Mayor Eric Adams said that a meeting with President-elect Donald J. Trump was about New York City’s future. Each man has his own reasons to forge close ties.
Mayor Eric Adams said that a meeting with President-elect Donald J. Trump was about New York City’s future. Each man has his own reasons to forge close ties.
When Mayor Eric Adams descended into Palm Beach Thursday night to meet with President-elect Donald J. Trump, he said he just wanted to advance New York City’s interests.
But the context was impossible to ignore: Mr. Adams, facing a federal corruption trial in April and the possibility of prison time, was going to visit the one person in the United States who was capable of pardoning him and who had indicated a potential interest in doing so.
The taxpayer-funded journey to Florida came with substantial political intrigue. For Mr. Trump, a Republican, the meeting could give him leverage in New York City, a place that is typically hostile to him and his party. For the mayor, a Democrat, the visit carried more peril.
Mr. Adams’s poll numbers are in the tank. He is facing several credible primary challengers. And his overtures to Mr. Trump risk damaging whatever hopes the mayor still has of winning a second term in City Hall this year.
“The politics are clearly unhelpful,” said Howard Wolfson, a political strategist for Michael R. Bloomberg, the former mayor. “But the politics are not driving the trip. The politics are clearly subsidiary to the desire to stay out of jail.”
In effect, Mr. Adams is stymied by an apparent conflict of interest that voters have no easy way to disentangle.
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