Caribbean-American Public Advocate Arrested While Protesting Outside Real Estate Board of New York

NEW YORK, New York – Caribbean-American New York City Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams was arrested on Thursday, by officers from the New York Police Department (NYPD) alongside over a dozen tenants and advocates engaging in civil disobedience outside the midtown Manhattan offices of the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY). 

Williams, the son of Grenadian immigrants, told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) that the activists from the non-profit group Housing Justice for All were speaking out  against REBNY’s campaign to protect bad landlords and prevent tenant protections from being enacted statewide when NYPD officers took them into custody for obstructing the building’s entrance.

The Public Advocate said he and others “face arrest on behalf of tenants across New York facing eviction as rents rise and landlords continue to put profit over people.” 

He said they were blocking the entrance to REBNY “just as they have blocked real tenant protections from being enacted in Albany,” New York State capital, “through their disingenuous lobbying and spending.” 

“At this crucial moment of the housing and homelessness crisis in New York, we need to not only protect the progress we have fought for over years, but march forward, enshrining Good Cause eviction protections into state law and expanding access to deeply affordable, income-targeted housing,” Williams said. “Stable housing is essential to public safety. Yet, when New Yorkers ask for this kind of support, those pleas are rarely heard by those in power. 

He noted that, last month, the city’s worst landlord was arrested for his negligence in harming his tenants. 

“[On Thursday], we were arrested to protest REBNY’s active campaign to harm tenants statewide, to urge state lawmakers to reject big real estate’s influence, and to finally pass the protections New Yorkers desperately need,” Williams said. 

With housing costs soaring and many New Yorkers being forced from their homes, he said REBNY has “continued to lobby against the passing of Good Cause eviction protections and other efforts to expand access to affordable housing.” 

“Donations and lobbying efforts from the real estate industry have exacerbated the housing and homelessness crisis in New York City and statewide,” Williams said. 

Following the arrest, the public advocate said he was taken to the 7th Police Precinct in Manhattan.