CARDI B’S ‘GIRL TALK’
Dances, chats with youths in NYPD teen outreach program
Rapper Cardi B talked and danced with young girls at the NYPD Police Academy as she spent the week fulfilling court-mandated community service over a 2018 Queens strip club assault.
The Bronx-born chart topper, 30, showed up at an NYPD “Girl Talk” event at the academy in Queens on Friday where she spoke to dozens of teens wearing pink hats.
Dressed in a glam Chanel knit cap, white-colored pants and cream-colored coat, she danced for the crowd and gave out prizes, according to social media posts about the event.
Given a chance to offer advice to the girls, Cardi B told them to be true to themselves.
“I feel like there’s so many people that make y’all probably feel like, ‘This is what’s cool, this is what’s going on, this is what it takes to be lit, this is what it takes to be fire,’” she said.
“Sometimes that’s a little bit of peer pressure like on a girl. And don’t fall into that, you know what I’m saying? Like be great, be you, you’re amazing, you’re dope yourself.”
The event generated lots of online excitement for the department.
“Our explorer Nikeilia was able to take a picture with the one and only Cardi B!!” cops from the 88th Precinct in Fort Greene tweeted. “The girls had a great time at todays event. #GirlTalk”.
The NYPD Girl Talk event was created by NYPD Chief of Training Bureau Juanita Holmes as a mentorship program for young girls needing someone to lean on as they navigate peer pressure and other challenges facing city teens.
Special guests at past Girl Talk events have included world-renowned ballerina Misty Copeland.
The NYPD on Friday got some social media blowback for inviting the often bawdy rapper to speak to impressionable teen girls.
“Watch @NYPDnews associate with “known Criminal” @iamcardib,” retired NYPD Lieutenant John Macari posted on Twitter with a video of Cardi-B dancing at the event.
“What a great role model. SMH (shake my head),” Twitter user Crime Prevention Guy wrote.
Another social media poster said the “WAP” singer was “the last person I’d want around my daughter.”
All week, Cardi-B has been tweeting about fulfilling her community service — and complaining about how early it was in the morning.
“My brains are burning from waking up early‚ community service then studio … but I did the crime,” she wrote as she posted a selfie on her Twitter account Friday, wearing the same outfit she wore at the Girl Talk event. “I only have myself to blame.”
Cardi, whose real name is Belcalis Almanzar, was sentenced to 15 days of community service following a plea deal for her role in a 2018 bottle-throwing attack at the Angels Strip Club in College Point
If she fails to complete the service by March 1, she will have to serve 15 days in jail.
The plea deal allowed Cardi B to avoid jail time on assault and reckless endangerment charges over a violent dispute with the bartenders, sisters Jade and Baddie Gi.
The “Bodak Yellow” singer also agreed to stay away from her victims as part of the deal.
The rapper agreed to the plea deal in September. In January, she returned to court, claiming that she wouldn’t be able to fulfill her community service by the deadline given to her. After consulting with her attorneys, a Queens judge extended her deadline to March 1.
Officials said the rapper was one of about 10 people involved in the melee.
“Part of growing up and maturing is being accountable for your actions,” she said in a statement when she was sentenced. Two co-defendants also pleaded guilty. Cardi B’s appearances at Queens Criminal Court turned into minirunway shows as the fashionista showed off a
number of eye-popping looks, which at one point included a bushy hat and a floor-sweeping cape adorned with black plumage.