By JAKE OFFENHARTZ, JENNIFER PELTZ and ANTHONY IZAGUIRRE, Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) — New York Gov. Kathy Hochul held a series of meetings with key political leaders Tuesday as she contemplates removing Mayor Eric Adams from his office, an unprecedented step that reflects the growing turmoil inside City Hall.
The governor’s scheduled sit-downs — with a cohort of influential Black leaders and other top officials — come as Adams, a Democrat, faces questions about whether he has lost the ability to independently govern the city in the wake of a Justice Department move to drop his corruption case so that he could better assist in President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Hochul, also a Democrat, has the power to remove Adams from office. But she has been hesitant to do so, arguing that such a move would be undemocratic, while thrusting the city into an unchartered legal process.
But her political calculus appeared to shift on Monday night after four of Adams’ top deputies announced their resignations, which she said “raises serious questions about the long-term future of this Mayoral administration.”
Two people familiar with the governor’s schedule but who were not authorized to publicly disclose details about the meetings said Hochul is expected to speak on Tuesday with U.S. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, the Rev. Al Sharpton and U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks about Adams’ future.
Following his meeting, Sharpton said the governor told him she would “see what the judge decides tomorrow and keep deliberating with other leaders.” He did not say explicitly whether he urged the mayor to begin the removal process, but he said he backed Hochul’s decision to wait on Wednesday’s court hearing.
Both the comptroller and council speaker are members of the so-called “committee on inability,” a five-person body empowered by the city’s charters to remove a mayor who is deemed unfit to serve.
Lander, who is also running in the Democratic primary, said he would convene the panel if the mayor does not outline a contingency plan for running the city by the week’s end. Hochul has also spoken by phone with another member of the committee, Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, according to the two sources.
Adams did not address the growing calls for him to step down during an unrelated news conference about a police officer who was shot in the shoulder Tuesday morning. As he left the hospital, he offered a terse response to reporters who asked why he had not taken questions in weeks: “Cause y’all liars.”
Mayor faces a political crisis
Adams’ mayoralty has spiraled into a political crisis in the nation’s most populous city.
The winds of scandal started to blow in November 2023, when the first-term mayor’s phones were seized as part of a federal investigation into his 2021 campaign fundraising. He denied any wrongdoing.
Over the ensuing year, multiple key aides and allies in his administration came under scrutiny, and some resigned. Then Adams himself was indicted on bribery and other charges, accused of doing favors for the Turkish government after getting illegal campaign donations and fancy overseas trips.
He pleaded not guilty and claimed he was being politically targeted for criticizing then-President Joe Biden’s immigration policies. Adams, a centrist Democrat, started drawing closer to then-former President Donald Trump as the Republican ran last year to reclaim the White House.
After Trump won, Adams’ overtures intensified — and Trump started publicly floating the possibility of a pardon for the mayor, suggesting Adams had been “treated pretty unfairly.” Adams flew to Florida to meet with Trump before he took office, and the mayor ditched a planned Martin Luther King Day observance in New York after getting a last-minute invitation to Trump’s inauguration. Meanwhile, Adams signaled openness to softening city policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration authorities.
Adams insisted he was looking out for the city’s interests, not his own, in cultivating a relationship with the president.
But the argument was tested when Trump’s Justice Department ordered prosecutors this month to drop the charges against Adams, at least for now. Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove said the case had “unduly restricted Mayor Adams’ ability to devote full attention and resources” to illegal immigration and violent crime. Both are Trump priorities.
The order spurred an extraordinary standoff between the Trump-appointed Bove and several career prosecutors and supervisors of public-corruption cases, who resigned rather than carry out what they saw as an improper, politically based dismissal of the charges. Ultimately, two senior Justice Department lawyers filed the requisite paperwork Friday to ask a judge to put a formal end to the case. A hearing has been set for Wednesday.
In the meantime, a broader storm began to swirl over a now-former prosecutor’s claim that Adams’ lawyers offered his cooperation on immigration policy in exchange for getting the case dismissed. The Adams attorneys have denied any quid-pro-quo offer, while saying that they told prosecutors, when asked, that the case was impeding the mayor’s immigration enforcement efforts.
A chorus of New York Democratic officials now has called for Adams to quit or be ousted, saying he sold out the city to save himself.
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