Trump Says Mayor Eric Adams Visited the White House to ‘Thank Me’ – The New York Times

Eric Adams Corruption Case
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The meeting on Friday between Mayor Eric Adams of New York City and President Trump came as documents related to his abandoned federal corruption case were released.
By Emma G. Fitzsimmons and Jonah E. Bromwich
For the first time since his federal corruption case was dropped, Mayor Eric Adams of New York City met with President Trump in Washington on Friday, hours before documents related to his case were released.
The stated purpose of the visit, according to the mayor’s office, was for Mr. Adams to “discuss New York City priorities,” including its infrastructure needs. But apparently there was another item on his agenda.
After Mr. Adams had left, Mr. Trump quickly summarized the meeting. “I think he came in to thank me, frankly,” he said without elaborating.
Asked what they discussed, Mr. Trump said: “Almost nothing.”
Mr. Adams’s initial recap of the meeting made no mention of any gratitude being expressed. He said he had brought up a wind farm project off the coast of Long Island that could have benefited the city but was canceled last month by the Trump administration.
On Friday evening, the mayor’s campaign spokesman, Todd Shapiro, acknowledged that Mr. Adams “took a moment to thank the president for his words of support” last year.
“At a time when Mayor Adams was being unfairly and selectively targeted by federal authorities, then-candidate Trump publicly acknowledged the injustice,” he added.
Mr. Trump said last fall that he and Mr. Adams had both been “persecuted” by prosecutors. After Mr. Trump became president, his Justice Department abandoned Mr. Adams’s criminal case.
On Friday, prosecutors released material related to the case, including search warrants and affidavits describing some of the evidence in the case. The judge who presided over the mayor’s case ordered that the documents should be made public in response to a request from The New York Times after the charges were dismissed.
Though the material runs close to 2,000 pages, an initial review indicated that the F.B.I. and prosecutors had been investigating whether Mr. Adams committed witness tampering, though they did not charge him with that crime when he was indicted. In a statement, a lawyer for Mr. Adams, Alex Spiro, said that the case “should never have been brought in the first place and is now over.”
Mr. Trump has previously said that he knew nothing about Mr. Adams’s case and was not involved in it.
The material helps to elucidate the charges against Mr. Adams, which a federal judge, Dale E. Ho, dismissed last month after a request from high-ranking officials in the Justice Department who said the case was hindering the mayor’s cooperation with the president’s immigration agenda.
Although Friday was the first public meeting between Mr. Adams and Mr. Trump since Mr. Trump returned to the White House, the mayor had flown to Florida in January to have lunch with Mr. Trump shortly before his inauguration, and he also attended the inauguration.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said on Friday that Mr. Adams had requested the meeting and “the president was willing to take it.”
The trip came at a particularly sensitive moment, as the city navigates several thorny issues involving the Trump administration.
On Tuesday, the New York Police Department announced it was looking into why its officers gave investigators from the Department of Homeland Security the sealed arrest record of a New Jersey woman who was detained at a protest as part of their efforts to deport her. And Mr. Adams agreed to allow the federal government to open offices at the Rikers Island jail complex, but a state judge temporarily blocked the plan last month.
Mr. Adams appeared eager to promote Friday’s trip to Washington as he runs for a second term. He shared three videos on social media on Friday about the importance of working with the president.
“We must have a dialogue with the White House,” he said in a video.
The mayor also mentioned “developing our own chips,” a reference to the prospect of bringing computer chip manufacturing to the city.
The Justice Department’s move to abandon the case against Mr. Adams caused an uproar within the department and led to the resignation of at least eight prosecutors in New York and Washington, including the acting U.S. attorney in Manhattan, Danielle Sassoon.
Mr. Adams, who has denied any wrongdoing, had pleaded not guilty to the five charges against him, and had been expected to go to trial last month.
Judge Ho, in dismissing the case, said the arrangement between the mayor and the Justice Department “smacks of a bargain: dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions.” He added that Mr. Adams, like any other defendant, remained innocent until proven guilty.
Mr. Adams, a Democrat, is running for re-election as an independent in November after his party criticized him for his alliance with Mr. Trump. After his case was dropped, Mr. Adams continued to defend Mr. Trump and to argue that the justice system was political, promoting the book “Government Gangsters” by Mr. Trump’s F.B.I. director, Kash Patel, as he celebrated his legal victory.
The Adams administration has at times pushed back on parts of Mr. Trump’s agenda, including by signing onto an amicus brief on Thursday opposing Mr. Trump’s order to end birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants.
Several mayoral candidates have criticized Mr. Adams’s coziness with Mr. Trump and expressed concern over the president’s proposed budget cuts and threats of mass deportations.
Zellnor Myrie, a state lawmaker who is running for mayor, said in a statement that Mr. Adams cared more about “staying on Donald Trump’s good side than fighting for New York City.”
“Adams already gave up his independence as mayor to save himself from criminal prosecution,” he said. “Now, Trump and his cronies are coming to collect, and New York City will keep paying the price.”
Erica L. Green and Maggie Haberman contributed reporting from Washington.
Emma G. Fitzsimmons is the City Hall bureau chief for The Times, covering Mayor Eric Adams and his administration.
Jonah E. Bromwich covers criminal justice in the New York region for The Times. He is focused on political influence and its effect on the rule of law in the area’s federal and state courts.
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