President Trump to visit Nassau County to stump for Bruce Blakeman at law enforcement event

President Donald Trump is expected to be in Nassau County on Friday with local and state Republican officials to tout law enforcement issues and support County Executive Bruce Blakeman, who is running for governor in November.

The event, while not a campaign event for Blakeman, who is challenging Democratic incumbent Gov. Kathy Hochul, is intended to "give some love to Bruce," one statewide campaign source said.

The event is expected to be held at the Nassau County Police Department's Center for Training and Intelligence on the campus of Nassau Community College, according to a high-ranking law enforcement official.

"I am grateful that President Trump is coming to Nassau County to tour our outstanding, state-of-the-art law enforcement facilities and pay tribute to the men and women of our Police Department, Sheriff’s Department, Probation Department and our firefighters for their outstanding efforts to protect our county, state and country," Blakeman said in a statement.

In a statement, White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis said the president's visit will “highlight the FBI’s 2025 Crime Report that shows the largest year-to-year decrease ever in violent crime." Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel are expected to join the event. Both officials have ties to Long Island: Patel grew up in Garden City and graduated from Garden City High School, and Blanche, as a private attorney in 2021, represented several Long Island clients facing charges for white collar crimes, according to media reports.

"President Trump promised to make America safe again and the data proves he has done just that," Bis said. "Unlike Defund-the-Police Democrats, President Trump will always stand with our law enforcement officers and deliver safer American neighborhoods.”

Nassau County GOP did not respond to questions about the visit on Monday.

Blakeman, who trails Hochul in the polls statewide — even as they are in a near dead heat on Long Island — is a staunch supporter of the 45th and 47th president, whose own popularity has cratered statewide to about 30%, polls show.

"Nothing has been more damaging to Blakeman’s campaign, especially to his ability to attract moderate suburbanites, ubiquitous on Long Island, than President Trump’s plunging approval ratings," said Lawrence Levy, executive dean at the National Center for Suburban Studies at Hofstra University. "So unless the president comes with bags of money for Blakeman’s underfunded campaign, it’s hard to imagine how the visit will be a net positive. If Blakeman doesn’t have his MAGA base already secure, he’s in more trouble than even the polls suggest."

In a statement, Hochul campaign spokesman Ryan Radulovacki said: "Donald Trump and Bruce Blakeman, literally campaigning side by side this week, are showing New Yorkers what this race is all about: a governor who’s protecting our healthcare, investing billions in public safety, and standing up to Trump’s endless attacks, or a MAGA fanboy who'd rather be at Mar-a-Lago right now."

On many issues, Blakeman, serving his second term as county executive, has echoed Trump's policies, from immigration to transgender issues.

Blakeman, in Trump's words, became "MAGA all the way."

In 2024, Blakeman enacted the country's first post-pandemic mask ban. That same year, he barred transgender athletes from playing on female sports teams on county property. Shortly after Trump retook the White House, Blakeman directed Nassau police to partner with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to help arrest and deport Long Island immigrants who agents said are living in the country illegally.

But Hochul signed a bill in May forcing counties and local law enforcement agencies, including the Nassau police department and county sheriff's department, to end their partnership agreement with ICE by Aug. 25.

The bill bars state and local employees from questioning people solely for immigration purposes unless they are required to by a federal judicial warrant and prohibiting government employees from letting ICE agents into schools, parks, hospitals and other sensitive locations without a judicial warrant.

The measure does not prevent local law enforcement from working with ICE on criminal matters.

Blakeman first met Trump at the opening of one of his New York City projects in the early 1990s. Years later, the president backed Blakeman in his campaigns for county executive and now for governor.

Hochul and other Democrats have used Blakeman's relationship with Trump to fling campaign attacks, appealing to voters in a largely blue state.

In 2024, Blakeman was photographed holding an umbrella over the president at the wake in Massapequa for NYPD Det. Jonathan Diller. Blakeman later told Newsday it was Trump who first held the umbrella over them, and the two switched roles at Blakeman’s insistence.

Two months later at a rally in the Bronx, Trump flattered Blakeman for his Hollywood looks. "If I’m doing a movie of a politician, this is the guy I have playing him," Trump said.

Trump's visit comes after a controversial appearance by Vice President JD Vance on June 17 in Bethpage that was similarly announced beforehand as nonpolitical but instead focusing on policy attempts to root out waste, fraud and abuse.

But during his appearance, Vance devoted his remarks to attacking Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-Glen Cove), calling him "the worst congressman in the entire United States," and urging GOP voters to back Republican Mike LiPetri for Suozzi’s U.S. House seat and to "kick crazy Tom Suozzi the hell out of Washington."

After that event, Suozzi — who had not been invited — requested a federal investigation into whether Vance misused taxpayer dollars for political purposes. His office has not yet received a finding from U.S. Office of Special Counsel.

Nonpartisan government ethics experts said the episode did raise valid ethical questions of whether taxpayer dollars ostensibly funded the vice president’s travel to and from a political event — including the costs of security during the rally and the use of government equipment and supporting government personnel.

Craig Holman, a lobbyist for Public Citizen, a nonpartisan group that emphasizes government accountability, previously told Newsday that even if Vance’s itinerary had contained a mix of some official duties elsewhere, that such a "mixed" purpose trip should mean taxpayers pay only for the official duties portion and campaign funds pay for the political portion.