NEW YORK (AP) — New York Governor Kathy Hochul said on Tuesday that he will eliminate Mayor Eric Adams, an unprecedented step that reflects the growing chaos within city hall. We held a series of meetings with politicians.
The planned sit-in of the governor, with a cohort of influential black leaders and other top officials, is about whether Democrat Adams lost his ability to govern the city independently following the Department of Justice relocation. As he faces questions, he can better help President Donald Trump crack down on immigrants, his corruption case.
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Hochul, who is also a Democrat, has the power to remove Adams from his job. However, she hesitated to do so, claiming that such a move was undemocratic and would thrust the city into unknown legal proceedings.
Her political calculus appeared to have shifted Monday night as the four top Adams announced their resignation, but she “supposes serious questions about the long-term future of this mayoral administration.” He said.
The two, who are familiar with the governor’s schedule but were not allowed to publish details about the meeting, said on Tuesday US Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, New York City Director Brad Lander, City Councilman Adrienne Adams, The Rev. Al Sharpton and US lawmaker Gregory are welcoming Meek about Adams’ future.
After his meeting, Sharpton said the governor “sees the judge will decide tomorrow and continue to deliberate with other leaders.” He did not expressly state whether he urged the mayor to begin the removal process, but he said he supported Hochul’s decision to await the outcome of a court hearing in Adams’ case on Wednesday.
Both the Chief Secretary and the Council Chair are members of the so-called “Committee on Incompetence,” an organization of five people empowered by the city’s charter and deemed unsuitable for service.
Lander, who is facing Adams in the Democratic primary in June, said he will convene a panel if the mayor does not outline a contingency plan to run the city by the weekend. Hochul also spoke on the phone with another member of the committee, President Donovan Richards of Queens Borough. Richards later issued a statement asking Adams to “deep, honest thoughts” about whether he could continue as mayor.
Adams did not mention the growing call for him to resign at a press conference about the police detective who was shot in the shoulder Tuesday morning.
While the detectives left the recovering hospital, Adams provided a pure response to a reporter who asked why he didn’t ask questions for weeks.
Mayor faces a political crisis
Adams’ mayor was caught up in a political crisis after the Justice Department ordered prosecutors to withdraw bribery and other charges against him on Jan. 10. Adams pleaded not guilty.
Several career prosecutors and supervisors in public corruption cases have resigned rather than doing what they saw as an inappropriate and politically based dismissal of the charges.
The resignation was a temporary US lawyer in Manhattan. He wrote that Adams’ attorneys provided immigration policy cooperation in exchange for dismissing the case. Adams’ attorney refused the Quid-Pro-Quo offer but when asked, he told the prosecutor that the case was hampering the mayor’s immigration enforcement efforts.
In the end, two senior Justice Department lawyers submitted the necessary documents on Friday, asking the judge to formally close the case. That request spurred Wednesday’s hearing.
The winds of scandal began to blow first around Adams in November 2023, when the mayor’s mobile phones were seized as part of a federal investigation into campaign funding in 2021. He denied any misconduct.
In the following years, several key aides and allies of his administration were scrutinized, with some resigned. Adams himself was then charged with bribery and other charges, accused of giving benefits to the Turkish government after making illegal campaign contributions and exposing overseas travel.
He argued that he was politically targeted for criticizing then-President Joe Biden’s immigration policy. Adams, a centristic Democrat, began to draw closer to then-former president Donald Trump as Republicans ran to get the White House back last year.
After Trump won, Adams’ overtures escalated, and Trump began to publicly uncover the possibility of a mayoral pardon, suggesting that Adams was “treated fairly unfairly.” Adams flew to Florida to meet up with Trump before taking office, and the mayor abandoned the planned New York observance of Martin Luther King Jr. after being invited to Trump’s inauguration at the last minute. Meanwhile, Adams signaled openness to ease urban policies that restrict cooperation with federal immigration authorities.
Adams claimed he was looking for the city’s interests, not himself, in building relationships with the president.
