NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) – New York City Mayor Eric Adams held a security briefing to discuss safety plans for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade amid the vehicle explosion at a U.S.-Canada border bridge Wednesday and the state of heightened tensions in the city since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas war.
Adams noted that in the wake of the explosion in western New York Wednesday, Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism Rebecca Weiner has been communicating with partners across all the agencies involved.
“We have already enhanced security because of the holiday, and we don’t see any nexus between the incident there and here in New York City. We’re going to continue to be out in full force,” Adams said.
“[Chief of Patrol Jeffrey Maddrey] and his team will make sure we have the right manpower that’s here and we’re going to continue to monitor all the chatter that’s taking place to ensure that people can enjoy the holiday,” Adams added.
When questioned about the purpose of deploying NYPD officers to the Rainbow Bridge scene to assist in Wednesday’s investigation, Adams said that the city was acting in a “state of overabundance of caution” in order to identify if there was a threat to respond to.
Police Commissioner Edward Caban said at the security briefing that the NYPD has already been on “heightened alert” since Oct. 7, and that intelligence and counterterrorism have been preparing for the parade all year.
Caban confirmed that there are no credible or specific threats to New York City or the parade.
“There will be security measures that you will see, like uniformed officers that will be on post on and around the parade route. And there will be other measures you won’t see,” Caban said.
“So we’re saying come out, enjoy yourselves, we will do our job, your job is to have as much fun as possible. These are memories that will last a lifetime,” Adams said.