Mayor Eric Adams.
Credit score: Ed Reed/Mayoral Images Workplace.
Mayor Eric Adams swatted away questions on Thursday over this week’s revelation that he’s $3 million in debt to the prison protection attorneys who helped him beat his now-dismissed federal corruption case.
“Unless you guys are planning on chipping in money, why are you asking me?” Adams requested reporters. “I don’t understand. If the desire is ‘Eric owes money,’ then I’m not going to fulfill that.”
Adams insisted, “I have a relationship with my attorney,” and that it isn’t anybody else’s enterprise how he pays his non-public authorized payments.
“I’m going to do my job as the mayor, and how I pay my legal fees is between Eric Adams and his attorney,” he mentioned whereas referencing himself within the third particular person.
Adams didn’t elaborate additional on precisely what he meant or how he plans to pay down his authorized payments. However when requested if he has any issues that what he owes may depart him susceptible to the whims of his attorneys, Adams merely answered, “No.”
The mayor’s debt got here to gentle in an up to date submitting on how a lot his authorized protection fund, which he established in late 2023 after a federal investigation into his marketing campaign turned public, has raised and spent over the previous three months. The submitting with the metropolis’s Conflicts of Curiosity Board confirmed that whereas Adams racked up tens of millions of {dollars} in authorized payments over the previous a number of months, his protection fund has not raised a cent thus far this yr.
Donations to each Adams’ protection fund and his re-election marketing campaign have slowed considerably in latest months following his indictment and as his approval ranking has reached a historic low of 20%.
Adams retained Wilmer Hale shortly after his former high marketing campaign fundraiser, Brianna Suggs, had her dwelling raided by federal brokers in late 2023. However when he was hit with a five-count federal indictment practically a yr later, he introduced on Quinn Emmanuel accomplice Alex Spiro as his lead tiral lawyer.
Spiro, whose agency charged Adams over $700,000 a month, was profitable in getting the prices towards him deserted by President Trump’s Justice Division after assembly with high DOJ officers in January. A federal district decide—Dale Ho—dismissed the case earlier this month with prejudice, which means the fees can’t be resurrected.
However although Adams beat the fees, he paid a heavy political value that has thrown his re-election probabilities into severe doubt.
That got here within the type of ex-Manhattan US Lawyer Danielle Sassoon alleging that Spiro and high DOJ officers engaged in a quid professional quo — buying and selling Adams’ cooperation with executing Trump’s immigration agenda with dismissing his case.
In his choice, Ho appeared to agree with Sassoon, writing: “Everything here smacks of a bargain: dismissal of the Indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions.”
