Related Articles
New York City Mayor Eric Adams, whose re-election campaign slogan promised “Always Delivers. Never quits,” announced he was ending his run Sunday with only five weeks left until election day.
“Despite all we’ve achieved, I cannot continue my re-election campaign,” Adams said in an eight-minute video posted to X, formerly Twitter.
Adams, who had been polling in last place for several weeks, blamed “repeated rumors of my departure” as well as the New York City Campaign Finance Board (CFB), which persistently denied Adams’ requests for matching public funding, as the reasons he was leaving the race. According to the CFB, they did not grant him public election funding because his campaign did not submit the necessary paperwork and “impeded” the board’s independent investigation into whether his campaign broke the law.
“The constant media speculation about my future and the CFB decision to withhold millions of dollars have undermined my ability to raise the funds needed for a serious campaign,” Adams added. “I hope that over time, New Yorkers will see the city thrive under our leadership, and policies that we have put in place should be continued and expanded.”
Adams conceded that some voters “remained unsure of me” due to the “unfortunate events surrounding my federal case.”
“I was wrongfully charged because I fought for this city,” Adams said.
The federal government indicted Adams last September, charging him with bribery and campaign finance violations. Adams “abused his position as this City’s highest elected official, and before that as Brooklyn Borough President, to take bribes and solicit illegal campaign contributions,” U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said at the time Adams was charged.
Once Trump entered office, Adams, a Democrat, started cozying up to the administration, aiding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in identifying and detaining immigrants for deportation.
“Let’s be clear: I’m not standing in the way. I’m collaborating,” Adams said in February of his work with the White House on its immigration crackdown while sitting next to Trump border czar, Tom Homan, on Fox News.
Just months later, the Justice Department, under Trump, requested the charges against Adams be dismissed but without prejudice, meaning the government could pursue its case against Adams down the line. Instead, the judge dismissed the case with prejudice, meaning the charges cannot be refiled, and commented that the abrupt dropping of charges seemed suspiciously like a quid pro quo on immigration.
“Everything here smacks of a bargain: Dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions,” Manhattan Federal District Court Judge Dale E. Ho wrote in his ruling. “Dismissing the case without prejudice would create the unavoidable perception that the Mayor’s freedom depends on his ability to carry out the immigration enforcement priorities of the administration, and that he might be more beholden to the demands of the federal government than to the wishes of his own constituents.”
Adams and his attorneys have denied any such bargain took place, but as Rolling Stone reported, in a Feb. 3 letter, two of Adams’ attorneys wrote to Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove to request the charges be dropped, so Adams could assist Trump with immigration. Dealing with the trial while also helping the Department of Homeland Security would be “untenable,” they argued.
“As his trial grows near, it will be untenable for the mayor to be the ever-present partner that [the Department of Homeland Security] needs to make New York City as safe as possible,” Adams lawyers Alex Spiro and Bill Burck wrote to Bove, advocating “strongly in favor of dismissal.”
A week later, Bove ordered federal prosecutors to drop the charges.
In his announcement video, Adams did not endorse another candidate for mayor. Instead, he encouraged voters to “be suspicious” and cautioned against “extremism growing in our politics” and political violence.
Appearing to criticize Democratic mayoral nominee Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, who is running on a platform that promises sweeping change, including freezing rents, building new affordable housing, offering no cost child care and buses, and taxing corporations and the rich.
“Beware of those who claim the answer to destroy the very system we built together over generations,” Adams said. “That is not change. That is chaos.”
As of a few days ago, Mamdani held an 18- to 20-point lead in the race.
Adams also did not publicly throw his support behind former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, who was forced to resign from the governorship after multiple women accused him of sexual harassment and assault, including unwanted kisses and groping and inappropriate remarks about their looks and sex lives. Cuomo initially ran as a Democrat but lost the nomination to Mamdani in June, choosing to continue his run as an independent.
Centrist Democrats who view Mamdani as too far left, as well as Trump himself, have expressed the wish that Adams drop out to increase Cuomo’s chances for victory. The Trump administration has even floated possible government or private sector jobs for Adams should he leave the race.
“The president doesn’t want a socialist running the city,” a source told CBS News.
But Adams denied the reports of White House intervention. “All that’s hypothetical,” he said. “For the last year and a half… people saw what I’ve done in the city, and they saw my resiliency. I have been getting calls from private industries, from boards, from educational institutions. I have been getting offers for the last year and a half.”
This news led Mamdani to hold a press conference Wednesday about “meddling in New York City’s mayoral election.”
“Today we have learned what New Yorkers have long suspected — that Andrew Cuomo is Donald Trump‘s choice to be the next mayor of this city,” Mamdani said. “This is, however, about an affront to our democracy, an affront to what makes so many of us proud to be Americans — that we choose our own leaders, not that they get to pick themselves. Not that they get to be picked by the president of the United States.”
