NYC Businesses Board Up Over Election Unrest Fears

NEW YORK CITY — Plywood boards sealed shut some of New York City’s most-visible storefronts ahead of potential Election Day unrest.

Mayor Bill de Blasio on Monday said the NYPD will be ready for “all sorts of challenges” as polls close. He said he understands why store owners — such as on Fifth Avenue in Midtown and other commercial corridors — would board up their windows, given the election’s divisiveness and volatility.

But he said the city isn’t recommending store owners do so.

“We do not have any specific reports or specific threats at this point,” he said. “Everyone, of course, is concerned about the election results and what plays out after. But I want to emphasize, at this moment, we don't see a specific challenge.”

Large-scale protests have gripped New York City throughout 2020, and some of them have turned destructive. De Blasio himself has warned about President Donald Trump’s rhetoric stoking intimidation and violence at polling locations.

NYPD officials plan to station officers at more than 1,200 polling locations on Election Day. Terence Monahan, the city's Chief of Department, recently said the city is prepared to dispatch hundreds of uniformed officers to any election-related troubles.

But some fear the large police presence could draw a negative reaction citywide, depending on how events unfold.

Protesters, especially in May and June, demonstrated against years of NYPD brutality and enforcement against people of color — only to be met with aggressive cops who drove cars into crowds and brutalized demonstrators. Looting also popped up early in the protests, but most demonstrations were peaceful.

Recently, protesters against police brutality destructively swarmed near Brooklyn’s Atlantic Avenue and struck a cop with a vehicle. Heavily-armored cops also cracked down on a small anti-Trump protest while they let a caravan of pro-Trump demonstrators stop traffic and intimidate motorists on the Whitestone Bridge, according to two Gothamist reports.

The city's police unions have vocally backed President Donald Trump, but Monahan claimed officers won't let their own politics sway how they act during the election.

"When we put on this uniform we are apolitical," he said.

NYPD officers have been retrained on crowd control and conducted "table top exercises" on various scenarios, Monahan said.

De Blasio said the situation likely will depend on how Election Night unfolds.

“We're going to know a lot more though obviously on Election Night, a close election is one thing, a not-so-close election is another thing,” he said. The way the vote counts continue to go is going to tell us a lot, both, you know, the process, the timeline, what the candidates say – there's a lot of variables, but we'll be ready for anything.”