Man carrying knife enters New York Times building and asks to see ‘politics section,’ police say

The man’s knife was confiscated by security personnel

A man carrying a knife entered The New York Times building in Manhattan on Thursday and asked to see the newspaper’s “politics section,” a New York Police Department spokesperson said.

The man, who was also carrying a stuffed animal, had the knife confiscated by security personnel at the building shortly after entering around 12:15 pm. No one was hurt in the episode, which The New York Post reported did not include any fight.

Police said that the man was taken to Roosevelt Hospital for an examination.

The incident at the Times’ headquarters comes as instances of political violence and violence directed against the media in the US have increased substantially in recent years. Last month, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband was attacked at the couple’s home in San Francisco and hospitalised — an act that some Republicans mocked.

Members of the media and media institutions have also been targets of attacks, most notably when a gunman shot seven people and killed five at the offices of the The Capital newspaper in Anapolis, Maryland, in 2018.

It was not immediately clear why the man who entered The New York Times building wanted to see the politics section, though former President Donald Trump has repeatedly attacked the newspaper for its coverage of him since his first run for president began in 2015.