NYC councilman under fire for 'lying' about NYPD encounter, called to resign from public safety committee

NEW YORK, NY - City Councilman Yusef Salaam of New York is being called upon to step down from his seat leading the city's Public Safety Committee. This, after the prominent Democrat and defendant in the infamous "Central Park 5" case revealed a traffic stop found him sporting out-of-state license plates on a vehicle with allegedly illegal tinted windows.

Salaam is also fielding heavy criticism for his claims surrounding the encounter with an NYPD officer on Friday night. The officer reportedly pulled him over for his tinted windows, only to let him proceed unticketed once he identified himself as a councilman.

As reported by The New York Post, even fellow Democrat Councilman Robert Holden from Queens was extremely critical of Salaam. "This is damning," he wrote in a post to X sharing a statement from the NYPD refuting Salaam's narrative.

He continued, "...an elected official with illegal tints and out-of-state plates, not legally registered, using his official title to evade the law. Worse yet, he lied about the exchange until NYPD set the record straight. CM Salaam should resign as Public Safety Chair."

As noted by the Post in a previous report, Salaam slammed the NYPD for the encounter in public statements.

In one such statement Saturday he claimed, "Last night, while driving with my wife and children and listening in to a call with my Council colleagues on speakerphone, I was pulled over by an NYPD officer in my beloved Village of Harlem within the 28th Precinct. I introduced myself as Councilman Yusef Salaam, and subsequently asked the officer why I was pulled over. Instead of answering my question, the officer stated, ‘We’re done here,’ and proceeded to walk away.
 

“The fact that the officer did not provide a rationale for the stop…calls into question how the NYPD justifies its stops of New Yorkers and highlights the need for greater transparency to ensure they are constitutional."

The NYPD responded with a statement of its own saying, "The officer approached the vehicle, identified himself, and asked the driver to roll down his window. The driver complied and identified himself as New York City Councilmember Yusef Salaam, performing official duties, at which point the officer advised him to have a good night."

One of the police unions for NYPD, the Police Benevolent Association, similarly lauded the officer's work and excoriated Salaam. PBA President Patrick Hendry said in a statement reported by the Post, "This Council member and every other elected official who baselessly smeared our police officers owe them an apology."

Bodycam footage of the interaction released by the NYPD and shared to X by Amiri King also appears to contradict Salaam's narrative entirely.