February 26, 2025
J.R. Giddings: Good morning, welcome back to the Reset Talk Show. Mayor Adams, how are you?
Mayor Eric Adams: Quite well, how are you and all the listeners? Always good to be on. If I could just take a moment. I was just notified that a long time civil servant and employee passed away. Reuven Lipkind, many people from the Brooklyn community. He worked in my office. He worked in Jesse Hamilton’s office. He worked with my state senate office. Just a real hard-working member of the Crown Heights community. And to his wife, who also was a constituent service representative. You know, my heart goes out to him and his family and all those who knew him. Reuven Lipkind, just a great, great New Yorker and great Brooklynite.
Giddings: Thank you for that update, Mayor Adams. Mayor Adams, there’s a whole lot that we could talk about. New Yorkers are so concerned about where we are, where we’re going. So let’s talk about the reports about the possible change in the way New York City will cooperate with the federal immigration officers. Can you explain what that policy will be?
Mayor Adams: First, let’s ask ourselves what’s creating the anxiety. What is being created in the tabloids and what’s being created by words, it’s not what’s playing out on the ground. Here in the city, people have put this myth out there that ICE is raiding our schools.
We have not had one incident of ICE in our schools. We have no incidents of ICE in our hospitals, no incident of ICE in our houses of worship. And so we have to ask ourselves what’s creating this anxiety. I’ve said over and over again, people should send their children to school. They should go get medical help if they need it. If they’re a victim of a crime, they should call the police.
And they should continue, as I met with a group of pastors over the weekend, last week, to continue to go worship and go to your jobs and continue to do your job. What’s important here is what we have stated over and over again for two years now. JR, let’s be very clear. A lot of people are saying, well, Eric is saying something different from what he said pre-election. Go back two years. I said the same thing.
Those who are committing repeated violent acts in our city, documented or undocumented, should be held accountable. And if you’re undocumented, we will collaborate with federal authorities to have them removed from the country. I’ve said this for two years now. And so what we introduced in Rikers Island and what we are proposing is that ICE was on Rikers Island to coordinate with those dangerous gangs, part of our intel, to go after those dangerous gangs. And we’re going to put them back on there to go after these dangerous gangs and collaborate with correction officers, police officers, etc.
And this has not changed. It’s always been my position. Public safety is important. And you know what’s interesting, JR? When I was in Ecuador, people were leaving Ecuador because of the dangerous gangs took over Ecuador. They did not want to leave their country, but there were so many, so much gangs, so much violence, so much drugs. And they fled to come to America and New York City.
When I spoke with asylum seekers in some of our HERRCs, they said the gangs we fled from are now here in your city committing this violence. So migrants and asylum seekers don’t want this violence because they’re being preyed upon. And everyday New Yorkers don’t want it as well. And I’m going to continue to protect and fight for New Yorkers.
Giddings: Well, Mayor Adams, we’re going to go quickly because I know there is so much. But when you stop and you listen to a lot of the lawmakers here in New York that are asking for your resignation, how do you respond to that?
Number one, they say that what’s being said is that you are a puppet for President Trump. He’s holding you over the fire because your case is not completely resolved and they’ll be able to bring it back up at a later date. How do you respond to those two questions?
Mayor Adams: Well, okay, let’s break that down for a moment because we have to have an intelligent conversation to separate the rhetoric from the reality. Look at the people who are calling for it. Some of them would get the– become mayor if I am prematurely removed from what the voters call for.
Then look at the names, the faces, the organization. J.R., they have been criticizing the success of this administration from day one. They criticize my public safety policies, even though we removed 20,000 illegal guns off the street. They criticize my employment policies, although we decreased unemployment by 20 percent among Black and Hispanics and all demographics.
They criticize my job, economic recovery, although we have more jobs in the city’s 400 year history. So you have the same people who have been criticizing the success of this administration from day one. Now they found another reason to criticize.
And we want to give the appearance that the city said, Eric, you need to step down. Now, let’s say the argument, which is not valid. But let’s say the argument is an argument. Is that why you remove a mayor of the largest city in America that the people voted into office? Where’s the democratic process here?
You want to remove a mayor because you heard a bunch of news stories or you hear loud noises. That is just not democracy, J.R. Democracy is allowing the voters to vote, not based on optics, not based on those who never wanted me to be the mayor. All of a sudden being the loudest is [inaudible]. So we need to ask ourselves, are we who we say we are? Are we a bunch of hypocrites that we believe in democracy when you get the person in office that you want?
And it is it is ridiculous for people to tell me as the mayor of the largest city in America, you should not be talking to the president of the United States. Let me just think about that for a moment. I got to speak with Washington to bring resources to this city. And that’s what I’m going to do. And I’m not going to allow those who are still angry over the results of the election. Tell us we should not collaborate with Washington, D.C., to bring resources to this city.
Giddings: Well, the one thing that’s been highlighted across the city is that your charges are still looming. Are you concerned about your charges being brought back sometime in November?
Mayor Adams: No, I’m not. I did nothing wrong. I said it over and over again. Even the attorney general stated that the evidence was weak at best. The assistant of the deputy attorney general pointed out that this was a really real abuse of authority. And it’s not only me, J.R. Think about it for a moment. The president of the… President Biden said that the Justice Department was weaponized. President Biden said his Justice Department was weaponized. President– .
Family members felt that it was weaponized. So it’s not like I’m standing alone in this weaponization call. And I take my hat off to this administration for going in and making sure our Justice Department is going after dangerous and violent people and not using it as a weapon against those who critique our government.
And so I don’t worry about it coming back because there was nothing there in the first place. And our my attorney did an excellent job. And I’m happy that the current Justice Department is saying we’re not going to use our Justice Department to go after Americans.
More innocent Americans were investigated, brought in, went after, for reasons that you cannot beyond. I think within the next few months, a lot of this is going to be revealed because Americans did not realize what was happening in their Justice Department. J.R., I’m going through a tunnel. If I lose you, I’m going to call you back when I get through. But I’m going to a tunnel right now.
Giddings: Okay. Alright. Quickly, Donnatella, Rabbi Cohen, come in for a minute, please. We have a mayor here and I’m going to give you a chance to ask him a quick question before I come back. Go ahead, Donnatella, ask Mayor Adams your question. And rabbi, Donnatella, please be brief.
Donnatella Craig: Hi, Mayor Eric Adams. As you know, I’m a fan of your administration and all you have done for our small businesses in terms of funding the recent $85 million in loans that are available. My question to you is, what do you—
[Crosstalk.]
Craig: Well, my question is, what do you suggest in terms of things that you can do to help people understand the integrity that you have for our city, even with the things that are being said overall?
Mayor Adams: You know, it’s what we’re doing. That’s a great question. It’s getting on the ground. It is clear that there’s a great level of distortion that’s coming from legacy media, particularly print. You know, we want balanced reporting. And I take my hat off to what The New York Post, what they do. They criticize us when we do things that they don’t agree with, but they write true stories on the success that we have.
And this unbalanced reporting with many of these print medias and online media, if you go do a review, you won’t see any of the success. You wouldn’t know that we have more jobs in the city history. We dropped unemployment, 33 percent to M/WBE, dropped the cost of childcare. The refusal of getting our message out, many New Yorkers get this source of information from them. So we now have to go on the ground and tell our houses of worship and tell the local communication networks to say, let’s report the real story of the success of the turnaround of the city. We turn around the city through COVID, through the migrant asylum seeker crisis, through the crime crisis. This has been a successful administration, but you would not know that based on what you’re reading.
Craig: Very true. And one last thing.
Giddings: Donnatella, we got to get the rabbi.
[Crosstalk.]
Craig: It was just a statement. The Amarachi family wanted me to extend their gratitude in saying that you’re doing a wonderful job for our city as well.
Giddings: Rabbi, where’s Dr. Giddings? There are a lot of questions that are coming in.
Mayor Adams: And again, J.R., if I lose you, I’ll pick you back up when I get through the tunnel.
Rabbi Eli Cohen: In the meantime, we’re hearing you very well, mayor. First of all, Reuven Lipkind, you mentioned his passing. I know you worked for Jesse in the senatorial office. He was a good friend and an honor who’s still very active in the city. We work with her closely and our heart goes out to her.
Just very quickly, I watched your news conference on Monday, and I love that line about you can’t be so idealistic that you’re not realistic. I thought that was a great line. Keep that in the press. That was on the crime issue and some crazy ideas that are coming through the City Council right now that I think we really have to be vigilant to make sure that we don’t completely handcuff our police when they’re trying to keep us safe. The other thing that I wanted to talk about is the great accomplishment of the City of Yes. You’ve got something passed that’s going to completely change zoning in the city, and I think the people should hear about it.
Mayor Adams: No, it’s very important. Our city is divided by community boards. We have 59 of them. When you look at housing, 10 community boards were building more affordable housing than the other 49 combined. And what our City of Yes said, every community should build a little more housing.
We have a housing crisis where they are less than almost 1 percent vacancy rate. We need to build more. That’s what City of Yes is going to allow us to do. It’s going to allow us to partner with faith-based leaders so they can also build more. We have to do more housing. You can’t have a housing development where you may have 300, 400 units, but you have 25,000 people applying for that. We have a shortage. And so we were really pleased that we were able to get City of Yes over the finish line. Now every community in the city is going to build a little more housing, and we’re really pleased with it.
[Crosstalk.]
Dr. Shelleyanne Giddings: Good morning, mayor. Good to see you again. I don’t really have a question. I just want to say that everyone should believe in innocence until proven guilty, and you have a lot coming at you. I just want to know if you’re finding ways to manage your success and, you know, just take care of yourself.
Mayor Adams: I love that. And believe it or not, as I reflect on Black history, this is not a lot coming. A lot is getting up in the morning, sun up, sun down, picking cotton, being with people. That is a lot. And when I look over the history of our ancestors, this is nothing that I’m going through.
You know, my faith is strong. I see my being in this society. I’m doing all right. You know, Dr. told me, Eric, I needed you to drop 20 lbs. I’m supposed to be in there. I’m cooking my own food. [Inaudible.] The best thing to do is be rooted in your faith and take care of yourself first. That’s what I’m doing. My mother used to say, you got this. I got this.
[Crosstalk.]
Giddings: Two quick questions before you leave, Mayor Adams. Do you feel that all the noise around the federal case will hurt you in the June primary?
Mayor Adams: Well, I think that what I must do because of the uncertainty, the leaks, the misinformation all people had to endure, I have to get on the ground like I did when I first ran for office. I have to share my story and share my success.
Yes, there’s a lot of noise out there. I must do what I do well during campaigns, talk to people and let them know. Let’s be clear on this. Out of everyone that’s running, there’s only one person that has won the mayoralty, and that’s me. I know how to campaign. I know how to communicate to New Yorkers.
And so, when you think about it, and I want everyone out there that are listening, even those who say, you know what, I don’t agree with the mayor all the time. Think about what’s being done right now. Right now, you are seeing people attempting to usurp the powers of the voters. They couldn’t beat me at the voting booth. They want to beat me by using procedural issues to say, hey, voters, you didn’t know what you were doing. We want to get rid of your mayor that you voted for.
This is unimaginable when you think about it. This is democracy being challenged. We couldn’t beat Eric in 2021, so we’re going to continue to find ways to remove him of power. And you got people who are saying the president used the word king, and, you know, who does he think he is?
Well, hey, you got people acting like kings in the city that say they’re going to take away the power of the New York voting population. And so, yes, there’s going to be a lot of noise. There are going to be people who don’t announce, and they’re going to be able to go beyond scrutiny and question like I am, question every day. But that’s the nature of it. And I’m up for the challenge. I’m excited about being a mayor. This is the best job on the globe, and I’m going to continue to fight for New Yorkers every day.
Giddings: Okay, Jeff, quickly, one minute.
Jeff Dismuke: Yeah, well, it’s great to have you back again. You have been on this show since you were borough president, and I think that you have built so much admiration from all of us. Your story is compelling. And one of the things that I love about your story is I see you as a man of great empathy. And you have expressed that, and you have demonstrated it in your treatment with the immigrants. And so now at this moment, and you touched on it a while ago, the immigrant story and the strings of the agreement, as Homan put it, are attached to you with the immigrant story. Can you continue to treat them with the empathy that you have done so well up to this point and treat them fairly and give them the opportunities that they have come for?
Mayor Adams: Yeah, and that’s such a great question that you raised, because one must understand that the power of immigration is in the hands of the federal government, not cities, the federal government. And I had to do several things under the last few weeks.
As I dug into the laws, I spent months having my team update me on the laws, make sure that we know what the laws are. And there are three high points that we need to recognize. One is that we should never have city employees, the 300,000 employees. They should never interfere with the lawful execution of the actions of the federal government. [Audio drop.]
[Inaudible.]
Giddings: Thank you, mayor. Best of luck.
As we wrap up, can you hear me as we wrap up? What message would you like to share with New Yorkers? What message would you like to share with New Yorkers to regain their trust?
Mayor Adams: Well, folks, don’t allow the noise to get in the way of this. Our numbers show this administration. And I know there’s a lot of questions. And it was a good job. [Inaudible.] This is a democracy. [Inaudible.]
Giddings: Mayor Adams, the connection is poor. So I want to thank you for coming back to the reset talk show. And I know there are a lot more shows that we have to do. So thanks. Enjoy your day. And good luck.
Mayor Adams: Thank you very much. We’re ready for the campaign season. It’s time to reset. So I want to start resetting [inaudible].
Giddings: It is time to reset
Source:https://www.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor; midtowntribune.com