The fallout from Thursday’s Bronx ICE shooting hit the streets fast. Hours after the shooting, protesters outside a Manhattan hospital grabbed NYPD barricades and rammed them into officers. On Friday, up to 5,000 people marched through lower Manhattan chanting for the police commissioner’s job.
The spark: Thursday afternoon on Marble Hill Avenue, ICE agents moved to arrest 28-year-old Oscar Belgal. Federal officials say Belgal, a Dominican national with alleged ties to the Trinitarios gang, used his SUV as a weapon against agents. An agent fired seven rounds. Belgal was hit in the neck and is expected to survive. His 5-year-old son was in the back seat and was not hurt.
Thursday night the crowd gathered outside NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital, where Belgal was taken. Video shows protesters seizing a row of metal barricades and shoving them into the police line. At least five protesters were taken into custody.
“Stop escalating. You are escalating. You are pushing.”
Darializa Avila-Chevalier, a DSA congressional candidate backed by Mayor Mamdani, got in an officer’s face during the scrum and was knocked to the ground. On Friday she called for NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch to resign, accusing police of rapidly escalating the violence.
Friday’s march filled Foley Square with “Fire Tisch” chants. DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin accused Mamdani of inciting hostility toward federal agents. Mamdani, for his part, said he spent two hours on the phone with Trump Thursday night trying to get Belgal released from federal custody. It did not work.
The shooting took seconds. The fallout is going to take a lot longer.