President Donald Trump is lamenting New York City’s move to ban Central Park’s horse-drawn carriages, arguing the city shouldn’t scrap a tradition more than a century old following a deadly accident.
“So sad to see the beloved Central Park Horse-drawn Carriage Industry ending after over a Century, based largely on one tragic accident. When there is a car accident in the area, of which there are many, they don’t stop cars from entering the Park. So why would they stop the Carriages? It was a Great Tradition. Another piece of History that’s gone. It will be missed!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
In a second post, he blamed politics.
“The Horse-drawn Carriage in New York City is a quintessential New York experience. So sad that, for political reasons, we will see it go!” Trump wrote.
The city council was expected to vote Thursday on Romanch’s Law, which would phase out carriage rides in Central Park by June 2028 under a deal between Council Speaker Julie Menin and Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
The bill is named for Romanch Mahajan, an 18-year-old visitor from India who died in June after the horse pulling his family’s carriage bolted in Central Park. His father has said he leaped from the runaway carriage to help his mother, who had been thrown from her seat. Menin has called his death a breaking point.
But the push predates the teen’s death. The Central Park Conservancy, which backs the ban, cited eight horse-related incidents in the previous 13 months, local news outlet 6sqft reported.
Mahajan’s death appeared to be the first fatality in a carriage accident since the rides came to Central Park, the Associated Press reported. The Manhattan Borough President’s office, which supports the ban, counted 96 serious carriage horse incidents and 40 horse deaths from 1982 through June in a July analysis. It said the figures, drawn partly from an advocacy group’s records and news reports, are likely an undercount.
New York would join a growing list of cities to end the rides. Chicago’s ban took effect in 2021, Montreal ended its carriages in 2020, and Philadelphia’s City Council voted in June to outlaw them.
If passed, the ban would succeed where past mayors failed. Bill de Blasio pledged to end the rides on his first day in office but abandoned the effort amid heavy opposition from unions and a media campaign featuring actor Liam Neeson, and Eric Adams’s late push went nowhere, according to the AP.
Mamdani has declared on social media that the city’s horse carriage industry is coming to an end.
The bill would bar new carriage licenses, create a program to help owners humanely place their horses and require the city to offer drivers job programs, including counseling and tuition assistance.
The Transport Workers Union Local 100, which represents more than 150 drivers, says the ban will be devastating for drivers and owners and has vowed to challenge it in court as unconstitutional. Transport Workers Union International President John Samuelsen accused Menin of using a tourist’s death to manufacture a public safety crisis, calling it political opportunism, the AP reported.
