In his campaign for re-election, Mayor Eric Adams says he’s running on his record … against a guy who has no record.
He’s referring, of course, to Zohran Mamdani, the 33-year-old socialist nepo baby who won this week’s Democratic primary. The State Assemblyman has barely held a job and has been absent for about 50% of Assembly votes.
But it can’t be denied that Adams must defend his record.
In September 2024, he earned the dubious distinction of becoming the first sitting New York City mayor hit with a federal indictment — accused of bribery and conspiracy. The case was dropped in April on orders from President Trump’s Department of Justice.
And from late 2023 through last year, Adams’ administration was rocked by a near-constant exodus of his closest confidants from City Hall, with many leaving under a cloud of scandal.
But the former cop, who won office in 2021 on a law and order platform, has survived. And with Mamdani’s defeat of Andrew Cuomo in Tuesday’s Democratic primary, his campaign has taken on new importance.
“I’m perfectly imperfect,” Adams told me, as he sat down for an hour chat ahead of the official launch of his re-election campaign.
“Yes, there are those that I should not have brought on board,” he said of staffing woes. “There are those who were not fit for the assignments they were in. And there were those that should not be in government.”
But he’s steadied the ship in many ways: appointing the uber-competent Jessica Tisch as his police commissioner, and standing up to the Biden administration for its handling of the border — a disaster that allowed migrants to flood our city and stress our resources.
Adams was elected to a city atrophied by a pandemic exodus, with disorder on the streets and trains and an overemphasis on identity politics pushed by his predecessor Bill de Blasio.
But after four years, there are signs that sanity and vitality are returning to the Big Apple.
That growth is precarious, and Adams knows it. A Mamdani administration, he said, “can take us backwards.”
With that, I tossed Adams a copy of Wednesday’s Post, featuring Mamdani on the cover with the headline “SOS NYC.”
He said the paper sees our shared emergency “clearly.”
Adams sees himself as a bulwark against a socialist agenda that would strip our great city of its grit and its coffers. He’s heeding that distress call from sensible New Yorkers — claiming that his phone rang constantly throughout primary night, allowing him only an hour and a half of sleep.
Donors, volunteers and Cuomo boosters are all looking to get on his calendar, he said.
“This is a resilient city and we need a resilient mayor. And [Mamdani’s] a snake oil salesman,” Adams told me. “He sells lies and, the reality is, what he’s promising — he cannot deliver . . . Every time he talks about his policies, it exposes [his] lack of understanding of government.”
Case in point: Mamdani claims he will pay for his urban utopia by raising income taxes on high-income earners.
“Mayors don’t raise income taxes, assemblymen do,” Adams said. “If he couldn’t raise it in Albany as an assemblyman, how is he going to raise it as mayor?”
Hizzoner said he wasn’t blindsided by Mamdani’s underdog victory over Andrew Cuomo, either.
He told me how, over the past few weeks, he heard people talking about Mamdani in a Brooklyn Trader Joe’s (the mayor was buying lentil noodles: “They are great and only $3 a bag”) and at a Harlem restaurant.
Wherever he went, really.
“I said to myself, when [Mamdani] was 30 points behind in the poll but with 2,000 volunteers on the streets — and I saw a lackluster Andrew Cuomo — I knew then that this guy was going to win the primary,” he recalled.
I don’t buy that Adams is the Miss Cleo of Trader Joe’s, but he at least understands that he’s dealing with a candidate fueled by grassroots energy, an army of devoted canvassers, and undeniable charisma.
Mamdani toppled a barely-there Cuomo by flooding social media, speaking with influencers, walking the streets to meet New Yorkers, and creating poppy ads. It’s pure hustle in the manner of his supporter Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
He’s also promised voters a bunch of free stuff (groceries, bus fare, rent freezes) — which, no surprise, landed with college educated New Yorkers who are likely saddled with student debt. It all sounds good, even though it’s fiscally impossible and irresponsible.
So how will Adams defeat the socialist juggernaut? By appealing to sane moderates.
“[Mamdani] won the Democratic primary that is the left end of the Democratic party. We have a million independent voters who are not registered,” the mayor said. “You have a whole pot of general election voters that will come out because of the urgency of the moment.”
He knows his limits, particularly among the delusional anti-Israel protesters that Mamdani courts: “We are never going to convince those who have been radicalized [and] hate America. [Who espouse] ‘from the river to the sea’ and they don’t even know what river and what sea they’re talking about.”
He plans to tap into “African-American, Hispanic and Jewish communities.” Adams said first- and second-generation immigrant communities are “underestimated. They want to know: Are our streets safe, are we educating our children, can I take care of my house? These are hard-working, American-value, first- and second-generation immigrants.”
And he has some wins to tout: Homicides and shootings are down. Subway crime is finally dropping. Broadway had the greatest 12 months of recorded history.
“Businesses are returning, and our nightlife industry is telling me their places are booming,” said the man known for his love of hotspots like Zero Bond and Casa Cipriani.
“And 89% of the migrants and asylum seekers we had are out of our care now.”
Adams will have some challenges on his indictments, which he was eager to discuss.
“Nothing was there,” he said.
The mayor believes the Biden administration “tried to publicly embarrass” him when he “started to be vociferous about the migrants and asylum seekers,” though he doesn’t blame President Biden directly. When prosecutors dropped the charges, it led to accusations that Adams accepted a quid pro quo from the Trump administration.
Adams denied making a deal with the president for himself. But he made it clear that — unlike Mamdani, who has said he will fight Trump — he understands the importance of New York City working with the federal government, regardless of who is in the White House.
“Your job [as mayor] is not to be at war with the president, but to work with the president to get the resources here,” Adams said, adding that he worked with both Biden and Trump for the good of New York.
Now, with the specter of socialism and dangerous idealism looming over us, our admittedly flawed mayor might be the best hope for the survival of this great but vulnerable city.
“Do you want socialism that has failed all over the globe . . . or do you want a healthy capitalist society, where you could come as a dishwasher and eventually own a chain of restaurants?” Adams told me.
“This is a country of opportunity, not enabling people. What Mamdani’s offering — to give you everything? That’s not a healthy environment.”
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