Adams Begins Mayoralty with Series of Ethics Questions

*Reposted from Gotham Gazette. Written By Samar Khurshid. (photo: Ed Reed/Mayor's Office)*

When Eric Adams was running for mayor, his opponents in both the primary and general elections repeatedly questioned his honesty and integrity. They pointed to his involvement in a state corruption investigation, his history of blurring the lines of campaign finance law, some of his political relationships, and whether he is consistently truthful. Questions swirled around whether Adams simply plays by his own set of rules, even while running on a strict law-and-order platform as a former police captain pledging to make the city safer.

Adams scoffed at the criticism and voters elected him the 110th mayor of New York City. But in just his first few weeks as the city’s chief executive, Adams has given new credence to those concerns after appointing officials that bring into question whether he is willing to flout the city’s conflicts of interest laws, ethics norms, and even his own professed high standards for the integrity of his mayoral administration.

The central concerns swirling around the new mayor relate to three prominent appointments he has made to his young administration, including a scandal-scarred former top NYPD official as a deputy mayor; a political fixer and lawyer with a variety of messy entanglements as his City Hall chief of staff; and his own brother as the well-paid head of his police security detail. Adams was facing consistent questions about these and other decisions before they were overshadowed by the twin tragedies that have dominated his early tenure: a deadly Bronx fire and the killing of two police officers.

For entire article visit: https://www.gothamgazette.com/city/11047-mayor-eric-adams-ethics-questi…