As Mayor Eric Adams awaited a decision by federal prosecutors in Manhattan over whether to heed the Justice Department’s order to dismiss his five-count corruption indictment, he delivered an address on Tuesday to staunchly defend his character and profess his innocence.
He insisted that the prosecution was based on sensational claims and had put him and his family through an “unnecessary ordeal” that he argued was now over.
“I never broke the law and I never would,” he said in the six-minute speech at City Hall. “I would never put any personal benefit above my solemn responsibility as your mayor.”
Mr. Adams did not address concerns that the potential resolution of his case would make him beholden to President Trump, who has said that he and the mayor were both “persecuted” by prosecutors and that he would consider pardoning Mr. Adams.
Mr. Adams sought to reassure New Yorkers that he was focused on running the city, and he said that he would work to regain their trust.
“You can trust me to keep moving the city forward,” he said.
The acting head of the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan, Danielle R. Sassoon, must now decide whether to carry out the order by Emil Bove III, the Justice Department’s acting No. 2 official, to dismiss the charges “as soon as is practicable” by filing a motion with the judge overseeing the case.
If prosecutors in Manhattan do move to drop the case, the judge, Dale E. Ho of U.S. District Court in Manhattan, may question the motion. But under legal precedent, he has limited power to refuse the request.
The federal investigations of the mayor and his inner circle have put the city on an uncertain path for more than a year. Mr. Adams has resisted calls to step down, even as numerous investigations have expanded and top city officials have resigned.
Elected officials in New York on Tuesday continued to express alarm about how Mr. Adams, a Democrat who is running for re-election this year, would govern the city under pressure from Mr. Trump, who could move to bring back the charges if the mayor stepped out of line.
They questioned whether Mr. Adams could put the city’s best interests above his own during the final 10 months of his term.
During an unrelated news conference on Tuesday, Gov. Kathy Hochul was asked repeatedly whether Mr. Adams was compromised and could be trusted to make decisions with the best interests of New Yorkers in mind.
“I truly do not know,” she said, adding that he needed to take steps to “make sure that people have confidence” in him.
Ms. Hochul has the power to remove Mr. Adams but said Tuesday she would not exercise it, because overturning the will of the voters who elected him “does not feel like something that’s very democratic.”
Zellnor Myrie, a state senator from Brooklyn who is running for mayor against Mr. Adams, sent a letter to Judge Ho urging him to reject the dismissal and to appoint a special prosecutor to continue the case.
Mr. Myrie said the Justice Department’s directive to dismiss the charges without prejudice was a “gun to the head of the legitimate democratic governance of the city of New York.”
Democrats in New York are deeply concerned about the impact of Mr. Trump’s agenda on the city. Mr. Trump, a Republican, has threatened to kill new congestion pricing tolls in Manhattan that support the subway, to enact mass deportations in a city that is known for welcoming immigrants and to freeze federal spending on key programs.
The mayor has recently gone out of his way to curry favor with the president, visiting him in Florida last month, attending his inauguration and saying that he would not publicly criticize Mr. Trump as other members of his party have done.
Renewed calls for the mayor to resign came on Tuesday, including from Brad Lander, the city comptroller who is running for mayor.
Mr. Adams typically holds a news conference on Tuesdays at City Hall, the one weekly opportunity for reporters to ask him questions. Instead, he delivered a speech shortly after noon with no reporters allowed.
The mayor’s defense lawyer, Alex Spiro, said in a statement on Monday that the order to drop the charges proved that Mr. Adams was innocent and had not broken the law. But Mr. Bove made clear in his memo to prosecutors that he had not assessed “the strength of the evidence” and that the decision had been driven instead by the indictment’s proximity to the upcoming mayoral election and what he said was its interference with the mayor’s ability to assist Mr. Trump’s immigration crackdown.
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