New York’s governor meets top political leaders as she weighs removing Mayor Eric Adams from office

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul held a series of meetings with key political figures 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 uncharted legal process.

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 was 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 the mayor’s future. (The mayor is not related to the council speaker.)

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 the outcome of a court hearing Wednesday in Adams’ case.

A complex process

If Hochul decides to take action, she would have to follow a complex, court-like procedure that would entail serving Adams with charges and allowing him to defend himself.

Alternatively, a New York City mayor can be removed by a “committee on inability” comprising five local officials. Hochul has spoken this week to at least three of them — Lander, Adrienne Adams and Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, all Democrats. The other two members are high-ranking mayoral appointees.

There is little consensus about the feasibility of the process, which has never been used before.

Lander, who is running against Eric Adams in the June Democratic primary for mayor, said he would convene the panel if the mayor does not outline a contingency plan for running the city by Friday.

But the council speaker threw cold water on the idea, arguing the drastic step should be reserved for officials who are incapacitated. Richards, meanwhile, called for the mayor to “give deep, honest thought” to whether he could continue to serve.

The mayor, at a news conference about a police detective who was shot in the shoulder Tuesday morning, did not address the growing calls for him to step down.

While leaving the hospital where the detective was recovering, Adams 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 spiraled into a political crisis after the Justice Department ordered prosecutors on Jan. 10 to drop the bribery and other charges against him. Adams has pleaded not guilty.

Several career prosecutors and supervisors of public-corruption cases resigned rather than carry out what they saw as an improper, politically based dismissal of the charges.

One of those who resigned was the interim U.S. attorney in Manhattan, who wrote 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.

Ultimately, two senior Justice Department lawyers filed the requisite paperwork Friday to ask a judge to put a formal end to the case. That request spurred the hearing set for Wednesday.

The winds of scandal first started to blow around Adams 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 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 Jr. 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.