NEW YORK – Mayor Eric Adams is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, federal program bribery and to receiving campaign contributions from foreign nationals, wire fraud and bribery in a federal indictment unsealed Thursday as part of a City Hall federal corruption investigation. The charges stem from an investigation by the Manhattan U.S.
attorney’s office that has scrutinized allegations that Turkey’s government funneled illegal donations into Adams’ 2021 campaign coffers. Earlier this month, it was revealed that probe is also looking at communications between Adams and the governments of five other foreign countries. New York City Mayor Eric Adams speaks during a news conference Thursday outside Gracie Mansion in New York.
Yuki Iwamura/Associated Press In the indictment, federal investigators described what they called a scheme that spanned “nearly a decade,” starting when Adams became Brooklyn borough president in 2014, that involved him seeking and accepting “improper valuable benefits, such as luxury international travel, including from wealthy foreign businesspeople and at least one Turkish government official seeking to gain influence over him.” They say Adams then proceeded to solicit and accept illegal straw donations from Turkish nationals and, once he became mayor, his “foreign-national benefactors sought to cash in on their corrupt relationships with him” by seeking and securing favors from him. Adams has kept this favor trading relation.