Mayor Eric Adams claimed Tuesday that everyday New Yorkers don’t care a whole lot about the federal probes targeting top City Hall and NYPD officials and the abrupt resignations of some of his key aides.
Adams, asked at his weekly news conference if he understood New Yorkers’ concerns about the issues, said city dwellers never expressed those worries to his face and blamed the media for making them a bigger issue than they are with the public.
“No, I don’t understand,” he said. “If they had the same level of concern, then I would see it when I’m in the public.”
Adams made his assertion shortly after he laughed off a Post reporter’s related questions as he walked into City Hall.
Several of his allies have been ensnared in the potential corruption probe, including Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Phil Banks, his brothers schools chief David Banks and retired MTA official-turned-safety consultant Terence Banks, Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright, former NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban and Tim Pearson, a top adviser. No one has been charged.
The mayor finally acknowledged after repeated questioning toward the news conference’s end that New Yorkers might care a little bit about the scandals.
But he still suggested that they’re talking more about other issues.
“New Yorkers are concerned, because this is concerning, and we want to resolve that,” he said of the scandal.
But “what I’m saying to you about everyday New Yorkers, they want to know, ‘Eric, what are you doing about the safety of my city, the schools, the housing, my employment.’ That is at the top of their agenda because that’s what I hear when I’m out in the streets. That’s what I hear when I’m at town halls. That is what I hear when I am at the churches, the mosque, the synagogue. That is what I hear,” the mayor said.
The mayor spent the bulk of his hour-and-a-half-long news conference repeatedly dodging other questions about the snowballing problems swirling around City Hall, too.
“We’re not going to be distracted, and one of the distractions is answering the same questions over and over and over again,” he said.
Over the often contentious Q-and-A, Adams defended Pearson’s controversial work on migrant contracting. Hizzoner also detailed his decades-old relationship with the Banks family.
Caban and the city’s chief counsel, Lisa Zornberg, have resigned during the scandal.
There have been vocal calls for Adams to oust Phil Banks and Pearson — including from The Post’s editorial board.
Sources have told The Post that the sudden weekend resignation of Zornberg came after she recommended to the mayor that Banks and Pearson leave the administration. Adams, during the news conference, refused to offer any details about what he called his “private conversations” with Zornberg.
Adams, when asked about The Post editorial’s demand to fire Banks and Pearson, smiled.
“I think they have a moderate pragmatic approach — they’re not so idealistic,” he said.
“And they beat me up from time to time. But when I read that paper, I think they got their fingers on the pulse of everyday, working-class people.
“I don’t agree with everything in The Post, and they don’t agree with everything I do,” he said, before adding, “There’s a whole lot of stuff that I’ve done that The Post says this is the right guy for the job.”