Philly mayor regrets saying he’d ‘be happy’ not to have his job
Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney on Wednesday said he regretted comments he made in the aftermath of a chaotic July 4 shooting, saying he was frustrated and emotional when he said he looked forward to not being mayor anymore.
Speaking publicly for the first time since since his controversial comments early Tuesday, Kenney took questions Wednesday afternoon from a bevy of press assembled in City Hall. He reiterated a statement he released Tuesday walking back his comments that he’ll “be happy” when he’s no longer mayor because he worries so much about public safety at large events.
“What I was getting at was the collective weight of issues in our city and our nation that has brought collective trauma,” he said Wednesday alongside a handful of top police brass. “I love our city and as mayor, there’s nothing more I want than to help solve this problem and to keep our residents and visitors safe.”
He said he would not resign, as some have called for him to do, including a few rumored 2023 mayoral candidates who are sitting members of City Council and said he should step down.
Kenney explained that he was frustrated after the latenight incident. Two police officers standing near the Philadelphia Museum of Art — Philadelphia officer Sergio Diggs, and Montgomery
County Sheriff ’s Deputy John Foster — were hit by bullets just before 10 p.m., minutes before fireworks began booming over the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. More than 10,000 people were evacuated from the Parkway as police searched for a possible shooter.
The mayor went to Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, where the officers were being treated. There, he met with doctors and police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw. He then met with Diggs, whom he said was wearing a hospital gown and “his highway boots,” and hugged the officer’s mother, grandmother and wife.
Then, Kenney said, he stepped outside with Outlaw at 12:20 a.m. to speak to the media, where he unloaded.
“I don’t enjoy Fourth of July,” he told reporters that night. “I didn’t enjoy the [2016] Democratic National Convention. I didn’t enjoy the NFL Draft. I’m waiting for something bad to happen all the time. So I’ll be happy when I’m not here — when I’m not mayor, and I can enjoy some stuff.”
On Wednesday, he said those comments were made in “the frustration of the moment.”
“I’m not a robot, I’m a human being,” he added. “[It was] frustration over the fact that we are expected to solve a problem when all the tools to solve the problem have been systematically taken away by the state Legislature.”
The mayor has often said the General Assembly holds Philadelphia back from
tackling gun violence in a meaningful way because Pennsylvania cities are generally preempted from passing their own gun-control measures. He said a recent package of legislation passed by Congress is “really not affecting us” because it doesn’t curb handguns or limit purchases based on age.
He defended his administration’s handling of the city’s surge in shootings and said police are taking illegal guns off the street at a record pace.
And he said residents and visitors should not fear attending events in the city.
“We need to move forward and not be paralyzed by fear,” he said, “and continue to do the things we’re doing as safely as we can.”