New York City’s largest police union and civil rights lawyers are clashing over a settlement which would require the city’s police department to overhaul its response to protests and give the protesters far more leeway to disrupt daily life in the city. 

The September settlement was a result of lawsuits from Black Lives Matter protesters who alleged that the police response to protests over George Floyd in 2020 was unlawful. In the wake of the destruction resulting from the 2020 riots, protesters in cities from St. Louis to Philadelphia have received millions in payouts after suing over police brutality, as the Sun reported. 

New York City’s settlement requires the police to create a “four-tiered” strategy, beginning with a hands-off approach, the New York Post reports. The city’s police union urged a United States District judge, Colleen McMahon, to spike the deal in court on Monday.

Police say the settlement would tie their hands in responding quickly to violence that takes place during protests. New York City has been disrupted by anti-Israel protests since Hamas’ October 7 massacre, with protesters blocking travel, disrupting traffic, and harassing residents. Speaking of the mobs of anti-Israel protesters, one councilwoman recently told the Sun “they’ve declared war on our city.”

“You have to allow gut feelings and subjective judgments to play a role,” the Police Benevolent Association’s lawyer, Robert Smith, said on Monday. 

The settlement states that when a “First Amendment Activity” such as a protest or demonstration, “temporarily blocks vehicular or pedestrian traffic or otherwise obstructs public streets or sidewalks, the NYPD shall whenever possible accommodate the demonstration.”

According to the American Civil Liberties Union of New York, the settlement requires a tiered system that “is designed to reduce the deployment of police officers at protests and to limit which officers can police most protests,” the group said in a statement. “There are also safeguards built in to help hold the NYPD accountable if and when the department doesn’t comply,” the organization wrote, adding that while it’s a “significant step in the right direction” it isn’t enough.

Mayor Adams initially supported the settlement, saying it “sets new protocols and policies in place for the NYPD when responding to spontaneous protests as we ensure that we are both protecting public safety and respecting protesters’ First Amendment rights.” He has since expressed regret over it, calling the deal “a problem,” per the New York Post, and said that “anyone who polices this city should be concerned about what’s in the settlement.”

The police union and the city’s Common Sense Caucus said in a statement that the settlement would “jeopardize the safety of the public and New York Police Department officers, and have far-reaching long-term negative impact on New York City.”

“We are already grappling with the damaging consequences of daily protests that have been shutting down streets and bridges, disrupting major transportation hubs and stifling commerce, both here in New York and across the country,” the letter states, adding that the protests pose a threat to police officers, the public, and the protesters themselves.

First Amendment rights “are not without limits,” the letter states. “There is a clear and fundamental difference between gathering to exercise the Constitutional right to express an opinion or petition the government to redress grievances, and gathering with the intent to obstruct, intimidate and menace your fellow citizens or to incite violence.”