The “sheer size” of the number of New York City Police Department officers that arrived at Columbia University to clear away a tent encampment and protesters occupying the school’s Hamilton Hall intimidated the demonstrators and solved the “immediate problem,” former NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly told Newsmax on Wednesday.

“I thought it was professionally done,” Kelly told Newsmax’s “National Report,” about Tuesday’s police response. “It was done in a very deliberate fashion… the immediate problem, I think it has been solved, but these young people [who were arrested] are already all out and got some sort of appearance ticket or summons for what they’ve done.”

He added that their court appearances are still a month or more away, “so a lot can happen during that period of time” but “as far as the police activity, I thought it was well done. There was apparently no or very little confrontation.”

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