Top Adams aide slams Council Speaker for booting members off budget team, re-igniting tensions in City Hall

First Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro went on the attack against City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams on Friday, charging that she “misused” her office by booting two council members off her budget team after they endorsed her mayor’s race rival Andrew Cuomo.

The first deputy mayor’s comments re-ignite tensions between himself and the speaker. The pair appeared to be trying to reconcile, following Mastro’s recent appointment as first deputy mayor, after the speaker effectively killed his nomination to be the city’s top attorney last year.

Mastro, in a Friday statement, accused the speaker of acting improperly by kicking Council Members Selvena Brooks-Powers (D-Queens) and Lynn Schulman (D-Queens) off her Budget Negotiating Team, a development first reported by the news site City & State on Thursday night. The move came after both members endorsed Cuomo, the former governor and current front-runner in this year’s Democratic mayoral primary in which the speaker is also participating.

Mastro framed the speaker removing two “experienced” council budget negotiators from her team as detrimental to the “extremely important” ongoing negotiations over the city’s Fiscal Year 2026 spending plan. The two sides of City Hall must pass a budget for the next fiscal year by a July 1 deadline.

“The speaker has misused her city position for her own personal interest,” Mastro said. “This is not the way responsible parties should be conducting themselves. It places politics ahead of process. The appearance of impropriety should have no place in these budget negotiations.”

City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams .Photo by Lloyd Mitchell

Mastro’s comments come after the council voted on Thursday to empower Speaker Adams to sue City Hall over potential violations of the city’s sanctuary laws. The council argues the action was necessary following Mastro signing an executive order, after Mayor Adams recused himself, allowing federal immigration authorities to operate on Rikers Island for the first time in over a decade.

Council spokesperson Mara Davis responded by accusing Mastro of trying to “distract” from the body taking action to block Mayor Adams’ administration from assisting with Trump’s immigration crackdown. The speaker has charged Adams made the move as part of a quid pro quo with the Trump administration to drop his criminal indictment — a request granted by a federal judge last week.

Davis also blasted Mastro for reportedly continuing to represent Madison Square Garden as a private attorney while holding the post of first deputy mayor.

“The council acted in unity this week to stop the Mayor and his Deputy from illegally handing City Hall’s power to the Trump administration,” Davis said in a statement. “If Randy Mastro wants to distract from that by turning the office of First Deputy Mayor into a political attack machine while representing special interests like MSG—that’s fine. We’re not backing down.”

Davis also took aim at the high amount of turnover in Mayor Adams’ administration over his nearly three and a half years in office. Mastro is Adams’ fourth first deputy mayor, he is on his fourth police comissioner, and third deputy mayor for public safety.

“We’ll pass on taking advice about Council matters from an administration already on its fourth round of deputy mayors,” she said.