Politics
As Hochul weighs action, Sharpton, Jeffries and Meeks grow more critical of Adams
Rev. Al Sharpton and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries have expressed more explicit concerns about Mayor Eric Adams in the past few days.
![Gov. Kathy Hochul speaks at a National Action Network event with the Rev. Al Sharpton.](https://cdn.cityandstateny.com/media/img/cd/2025/02/14/GettyImages_1251808683/860x394.jpg?1739577912)
Gov. Kathy Hochul speaks at a National Action Network event with the Rev. Al Sharpton. Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images
Despite his matter-of-fact pleas, some New Yorkers are not ready to put Mayor Eric Adams’ Trump problem in their rear view.
The ex-Manhattan U.S. attorney alleged Adams’ legal defense team proposed that Adams could help with the “enforcement priorities” of President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice if the charges against him were dismissed. Adams and his legal team have roundly denied that any such quid pro quo deal was made, and continue to maintain Adams’ innocence on all criminal charges against him. In the course of a week, however, Acting U.S. Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove directed federal prosecutors to request the charges be dropped temporarily – before making the request himself – and Adams is cooperating with border czar Tom Homan on immigration enforcement priorities, including moving to reopen ICE operations on Rikers Island.
Now Adams faces new calls to resign while Gov. Kathy Hochul faces escalated calls to remove Adams from office – a power she has under both state and city law. Hochul hasn’t ruled out using her power to unilaterally remove the mayor from office, but it would be a monumental and unprecedented step. It carries procedural and legal questions, as well as political repercussions, like making lefty Public Advocate Jumaane Williams acting mayor and potentially giving more runway to former Gov. Andrew Cuomo to run.
The developments in the story are fast-moving and not, as Adams suggests, behind us. But as of the time of writing, three key players have not yet publicly called for Hochul to take that drastic step. The Rev. Al Sharpton and Reps. Hakeem Jeffries and Greg Meeks – three Black political leaders with ties to Adams’ base of support – are part of a “permission structure” from which Hochul would likely seek approval, several political observers have said.
Sharpton and Jeffries have, however, rung louder alarm bells than they have since Adams was first indicted last September. After the U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon resigned on Thursday rather than move to drop the charges, Sharpton said, “I have not known Eric to do anything corrupt. But I think that when you look at the weight of – you have people resigning over this – you can’t ignore this. We had talked about – ‘we’ being some of the elected officials and clergy – had talked about sitting down, deciding, just two days ago, where we were going to go. It has escalated now.”
Sharpton, in a statement to Politico, suggested that he and potentially others are waiting for Judge Dale Ho on the request for dismissal. “If the judge comes back and says I’m not letting you stop the trial, there’s nothing for (Hochul) to do,” Sharpton said in the statement. “If the judge says that the charges are out, then you have an appeal to the governor.” Sharpton has kept his comments about what that appeal would look like vague.
Jeffries, who has been restrained in his comments about Adams since the indictment dropped, called it a “troubling situation” on Thursday. “These are very troubling developments, and we’re going to have to get some real answers to the questions that relate to how the Department of Justice directive came about, relative to the dismissal of charges that was ordered,” he said in an interview on NY1.
Meeks, too, has expressed concerns about the charges against Adams being dismissed at Bove’s direction. “I believe (Adams) when he said he didn’t do anything wrong, but you can’t interfere with the justice system,” he said in an interview with MSNBC.
“The only person who has the power to remove Eric from office is Kathy Hochul, and three of the most influential people in her orbit remain Al Sharpton, Greg Meeks and Hakeem Jeffries,” one Democratic strategist said this week.
None of the three political leaders responded to requests for comment or interviews on Friday.
At an unrelated press conference on Friday, Attorney General Letitia James confirmed that there are discussions happening about the mayor’s fate. “At this point, there’s a number of discussions going on, discussions going on at the state level, discussions going on at the local level, private discussions,” she said. “So at this point in time, we’re going to refrain from making comments until such time as we complete those discussions to determine the fate of the mayor of the city of New York.”
Hochul herself sounded some louder alarm bells on Thursday, following the spate of resignations from the Southern District of New York and the Justice Department over the case.Just as the mayor was announcing new immigration enforcement action after a meeting with Trump’s border czar, Hochul said in an interview on MSNBC that she needed time to “process and figure out the right approach.”
“The allegations are extremely concerning and serious,” she said. “But I cannot as the governor of this state have a knee-jerk, politically motivated reaction like a lot of other people are saying right now. I have to do what’s smart, what’s right, and I’m consulting with other leaders in government at this time.”
Amid the renewed calls to resign and to be removed, Adams released a statement on Friday attempting to eradicate any notions that he is beholden to Trump. Shortly after, Adams’ Law Department said in a letter that it would sue the Trump administration over its seizure of $80 million in federal funds from a city bank account. City Comptroller Brad Lander, a mayoral rival to Adams, had requested the city Law Department do so hours earlier.
Additional reporting by Rebecca C. Lewis.
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