In the most dramatic and existential threat to Mayor Eric Adams’ administration, the FBI this week raided homes and took devices from NYPD Commissioner Eddie Cabán; First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright; her partner, Schools Chancellor David Banks; his brother, Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Philip Banks III; their brother Terence Banks; adviser Timothy Pearson; and other officials. This is an enormous swath of Adams’ top people, and calls into serious question the administration’s overall stability.
What prompted a federal probe into NYC Mayor Eric Adams in the first place?
The first thing to note is that the latest dustup is wholly separate from the earlier and ongoing probe that involves Adams’ alleged entanglements with Turkey. In that case, he’s accused of taking unlawful campaign donations from people connected to Turkish businesses and the Turkish government in exchange for favors and preferential treatment like fast-tracking safety approval for a consulate.
In that probe, Adams is squarely a focus, though it should be noted that he has not been indicted. The FBI did seize some of his devices and threw that probe into public view in part by having raided the home of his top campaign fundraiser. While this latest probe has now swallowed a greater swath of the mayor’s senior leadership, it seems less focused on him specifically; in fact, from what we know about it so far, it doesn’t seem like Adams is personally implicated.
Speaking of, it’s not clear exactly what the federal prosecutors’ theory is here, though there are some suspicions. It clearly has some nexus to the NYPD, given that Cabán, his chief of staff and other high-ranking officials had their devices seized.
Pearson, an old Adams pal from the NYPD days, is technically an employee of the Economic Development Corporation, though his official duties have never been clear and he’s always been more of an Adams fixer and enforcer more than anything. Politico called him “the most powerful News Yorker you’ve never heard of” and he’s already engender a number of acute controversies, including getting in a fight with shelter staff at a migrant shelter, which he was visiting unannounced (clearly not something city’s public-nonprofit development organization has on its docket).
Phil Banks has his own sordid history — I’ll never miss an opportunity to point out that he resigned as a high-ranking NYPD official after being named an “unindicted co-conspirator” in an FBI corruption probe — and Terence has been working as an unregistered lobbyist pushing clients before their other brother, David.
There is a specific theory about a certain pattern of corruption and NYPD misconduct that is floating around, and which is both somewhat shocking and plausible given what we know. Unfortunately, it is a little too speculative still for me to lay it out here, but suffice it to say it would involve a certain level of coordination between a lot of these officials towards a corrupt end and personal self-enrichment.
Umm, we heard he compared himself to Job in the Bible? Why, what does that mean and what do we think of Adams’ reactions right now?
The Job thing specifically is a bit new, but Adams’ tendency to describe himself in generally biblical or even messianic terms certainly isn’t. Late last year, he said he is “mayor because God gave me the authority to be mayor, and he placed in the hearts of the voters to give me that authority,” which is a bit of a wild thing for a mayor to say.
It also slots into his consistent belief that he is being tested and thwarted by semi-malicious forces that are impeding this pseudo-divine path; he complains constantly and bitterly about being misunderstood by a media that fails to see his vision, and seems to view all setbacks as righteous tribulations or tests.
Adams himself has said he has been functionally preparing to be NYC mayor since the 1990s, and he certainly seems to view the office as an endpoint (or perhaps a coveted springboard to other offices) of a long and careful trajectory that’s to some extent preordained. More generally, the mayor has been known to have a streak of mysticism, having once mused that crystals underneath New York City might be responsible for some of the city’s lasting power.
Is he at risk of being indicted and/or not winning another term?
He seems to be at decent risk of both, though I wouldn’t say either is a done deal. People have been predicting his imminent indictment since the minute the first federal investigation became public, but so far he’s stayed on top of the fray. Of course, indicting a sitting mayor of the largest and most iconic city in the country is no small matter; such a move would require personal sign-off from Attorney General Merrick Garland, and would only happen if and when the FBI believes the evidence is truly bulletproof.
Remember, predecessor Bill de Blasio spent practically his whole mayoralty under some type of investigation, and he was ultimately never charged. Pretty much every NYC mayor attracts some investigative scrutiny during their tenure, and that historically has not been a conduit to an indictment. That said, this doesn’t look great for Adams, and neither does a poll showing that a majority of New York voters would want him to resign if indicted (though I’ll note that this was a poll from late last year, and these things often shift).
The primary competition is already relatively fierce without an indictment, as the mayor faces State Sen. Zellnor Myrie, former Comptroller Scott Stringer, current Comptroller Brad Lander, and potentially other entrants to the race. I wouldn’t exactly call any of these candidates a slam dunk, but they’re serious candidates with some name recognition and the ability to raise money and drum up political support among well-connected allies. An indictment itself might not really be necessary to present Adams and his administration as too self-dealing and enmeshed in a string of legal troubles to properly govern.
It feels like a lot of family members of high-ranking city government officials are also getting pulled into this? The chancellor and his brother, the police commissioner and his brother… what gives?
The Banks brothers all seem to be involved in whatever it is that the FBI is currently investigating. As for Cabán, it appears his brother James was also raided, and is potentially involved in some of the activities at issue, which allegedly include a bit of smoothing over relations between businesses and the NYPD, for a price. James himself has a checkered trajectory that includes being kicked out of the NYPD for misconduct and being sentenced to 30 days for failing to make repairs to a building he owned. (Not to be confused with Cabán’s other brother, Richard, who has separately had legal and public relations issues around a restaurant he owns, where Adams has been known to hang out).
This is all in part downstream of the fact that Adams is known to heavily prioritize loyalty, and that leads to a lot of reliance on longtime NYPD buddies and their families, which can all in theory use the proximity to power to further their own interests. That approach now really seems to be catching up to him.
Anything else we should be looking for or asking you?
This is a lot of smoke for there to be no fire here. I can’t say for certain what indictments might come down or when, but it’s pretty clear at this stage that the administration will pressure Cabán to resign, which for the fiercely loyal Adams — who promoted former Correction Commissioner Louis Molina after he failed utterly to address conditions at Rikers — is a big step that likely wouldn’t be taken unless there was really a there there. I don’t know exactly what that will end up being, but this fire is now threatening to encompass the administration in a way that will be hard to recover from.
Update 9/12/24: Since this article was first published, Caban has resigned. This is the first high-profile departure from Adams’ administration in connection to the FBI investigations.
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