Politics
What the Mayor’s Troubles Mean for New York
Federal investigations are swirling around Eric Adams at a time when the city faces numerous challenges.
Good morning. It’s Monday. Today we’ll look at how federal investigations of Mayor Eric Adams’s inner circle could affect his ability to run the city.
Mayor Eric Adams speaking at Power and Authority Evangelical Ministry in East New York, one of two Black churches he visited yesterday.Credit…Adam Gray for The New York Times
The developments last week were stunning: As federal agents took the cellphones of five officials in Mayor Eric Adams’s inner circle, it became clear that several federal investigations were swirling around City Hall.
The details have yet to become clear. But the information that came out was enough to make for an extraordinarily difficult week for Adams, a Democrat and former police captain who once said he often reminded his team, “‘We’ve got to follow the law, got to follow the law,’ almost to the point that I am annoying.”
I asked Emma G. Fitzsimmons, our City Hall bureau chief, to explain what happened last week, what happens next — and how Adams’s ability to govern might be affected.
We’ve known for some time that there was an investigation of the mayor and his campaign fund-raising. What we learned last week was that two other federal investigations have reached into the mayor’s inner circle. What happens now? Can he and his team still manage the city?
