New York Mayor Eric Adams is the latest big city Democrat to call for the reinstatement of a policy deemed cruel and unconstitutional.
In response to the death of a mentally distressed man on the New York subway, Adams is embracing a solution once considered a more extreme conservative position: involuntary commitment to psychiatric treatment facilities.
“It is time to build a new consensus around what can and must be done for those living with serious mental illness and to take meaningful action despite resistance and pushback from those who misconstrue our intentions,” Adams said during a press conference about Jordan Neely, who was subdued by fellow passengers before dying in custody.
“I want to say upfront that there were many people who tried to help Jordan get the support he needed,” Adams continued. “But the tragic reality of severe mental illness is that some who suffer from it are at times unaware of their own need for care.”
Neely was reportedly well-known to New York’s homeless service providers and topped an internal list of those most in need of intervention.
However, the mayor’s support for involuntary commitment was met with immediate backlash from groups like the New York Civil Liberties Union.
“In the name of Jordan Neely, Mayor Adams is again responding to homelessness and unmet mental health need with the failed approaches of force and coercion,” said Donna Lieberman, director of the NYCLU.
Involuntary Commitment Trends in Blue Cities
Adams isn’t the only Democrat leader throwing support behind what modern day governments call “civil commitments”. to
Among the most notable, California Governor Gavin Newsom proposed framework to involuntarily commit people with schizophrenia or other psychotic disorders last year.
The proposal, called the Care Act, was passed with almost unanimous support in the state Legislature and will be implemented next year.
Democrat Ted Wheeler, the mayor of Portland, followed suit by pressuring the Oregon Legislature to lower the threshold for civil commitment, which is currently limited to those who are a danger to themselves or others or are unable to provide for their own basic needs.
Still, not all Democrats are on board. New York City Councilmember Diana Ayala, who has spoken about involuntarily hospitalizing her schizophrenic brother, says she understands but rejects the premise of forced hospitalization.
“You can’t hold people in a clinical setting for too long. Once you let them out onto the street, there’s no follow up, there’s no care available. So what happens then?”
Blue poop crat communists only want to build mental hospitals to incarcerate political opponents and people who do not agree with communist policy. Come on, now, you had to know that! If there’s ever a question as to what the crats are up to just figure out what the communist chinese would do; et voila, there’s your answer.
Is it “more humane” to abandon the SMIs to their own devices, homeless, not eating regularly, exposed to the elements, somehow than housing the where they have shelter, proper meals and care, activities available, and supervision, so they don’t get hurt or harm others? Because freezing in winter, roasting in summer, wet when it rains or snows, never knowing if or when a next meal may come, wandering the streets and subways, where the risk of injury or death is added to the risks of being stabbed or shot, robbed of anything they might have, etc? Someone, I’m not seeing that as a “better”, healthier option for them. Granted just locking them away isn’t “fair”, but neither is abandoning them, and communities are not providing a solution, either, so what is the answer?
Ironic that Democrats fought so hard to get rid of Involuntary commitments, but now they realize that was a practice to prevent the very problem we face.
Democrats really have No Common Sense.
Didn’t Hitler and Margaret Sanger do something like this for all those “crazy Jews” and Catholics? Smells like Swastika Pie to me. The “government” needs to encentivize the Catholic Church and other CARING religious groups to care for these people. They’ve been doing it for hundreds of years! Wait….I sense a demoSCAM in the wind! Similar to the Zelinskyy rebates to the Brandons. For shame, for shame. Do they think(?) we don’t see what’s going on?