Mayor Eric Adams said Wednesday that he believes he’s “leaving this city in good shape” when he wraps up his tenure at City Hall in December — but he issued a four-word warning to his eventual successor: “Don’t f**k it up.”
That choice-worded phrase, the mayor claimed, was something former Mayor Mike Bloomberg told him when he took office four years ago. This time around, with the sun setting on the Adams administration, he encouraged the man who would follow him into office not to backtrack on the progress made since then.
Hizzoner made the statement during an Oct. 1 press briefing at NYPD headquarters in Lower Manhattan, just days after abandoning his reelection run earlier this week. As he has often done, he said that he is leaving the city in far better condition than it was when he was inaugurated in 2022.
“I’m leaving this city in good shape,” Adams said. “More jobs than in the city’s history. Our children are outpacing the state in reading and math. We’ve built more housing. We’ve zoned the city to build 426,000 units of housing. We’ve made the city safer both above ground and below ground. You don’t see encampments along our highways and streets like you see in other cities.”
The mayor said he is not confident that what he characterized as his strong record of success will be upheld under his likely successor, Democratic nominee and frontrunner Zohran Mamdani.
Adams went on to list policy positions that he associates with Mamdani, without actually naming the democratic socialist Assembly member. Among them, Adams named Mamdani’s pledges to reduce the population on Rikers Island, disband the NYPD’s controversial Strategic Response Group, and eliminate its gang database.
“I am not confident that New Yorkers are going to continue [to see] the success that we have witnessed,” Adams warned. “When you talk about safety, you have to be very clear and very focused, and I don’t see that clarity.”
He also took aim at Mamdani’s economic agenda, which calls for raising taxes on millionaires and corporations to fund expanded public programs; as well as the lawmaker’s comments that billionaires shouldn’t exist and that “richer and whiter neighborhoods” should face tax hikes.
“If you don’t have a welcome matt for businesses so that we have employment; if you’re not willing to sit down with billionaires, who pay 50% of our taxes, those who are a million plus; when you talk about taxing white communities; all of these things are hurting what it takes to have a successful city,” Adams said.
A Mamdani spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Mamdani has met with dozens of the city’s business leaders since winning the Democratic primary and has expressed a willingness to maintain an open dialogue with them.
Adams dropped his independent reelection bid on Sunday after weeks of polling in last place, even trailing behind Republican Curtis Sliwa, who he soundly defeated in 2021.
Despite Adams’ claims of leading a successful administration, his campaign failed to gain much traction after his popularity sagged to historic lows. His high negatives in part resulted from his federal corruption indictment and the appearance that he made a deal with President Trump’s Justice Department to drop the case.
The mayor is reportedly seriously considering endorsing one of Mamdani’s rivals, either former Gov. Andrew Cuomo or Republican Curtis Sliwa. The New York Post reported on Wednesday that Adams is so against Mamdani being the next mayor that he is willing to throw his lot in with Cuomo, whom he dubbed a “snake and a liar” not even a month ago.
