Photo: NYC Mayor's Office, via Youtube; Video: By NYC MAYOR’S OFFICE, VIA YOUTUBE

The New York Police Department reacted angrily to a call from Senator Ted Cruz of Texas for law enforcement to “patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods.”

At a news conference on Tuesday, Commissioner William J. Bratton denounced the Republican presidential candidate as “out of line” and unfit for the White House.

“I would remind the senator he lives in the United States of America,” Mr. Bratton said. “And the statements he made today is why he’s not going to become president of this country.”

Mayor Bill de Blasio stood beside the commissioner and chimed in repeatedly with “Amen.”

After the attacks in Brussels on Tuesday, Mr. Cruz argued that the West “has tried to deny this enemy exists out of a combination of political correctness and fear.”

Europeans, he said in a statement released by his campaign, “are now seeing what comes of a toxic mix of migrants who have been infiltrated by terrorists and isolated, radical Muslim neighborhoods.”

He added, “We need to empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized.”

Mr. Bratton noted that the New York Police Department has more than 900 Muslim officers, many who are also members of the military serving in combat.

“Something the senator has never seen,” Mr. Bratton added. “I take great offense at his characterization of that whole population.”

Mr. Cruz later elaborated on his proposal on CNN by praising a “very successful” counterterrorism initiative in New York City during the Bloomberg administration, an apparent reference to the Police Department’s contentious monitoring of Muslim communities in New York City and beyond.

“Mayor de Blasio came in and ended that program,” Mr. Cruz said. “That was political correctness run amok.”

Mr. Cruz’s remarks were also roundly criticized by civil libertarian and Muslim groups.

Nihad Awad of the Council on American-Islamic Relations told The New York Times on Tuesday that Mr. Cruz was a “religious zealot.”

Ted Cruz’s Call to ‘Secure’ Muslim Neighborhoods Stirs a Backlash Ted Cruz angered American Muslims with a call to “patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods” in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Brussels.

Late Tuesday, the New York Police Department’s director of communications, J. Peter Donald, gave his assessment of Mr. Cruz’s proposal on Twitter.

“It’s hard to imagine a more incendiary, foolish statement,” he said.

On Wednesday, Mr. Cruz appeared on “CBS This Morning” to defend his remarks. He insisted that past surveillance of Muslims in New York had resulted in leads for the police, though he was unable to identify a neighborhood that he thought should be patrolled. About 3.3 million Muslims of all ages live in the United States.