Police Protests To Meet De Blasio At 1st Presidential Debate

NEW YORK — The campaign trail can't lead Mayor Bill de Blasio away from homegrown protests. Members of New York City's largest police union plan to rally against the mayor Wednesday evening ahead of his appearance in the first Democratic presidential debate.

The Police Benevolent Association says it will protest de Blasio's handling of labor issues and his "general mismanagement" of the city at 6 p.m. outside the Miami theater where the mayor will square off later that evening with nine other White House hopefuls.

"Mayor Bill de Blasio is campaigning for president under the slogan 'Working People First,' but apparently that doesn't apply to the people who work for him," PBA President Pat Lynch said in a statement.

The protest will come as the city and the union are in arbitration over a labor contract distpute, according to the New York Daily News, which first reported on the rally.

Lynch accused the mayor of lowballing raises and reducing health benefits for city employees while raising his own pay, and chasing his political dreams as the city's problems with homelessness and mental-health care linger.

Members of the Florida PBA, the Sunshine State's largest law-enforcement union, and Miami's Dade County PBA will join the city cops in their protest, according to a media advisory.

The city police union is also running a full-page ad in the Miami Herald on Wednesday, the Daily News reported. The ad says de Blasio puts "working people last" in bold capital letters and uses the mayor's blue and green campaign color scheme.

The PBA also protested outside the "Good Morning America" studio where de Blasio formally announced his campaign last month. In a statement that day, Lynch called it "laughable" that de Blasio wanted to "mismanage the entire country."

A spokesperson for de Blasio's campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the planned Miami protest.