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A curfew will take effect in New York City at 11 p.m. Monday, announced Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio, as both leaders expressed concern that ongoing protests in response to the death of George Floyd could lead to a new spike in COVID-19 infections.
“The demonstrations we’ve seen have been generally peaceful,” de Blasio said in a statement “We can’t let violence undermine the message of this moment. It is too important, and the message must be heard. Tonight, to protect against violence and property damage, the governor and I have decided to implement a citywide curfew.”
The curfew will last one night until 5 a.m. Tuesday morning, according to a news release from Cuomo’s office, and police presence will be doubled at protests Monday evening. Residents of the five boroughs will join about 45 million other Americans who’ve faced similar restrictions in light of the protests, with curfews enacted in places such as Los Angeles and Seattle.
Both Cuomo and de Blasio expressed concern that mass gatherings could reignite the disease, but said they supported the protestors’ cause and their right to assemble peacefully.
Earlier in the day, Cuomo had reiterated plans to begin reopening New York City on June 8, while warning that any uptick in infections resulting from the demonstrations likely won’t be apparent until a few weeks from now. He also warned that any potential curfew would not be “a silver bullet.”
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“Don’t snatch defeat from the jaws of victory,” Cuomo said in his daily news conference. “We’ve spent 93 days limiting behavior, closing down, no schools, no businesses open. And now mass gatherings with thousands of people in close proximity, one week before we’re going to open New York City? What sense does this make?”
“We don’t even know the consequence for the COVID virus of those mass gatherings,” Cuomo added. “We don’t even know. We won’t know possibly for weeks. It’s the nature of the virus.”
Nevertheless, the city is on track to begin reopening next Monday after 11 weeks of stay-at-home orders for all but essential employees, Cuomo said. More than 200,000 people have tested positive for the virus and nearly 17,000 people have died (21,600 if “probable” deaths are included) across the five boroughs, according to city data. New York State Health Commissioner Howard Zucker urged demonstrators to continue practicing safety measures that have been recommended throughout the citywide lockdown.
“Much as we say that we support peaceful protests, we want to push the message that people should wear masks, should try to social distance themselves as much as possible,” Zucker said. “We need to be smart. That means hand sanitizer, keeping a distance.”
Zucker also expressed concern about a future uptick in infections tied to the demonstrations, and said the health department was going to keep a close eye on infections.
With fewer than 1,000 new positive tests and 54 deaths in New York state on Sunday, Cuomo said, protesters were at less risk of spreading or contracting the virus than they would have been earlier in the crisis. There’s also evidence that the disease is harder to spread outdoors, which could also help mitigate new infections, he added.
“That they were mostly younger people is a good fact. The best fact is that we have already gotten the infection rate down,” Cuomo said. “So a lower percentage of people out there last night were infected. If this had happened 60 days ago? Forget it.”
Sunday marked the fourth straight day of protests, with thousands of demonstrators across New York City protesting racist police violence and Floyd’s death in Minneapolis. Demonstrations have largely remained peaceful during the daytime, with both looting and NYPD violence against demonstrators escalating in the evenings.
On Sunday, fires were set and some stores were looted in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood, with footage showing one NYPD officer aiming a gun at protestors. More than 250 people were arrested during Sunday’s protests. Arrests over the weekend included the mayor’s daughter, Chiara de Blasio, 25.
Both the governor and the mayor spent long stretches of their news conferences on Monday denouncing looting and blaming violence on small numbers of demonstrators and outsiders seeking to take advantage of the moment, with de Blasio warning that looting will be dealt with “very, very aggressively.”
They also addressed widely publicized incidents of NYPD officers behaving violently toward protestors, calling for independent investigations and broad reform, though the mayor also said, “I feel tremendous confidence that the NYPD will know how to deal with” the ongoing protests.
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Numerous NYPD officers have been photographed at protests without protective masks. A spokesperson from the mayor’s office said via email on Monday that all New Yorkers—both police and civilians—must wear face coverings in public, and that any protester concerned about their exposure to the virus should get tested at one of the 150 testing sites across the city.
