:12:47.040 and I wanted to ask him, what are you doing? 0:12:47.360 --> 0:12:49.560 And he puts them up like this, holds him with 0:12:49.559 --> 0:12:53.679 one hand and takes a steamer and starts to steam 0:12:53.720 --> 0:12:54.679 the pants. 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:56.600 So that the crease is really nice. 0:12:56.920 --> 0:12:58.960 And he stands there and he's answering my question and 0:12:59.000 --> 0:13:00.640 said he's steaming pants. 0:13:03.120 --> 0:13:05.760 Dinkins didn't like a crease out of order. I have 0:13:05.800 --> 0:13:08.040 to imagine that's part of why being the mayor of 0:13:08.120 --> 0:13:12.280 Chaos City was not necessarily his dream job. When Dinkins 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:15.400 was elected, his dad told the press, I wouldn't want 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:18.800 the job for a billion dollars. But Dinkins knew this 0:13:19.000 --> 0:13:22.400 was his chance to make history, and he did. 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:28.240 I stand here before you today as the elected leader 0:13:28.320 --> 0:13:31.640 of the greatest city of a great nation to which 0:13:31.720 --> 0:13:35.320 my ancestors were brought, chained and whipped in the whole 0:13:35.400 --> 0:13:36.280 of a slave ship. 0:13:37.880 --> 0:13:41.240 In January of nineteen ninety, David Dinkins took the oath 0:13:41.240 --> 0:13:43.080 of office on the steps of city Hall. 0:13:43.600 --> 0:13:47.880 And this year this city has given powerful proof of 0:13:47.920 --> 0:13:51.240 the proposition that all of us are created equal. 0:13:52.240 --> 0:13:54.520 Dinkins had a vision of what the city could be. 0:13:55.440 --> 0:13:59.440 I see New York as a gorgeous mosaic of race 0:13:59.480 --> 0:14:04.640 and religion, faith, of national origin, and sexual orientation of 0:14:04.720 --> 0:14:10.680 individuals whose families arrived yesterday and generations ago, coming through 0:14:10.720 --> 0:14:14.720 Ellis Island or Kennedy Airport, or on buses bound for 0:14:14.800 --> 0:14:15.679 the Port Authority. 0:14:17.360 --> 0:14:21.640 In that spirit, I offer this fundamental. 0:14:21.040 --> 0:14:26.480 Pledge, I intend to be the mayor of all the people. 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:32.000 Of New York, from City Island to Staten Island. 0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:37.720 New York City has always been deeply segregated into ethnic enclaves, 0:14:37.920 --> 0:14:41.320 the Dominicans of Washington Heights, black people in Central Harlem, 0:14:41.520 --> 0:14:45.160 Italians and Jews and Canarsi. The mosaic was Dinkins's way 0:14:45.240 --> 0:14:48.400 of reconciling those facts. It was his way of saying 0:14:48.480 --> 0:14:54.440 that diversity is not a problem, it's an asset. But 0:14:54.480 --> 0:14:57.040 if you cleared away the buildings he faced as he spoke, 0:14:57.600 --> 0:14:59.440 he would have been looking straight at the peace of 0:14:59.440 --> 0:15:02.960 the mosaic that had recently decided it no longer fit 0:15:03.960 --> 0:15:10.720 Staten Island. After Dinkins was elected, Staten Island had pushed 0:15:10.760 --> 0:15:13.720 forward its bill to secede from New York City. It 0:15:13.720 --> 0:15:16.120 had been in the works for years. At that point, 0:15:16.200 --> 0:15:19.200 but it's hard to imagine. Dinkins didn't take it personally. 0:15:19.800 --> 0:15:23.560 His colleague Marcia Smith thought that for Staten Island, this 0:15:23.720 --> 0:15:25.200 was all about Dinkins. 0:15:25.960 --> 0:15:28.560 Oh my god, what are they thinking? And well, of 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:30.800 course they're thinking that because they don't want to be 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:32.720 governed by a black mayor. 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:35.040 So it immediately seemed racially tinged. 0:15:35.080 --> 0:15:35.200 You. 0:15:35.240 --> 0:15:40.200 Absolutely, Dinkins knew Staten Island was threatening to secede, but 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:43.480 he didn't know how seriously to take it. Then one 0:15:43.560 --> 0:15:47.000 day his finance commissioner began looking into the matter and 0:15:47.080 --> 0:15:52.120 determined this was a bigger deal than anyone realized. The 0:15:52.160 --> 0:15:56.560 administration looked into it. If Staten Island succeeded, New York 0:15:56.800 --> 0:16:00.120 could be in a financial crisis. The city would, who 0:16:00.160 --> 0:16:03.440 is almost twenty percent of its land, including crucially its 0:16:03.520 --> 0:16:07.400 last operational dump, with a smaller population, It would get 0:16:07.400 --> 0:16:09.920 way less than federal and state aid. It would lose 0:16:09.960 --> 0:16:13.720 possibly the thousands of government workers who lived on Staten Island, 0:16:13.800 --> 0:16:16.560 including thousands of police officers in the middle of a 0:16:16.600 --> 0:16:19.800 crime wave, and it could leave the first black mayor 0:16:20.080 --> 0:16:26.320 with the legacy presiding over the city's destruction. Could Dinkins 0:16:26.560 --> 0:16:30.360 keep the biggest, most fractious city in the country from 0:16:30.440 --> 0:16:34.640 breaking apart. He had to scare Staten Island out of 0:16:34.640 --> 0:16:38.440 doing it, So the city launched a task force, and 0:16:38.520 --> 0:16:42.240 Dinkins decided that he personally would set sail for the 0:16:42.280 --> 0:16:50.240 island to argue the case himself. We'll be right back 0:17:02.040 --> 0:17:05.000 one night. A few weeks before David Dinkins went to 0:17:05.040 --> 0:17:09.240 Staten Island, a police officer named Michael O'Keefe was patrolling 0:17:09.280 --> 0:17:12.960 the Manhattan neighborhood of Washington Heights in an unmarked car. 0:17:14.080 --> 0:17:16.920 He saw a young man tugging a jacket around his waist. 0:17:17.240 --> 0:17:21.280 It was July, not jacket weather. He thought he was 0:17:21.320 --> 0:17:26.119 probably hiding a weapon. O'Keefe pulled over. The kid was 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:31.160 a suspected drug dealer named Keiko Garcia. O'Keeffe got out 0:17:31.560 --> 0:17:35.800 and tried to arrest him. Garcia resisted. What happened next 0:17:36.000 --> 0:17:38.560 was fast and unclear, but it was a warm evening 0:17:38.760 --> 0:17:41.920 and there were witnesses on the street. They said they 0:17:41.920 --> 0:17:45.360 saw the cop beat Garcia with a walkie talkie, take 0:17:45.400 --> 0:17:47.159 out his knees, and shove him into the lobby of 0:17:47.200 --> 0:17:51.320 an apartment building. They said they heard him screaming mama, mama, 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:57.280 they are killing me in Spanish. Then two shots. When 0:17:57.280 --> 0:18:01.000 more police arrived, they found O'Keefe's standing of Garcia dead, 0:18:02.119 --> 0:18:07.480 a bullet in the stomach, one in the back. That night, 0:18:07.920 --> 0:18:08.720 the riots began. 0:18:09.800 --> 0:18:13.119 Eighties. Bottles and bricks are being thrown. Several cars have 0:18:13.160 --> 0:18:14.000 been set on fire. 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:16.320 Some of their occupants have been thrown from the cars. 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:21.159 The building across from the shooting burned. There was fire everywhere. 0:18:25.640 --> 0:18:26.840 Oh shoo. 0:18:27.880 --> 0:18:31.560 A police helicopter hovered overhead. Someone shot at it. In 0:18:31.600 --> 0:18:34.320 the lobby of the apartment building where Garcia was killed, 0:18:34.800 --> 0:18:38.080 someone used his blood to write Kiko, we love you 0:18:38.480 --> 0:18:41.560 on the wall. One man threw a bottle at some cops, 0:18:41.600 --> 0:18:44.360 then ran away across the rooftops. When they chased him, 0:18:44.400 --> 0:18:48.600 he fell five stories to his death. Protesters burned pictures 0:18:48.640 --> 0:18:49.320 of the police. 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:53.480 Police officers watching their image burn didn't want to talk 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:55.800 on camera, but told me later they thought it was 0:18:55.840 --> 0:18:58.919 disgusting and were frustrated by orders not to interfere with 0:18:58.960 --> 0:18:59.639 a demonstration. 0:19:00.280 --> 0:19:03.040 People listening in on police radio said they heard cops 0:19:03.080 --> 0:19:06.560 joking that if they saw Al Sharpton protesting, they should 0:19:06.560 --> 0:19:10.600 shoot him. Phil Caruso, head of the police union took 0:19:10.640 --> 0:19:11.520 to the news. 0:19:11.960 --> 0:19:15.040 Of course, we don't approve of it, we don't condone it, 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:19.240 but it's something that is sort of a reaction on 0:19:19.280 --> 0:19:21.520 the part of police officers under a lot of stress. 0:19:21.680 --> 0:19:23.800 I think what we should do is start focusing on 0:19:23.840 --> 0:19:27.040 the so called victim. In this case, it was a 0:19:27.080 --> 0:19:31.399 known drug dealer who was wanted under a warrant because 0:19:31.400 --> 0:19:32.560 he violated his parole. 0:19:35.200 --> 0:19:38.240 So, yes, the cops were annoyed with the protesters, but 0:19:38.280 --> 0:19:40.760 they seemed even more annoyed with the mayor. 0:19:42.160 --> 0:19:45.320 I came to pay my respects and offer my condolences 0:19:45.359 --> 0:19:49.359 to the family and to assure them that everything that 0:19:49.480 --> 0:19:53.280 can be done will be done thoroughly investigate the circumstances 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:53.920 of this debt. 0:19:55.840 --> 0:19:59.320 From the start, Dinkins seemed suspicious about what had happened. 0:20:00.440 --> 0:20:04.000 He met with Garcia's family and consoled them. He invited 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:07.720 them to Gracie Mansion. He paid for Garcia's body to 0:20:07.760 --> 0:20:10.560 be shipped back to the Dominican Republic for a funeral. 0:20:11.080 --> 0:20:14.240 He walked the streets of Washington Heights and met with people. 0:20:15.520 --> 0:20:19.280 He told them, I promise you justice, I beg you 0:20:19.359 --> 0:20:19.800 for peace. 0:20:21.400 --> 0:20:22.840 I used to live up here I love to come 0:20:22.880 --> 0:20:23.639 to this neighborhood. 0:20:24.800 --> 0:20:27.200 The cops felt Dinkins had sold them out, that he'd 0:20:27.280 --> 0:20:31.320 sided with the family of a drug dealer, and somewhat 0:20:31.359 --> 0:20:32.320 important agreed. 0:20:33.960 --> 0:20:35.520 And my god, if you're going to pay for that funeral, 0:20:35.520 --> 0:20:38.480 there's that place, thousands and thousands of funerals not paid for. 0:20:38.480 --> 0:20:39.160 I'm all city today. 0:20:39.200 --> 0:20:41.199 It would be more justification clothing than that. 0:20:41.240 --> 0:20:46.760 One earo President of Staten Island, Guy Mullinary, the. 0:20:46.720 --> 0:20:49.800 Mayor has not bested with the responsibility of giving religious 0:20:49.800 --> 0:20:51.480 comfort to the family of. 0:20:51.440 --> 0:20:52.960 Somebody killed who's a drug dealer. 0:20:53.000 --> 0:20:57.399 And I think, I think, but that was very badly played. 0:20:57.440 --> 0:21:00.760 And I think mull and Aary had got his start 0:21:00.800 --> 0:21:03.399 as a real estate lawyer on Staten Island. Then he 0:21:03.440 --> 0:21:06.000 got into politics and realized he was really good at it. 0:21:06.520 --> 0:21:08.320 He used to just open up the phone book and 0:21:08.359 --> 0:21:12.160 call random people on Staten Island to talk. He was beloved, 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:16.679 polarizing in extremely old school. This is him talking to 0:21:16.720 --> 0:21:20.080 a WNYC reporter defending himself the time he said a 0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:22.960 lesbian shouldn't be Attorney General of New York. 0:21:23.840 --> 0:21:28.240 Not one editorial ever took her a task for her 0:21:28.440 --> 0:21:31.520 going out and asking for goats because she was a lesbian, 0:21:31.640 --> 0:21:33.920 not a single look. Do you think there's a difference 0:21:33.920 --> 0:21:37.359 between that and say you are having a fundraiser with 0:21:38.680 --> 0:21:40.000 who's the Italian Americans? 0:21:40.280 --> 0:21:40.520 Sure? 0:21:41.520 --> 0:21:43.440 Sure, what's the Italian American agenda? 0:21:44.359 --> 0:21:46.520 She had a gay and lesbian agenda. 0:21:49.119 --> 0:21:52.439 Mullinary's philosophy was that the only rules in politics are 0:21:52.440 --> 0:21:55.600 what the voters think, and his borough was full of 0:21:55.640 --> 0:21:58.280 people who did not think much of New York City. 0:21:58.880 --> 0:22:01.760 Staten Island was a essentially the last outpost for people 0:22:02.000 --> 0:22:04.720 who would like to leave the city but couldn't because 0:22:04.760 --> 0:22:07.520 they worked for the city and therefore had to live 0:22:07.600 --> 0:22:11.600 within its boundaries. There were a lot of police officers 0:22:11.600 --> 0:22:14.600 on the island, to the point where when I bought 0:22:14.600 --> 0:22:17.560 a used copy of Mollinary's memoir on eBay, it showed 0:22:17.600 --> 0:22:21.640 up with the inscription blue lives always matter. To put 0:22:21.680 --> 0:22:26.359 it mildly, this was not Mayor Dinkins's crowd in the 0:22:26.400 --> 0:22:29.760 weeks after Garcia was killed. It was Mullinary who took 0:22:29.800 --> 0:22:32.879 a stand against Dinkins and how he handled everything. He 0:22:32.920 --> 0:22:36.520 wrote the police precinct in Washington Heights that quote, I 0:22:36.600 --> 0:22:38.720 know that your morale has taken quite a beating in 0:22:38.760 --> 0:22:42.160 recent weeks, and the actions of Mayor Dinkins have undoubtedly 0:22:42.280 --> 0:22:46.600 contributed to your present feelings. However, I did want you 0:22:46.720 --> 0:22:48.760 to know that there are some of us in government 0:22:49.160 --> 0:22:54.000 who hold you in the highest esteem. Dinkins learned about 0:22:54.040 --> 0:22:57.040 the letter just before his trip to Staten Island. He 0:22:57.160 --> 0:23:02.760 was furious. Mollinary said that Dinkins's leaked it to the press, and. 0:23:02.840 --> 0:23:05.720 My letter never would have been made public except that 0:23:05.760 --> 0:23:06.800 he chose to make it public. 0:23:07.119 --> 0:23:08.760 So if you made it public, then how can you 0:23:08.760 --> 0:23:09.000 make the. 0:23:09.000 --> 0:23:11.240 Accusation that I'm trying to stir things up an acre 0:23:11.280 --> 0:23:12.840 to listen in our city. 0:23:12.880 --> 0:23:13.119 I'm not. 0:23:13.600 --> 0:23:15.600 I didn't want to be standing before all of you 0:23:15.760 --> 0:23:16.720 talking about this issue. 0:23:16.840 --> 0:23:18.040 Was just a private letter, I. 0:23:18.040 --> 0:23:21.359 Said to the Minimument of the Precinct, who needed a 0:23:21.400 --> 0:23:22.520 look from somebody in government. 0:23:22.560 --> 0:23:23.480 Nobody else was doing it. 0:23:26.040 --> 0:23:28.720 But at that point Dinkins couldn't call the trip off. 0:23:30.280 --> 0:23:33.840 So one hot summer morning, David Dinkins finally got on 0:23:33.920 --> 0:23:39.960 a ship and set sail for Staten Island. We'll be 0:23:40.040 --> 0:23:53.960 right back. The mayor boarded a ferry in Lower Manhattan 0:23:54.200 --> 0:23:56.440 and charted, of course, a half hour out to sea 0:23:57.160 --> 0:24:02.000 until it reached Staten Island, Dinkins got off the boat 0:24:02.240 --> 0:24:05.800 and made his way to Borrow Hall. A small crowd awaited. 0:24:05.560 --> 0:24:08.520