Gov. Cuomo cites looting as reason to not defund NYPD

Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Sunday panned calls to “defund” police departments spurred by unrest in the wake of George Floyd’s death, pointing to looting that ravaged the Big Apple last week.

“You have New York City, that is still reeling from the COVID virus, and now you have this night of looting, that I’m telling you shook people in the city to the core,” Cuomo told reporters in Albany. “You don’t need police? You don’t need police?

“That’s what happens when you don’t have effective policing.”

Cuomo was referring to opportunists who co-opted what were supposed to be peaceful protests demanding justice for Floyd — a black man killed May 25 after a white Minneapolis cop knelt on his neck — to ransack businesses across the city.

Though the looters ran roughshod over parts of Manhattan, The Bronx and Brooklyn for a few nights in the early part of the week — leading Cuomo to call out the NYPD, criticism he later walked back — the situation stabilized as the week wound on.

“Look at that looting,” said Cuomo. “It was frightening. … [When there’s] no police, you get looting. That’s what you get.

“Nobody wants that.”

Cuomo’s remarks came shortly after de Blasio announced that an unspecified amount of funding originally earmarked for the NYPD would be reallocated to city youth groups.

Hizzoner has faced a growing number of calls from activists, members of the City Council and educators to slash the NYPD’s $6 billion annual budget.