CITY HALL — Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said anti-Muslim rhetoric from the likes of Donald Trump hurts the NYPD's efforts to prevent homegrown terrorism attacks — as he called for the reinstatement of laws that ban assault weapons like the one used in the deadly Orlando gay nightclub massacre.
Comments from Trump effectively blaming Muslims for the Orlando shooting and suggesting they be kept out of the country are not productive, Bratton said in an interview outside City Hall after a bill signing Monday.
"It works against our ability to work with those communities, particularly since we need them to be supportive of what we do and we need them for information," Bratton said.
Mass shooters are more and more lone wolves "becoming radicalized very quickly, oftentimes through social media access," Bratton said. "We can stop so many of these things if we have the trust of communities."
A spokeswoman for Trump's campaign did not immediately return a call for comment.
The commissioner reiterated his point on a radio interview Wednesday morning, saying that some of the members of the NYPD security detail currently assigned to guard Trump's building are Muslim.
Bratton added that Sunday's massacre should make clear the need for a reinstated ban on assault weapons, like the AR-15 that Orlando mass shooter Omar Mateen used to kill 49 people and injure 53 others in what is being called the worst mass shooting in modern American history.
"Maybe out of this incident, as tragic as it is, maybe there may be, finally, some meaningful discussion to restore some of the laws that we lost over the last couple of years, particularly those that regulated, and in some instance, banned assault weapons," Bratton said.
Several of the recent mass shootings across the country have been carried out using a version of the deadly AR-15 assault rifle, a military grade weapon that can fire a large number of high-velocity rounds quickly, experts say.
"If you look at all the mass murders that were recently committed they all involved the same type of firearm, particularly this AR-15 type of weapon," Bratton said. "My whole position is there's no need for that in American society."
A 10-year ban on assault weapons expired in 2004 and Congress has not renewed it.
"I've been expressing concern for almost 40 years about how weapons are sold in this country and the lack of control over how they're sold and it's quite obvious we have a problem in this country relative to the terms of meaningful laws that regulate the sales of firearms," Bratton said.
He also confirmed that the gun shop where Mateen purchased his assault weapon was owned by a former NYPD detective — but said the officer was no longer connected with the department.
"No need for us to speak to him," Bratton said when asked whether the department would contact the officer. "All his business interest are in the state of Florida so he has no relevance to New York City any longer."
Before the bill-signing, Bratton said the NYPD's intelligence apparatus, combined with the "highest level of intimacy" ever with the FBI, has helped keep the city safe.