NYC Mayor Adams on allegations by Danielle Sassoon of quid pro quo: "This is silly"
New York City Mayor Eric Adams rejected allegations by former acting New York U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon that his attorneys had offered "what amounted to a quid pro quo" involving helping Immigration and Customs Enforcement "in exchange for dismissal of his case."
In an interview Friday morning on "Fox & Friends," Adams said Sassoon's allegations are just plain "silly."
"Think about my attorney, Alex Spiro, one of the, one of the top trial attorneys in the country. Imagine him going inside saying that the only way Mayor Adams is going to assist in immigration, which I was calling for since 2022, is if you drop the charges. That's quid pro quo. That's a crime. It took her three weeks to report in front of her a criminal action? Come on. This is silly," Adams said.
He later released the following statement:
"I want to be crystal clear with New Yorkers: I never offered — nor did anyone offer on my behalf — any trade of my authority as your mayor for an end to my case. Never.
"I am solely beholden to the 8.3 million New Yorkers that I represent and I will always put this city first.
"Now, we must put this difficult episode behind us so that trust can be restored, New York can move forward, and we can continue delivering for the people of this city."
The decision to drop the charges has prompted a flurry of Justice Department resignations. The latest is Hagan Scotten, the lead prosecutor in the federal corruption case involving Adams. In a scathing letter, he wrote in part, "I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool, or enough of a coward, to file your motion [to dismiss the charges against Adams]. But it was never going to be me."
Adams, Homan discuss ICE cooperation
Adams and President Donald Trump's "border czar" Tom Homan made a joint appearance on Fox News to tout their new level of cooperation, which includes Adams agreeing to sign an executive order allowing ICE agents on Rikers Island.
"I've called the mayor out many times for not stepping up when it comes to public safety threats. But I tell you, when I sat down with him, I saw the cop in him, and he really does want to do the right thing, because he's a cop. He's a lifelong cop. He wants, he wants to help take public safety threats off the streets of New York, making New York safer," Homan said.
"People want to hijack this narrative and turn it into a political narrative where we're saying we need to have public safety. I requested the meeting. I reached out to his team and said we want to sit down. This has been an issue I was talking about before the election, spring of 2022. You look at these quotes over and over again. We need to go after these dangerous people in our streets, and now I have someone that understands that narrative, and we are fighting together to get it done," Adams said.
"Getting back in Rikers Island is a game changer," Homan said. "We can get, not only we get the bad guys where they hit the street, the intelligence of how [the Tren de Aragua gang] operates, where they're operating, all this intelligence they gather at Rikers Island, we'll have access to."
"And by having ICE on Rikers Island, part of our gang intelligence, using our intel with NYPD correction officers, we can identify those gangs inside and outside on the street. There was no reason they were removed from Rikers Island," Adams said.
"We're working on some other things that we don't really want to talk about in open air just because the City Council will be putting roadblocks up on us. But the mayor and me have committed to several other things," Homan said.
Adams also announced he's closing six more shelters for asylum seekers.
Adams on sanctuary city laws
It's not as though the two agree on everything, including sanctuary city laws. Adams wants changes made, but also wants to protect the undocumented.
"Sanctuary city has stated that if you're in this city and you're paying taxes, you should have access to the services. What I asked the City Council to do, change the bill that was already in place and modify it, that if you are committing a crime, that we should be able to collaborate with ICE, even on civil enforcement, if you have committed a crime. That part of the bill is wrong," Adams said. "But everyday people who are here until they're moving to be documented, documented. If they are going to school, working, paying taxes, then they should be able to provide police services, hospital services, children should go to school."
"I'm strictly against sanctuary city status, just because I think sanctuaries are for criminals," Homan said.
Adams says he'll run for reelection as Democrat
Meanwhile, the Staten Island Democratic party has apparently decided to endorse former Gov. Andrew Cuomo for mayor, even though he still hasn't decided whether to toss his hat in the ring.
Adams was asked if he'd consider running as a Republican.
"I'm gonna run on the Democratic line," Adams said. "I had another Andrew in my previous race. He was beating me by double digits in February. But we don't call Andrew Yang mayor. We call Eric Adams mayor. Never give up. New Yorkers never give up."
Some Democrats call for Adams to step down
Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez is joining a number of high-profile Democrats, including Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado, in calling for the mayor to step aside.
"He should step down. He's compromised, and people are not trusting him," Velázquez said.
"At this point, there's a number of discussions going on. There's discussions going on at the state level. There's a number of discussions going on at the local level, and private discussions," Attorney General Letitia James said
Sources tell CBS News New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, who has the power to remove Adams, "is having conversations with her colleagues in government about the right path forward."
"The allegations are extremely concerning and serious, but I cannot, as the governor of this state, have a knee-jerk, politically motivated reaction," Hochul said.
Adams was asked about that Friday morning.
"She has her role. I have my role. And throughout this entire ordeal, which I think no American should have to go through, the torment of 15 month that my family and I had to endure for something I didn't do, I didn't do anything wrong," Adams said. "My attorney will handle the legal part. I'm going to handle running the city. We've returned jobs to our city. Our city is getting safer. We're building housing. I think that this is a great American narrative. I stood focused on what I was elected to do."
Meanwhile, former mayor Bill de Blasio is rising to Adams' defense. De Blasio was investigated for corruption himself, though charges were never brought.
"I don't see evidence of a quid pro quo. I also think, and I've said it for a while, that the original charges brought against him appear, to me, to be very flimsy," he said.
A spokesperson for the mayor insists, "He's not stepping down, he's stepping up."
