NYC Mayor, Eric Adams indicted on various charges
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New York City Mayor Eric Adams has been indicted on charges of bribery, fraud, and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations.
It has been revealed that New York City Mayor Eric Adams has been indicted on charges of bribery, fraud, and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations. Adams claims he is innocent of the charges and urges New Yorkers not to give up on him until he can prove his innocence.
Mayor Adams was raised in South Jamaica as one of six children. Adams was a victim of police brutality at the age of 15 when he was beaten in the basement of a precinct. Dealing with these events, he turned these struggles into his life’s purpose and became a police officer. While Adams was in the New York Police Department (NYPD), he was an activist and one of the most progressive officers when it came to policy change. While serving as his force captain, he helped create the first computerized system for tracking crime. After this, Adams worked his way through the New York political system and eventually became the current Mayor of New York City.
Now, it has been released to the public that Adams could have potentially been accepting illegal campaign donations from as early as 2014, coming from Turkish officials and foreigners. In exchange for donations from the Turkish people, it is reported that Mayor Adams expedited the process of opening the Turkish consular building, forgoing a fire investigation. A Turkish official said, “It was his turn to repay,” to Mayor Adams in 2021.
Adams received greatly discounted flights and hotel rates in exchange for his cooperation. It is estimated that the discounts translated to over 100,000 USD. He also qualified for around 10 million dollars in public campaign funds due to straw donor support. US Attorney Damien Williams said, “Mayor Adams took these contributions knowing they were illegal and aimed at buying influence…year after year, he kept the public in the dark, claiming he received no gifts.”
There is proof that Adams was trying to conceal his tracks, and there have been reports of a co-conspirator from his administration working alongside him. Some methods used to hide their actions include deleting messages, changing passwords, and fake paper trails. The indictment says, “As described above, Adams repeatedly did not disclose the free and heavily discounted travel benefits he accepted from the Turkish Official, the Promoter, and the Airline Manager; created a false paper trail to suggest he had paid for his travel when, in fact, he had not; assured the Adams Staffer that he had a practice of deleting all his messages with the Adams Staffer; and directed the Adams Staffer to ensure that his activities in Turkey in 2021 were shield from public view”.
Mayor Adams could face a maximum of 45 years in prison for the five charges he is facing. One of the charges, wire fraud, could lead him to receive a maximum of 20 years behind bars. There are claims that he stole money from the matching funds program in New York City. All campaign funds are required to be written down and publicly available, which these funds were not.
Many are calling for the Mayor to resign before the trial goes public. Mayor Adams is resistant and says he is not giving up. New York Governor Kathy Hochul holds the power to remove him from office but has not yet reached that conclusion. She says that he needs to “find an appropriate path forward to ensure the people of New York City are being well-served by their leaders.”