WTF is Eric Adams doing?

The week that President Donald Trump took office for the second time, Mayor Eric Adams seemed determined to find new ways to act like he’s not a Democratic politician running for mayor of New York City. 

“People often say, ‘Well, you know, you don’t sound like a Democrat, you seem that you’ve left the party,” Adams said in a sit-down interview with far-right pundit Tucker Carlson on Tuesday. “No. The party left me, and it left working-class people.”

That was just a day after Adams sped off to Washington D.C. in the early hours of the morning to attend Trump’s inauguration on a last-minute invitation. Four days earlier, Adams flew to Mar-a-Lago to meet with Trump directly. In another sit-down interview this week, this time with Stephen A. Smith, the ESPN host told him, “You sound like a conservative. You understand that, right,” as Adams explained that he won’t tolerate crime in the city.

“When I went to Florida to sit down with the president, it was clearly to lay out the support we need for infrastructure, for housing, for affordability, those real issues,” Adams said in an interview on “The Reset Talk Show” this week. “When people continue to try to create their own narrative, then there's nothing I could do about it. I've been very clear that I have a great attorney to deal with my personal issues. My role is what I was elected to do, and that is to move our city forward.”

For some, the explanation for Adams’ friendliness with Trump appears obvious. Adams is in choppy waters. He’s facing federal corruption charges, to which he’s pleaded not guilty, with an expensive trial set to start just nine weeks before the Democratic primary in June. 

If Adams is now cozying up to Trump in pursuit of a presidential pardon, as some observers and many of his political opponents believe him to be, the logic of his recent moves is evident. Trump is known to reward acolytes and punish critics, without the subtlety and pretense that traditional politicians typically aim for.

“His legal issues trump – no pun intended – his political issues,” said political consultant Chris Coffey. “Pardon is legal strategy No. 1. If the questions are between his freedom and whether he gets reelected next time, your freedom is always going to win out.”

But if Adams is in fact running for reelection this year (which his team insists he is doing) as a Democrat (which is still the most viable path in a citywide election), his recent moves look more baffling. Adams faces a competitive reelection bid, with former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, still not even in the race, outperforming him in several recent polls. Ditching planned appearances at Martin Luther King Jr. Day events in New York City to heed a last-minute call to attend Trump’s inauguration is a great way to make inroads with the president and the new powers that be in Washington. How it helps him hold on to his base of Democratic Black voters in outer boroughs – a base of support that could be threatened by an Cuomo candidacy – is less clear. “As a legal strategy, I understand it. As a campaign strategy, I don’t,” said political consultant Eli Valentin.

Business as usual?

Adams has suggested that forming a relationship with the new federal administration is to the benefit of New York City, which could suffer from an antagonistic White House, as the city saw during Trump’s first term. Adams said that he and the president did not discuss his legal case at his Mar-a-Lago meeting with Trump last week, but broached infrastructure, manufacturing and “improving the city.” 

On its face, a local mayor not wanting to burn bridges with the federal government is not ridiculous. “You are the mayor of New York City, so if you say to me, ‘I want to have a good relationship with the president because we have all of these ills that will require some federal funding,’ I recognize that,” said political consultant Lupe Todd-Medina. “But does that require you skipping MLK events in New York City to rush off to go to Trump’s inauguration and be seen in photos hanging out with people like Roger Stone?”

“Developing a relationship with the Republican administration is not the problem,” former state Democratic Party Executive Director Basil Smikle said. “The problem is that Trump has voiced opinions that are so antithetical to who we are as New Yorkers, that not standing up against that looks weak. Voters don’t believe that the mayor of New York should kowtow to the president.”

A former registered Republican, Adams has long been more centrist than some of his Democratic colleagues. But in refusing to publicly criticize the president, Adams – who once declared himself the “face of the new Democratic Party” and once castigated the “idiot behavior of (Trump’s) buffoonery” – is striking a different posture today. “You shouldn't start out the gate criticizing. You should start out trying to collaborate,” Adams said, when asked this week about whether he holds Trump accountable for the insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021. “So the same thing I did for President Biden, I am doing for this president.” 

Whether he is running for reelection or not, Coffey said, Adams needs to appear to be doing so in order to have any pull with Trump. But Adams’ recent moves – including hobnobbing with GOP leaders during his trip to D.C. – have prompted some to question whether he is committed to running as a Democrat, as opposed to running on another party line. There is a path for Adams to run as a Republican or independent candidate, and attention he’s getting in GOP circles lately could expand his pool of donors, some speculated. But in a city where registered Democrats still outnumber Republicans by at least six-to-one, it’s not a particularly promising path to election. 

Adams was largely elected in 2021 on the support of Black and Latino voters in outer boroughs. Though the city saw shifts toward Trump last November, Adams’ base is still largely blue. Without clarity about what his friendliness with Trump is getting for New York City, Smikle said, “Voters are going to question whether or not he’s cozying up to Trump to help New York or to help himself.”