2 days Ago By NY Daily News
NEW YORK — Mayor Adams offered a somewhat different response Tuesday to questions about the swirl of federal investigations touching his administration, letting the press know he’s growing weary of continuous updates. For the last several weeks, Adams and his maintained matter-of-factly they had received no indication he was the target of any of the federal investigations facing his administration. But on Tuesday afternoon — in his first weekly press conference since the chief counsel, Lisa Zornberg, — Adams offered a different take.
“Every week, I’m not going to have an annual, you know, advisory of what I’m classified in,” he said when asked whether he has been told he’s a target or a subject of any of the ensnaring top officials in his administration. “The investigation will take its course. It would be inappropriate for me to talk about an investigation.
” While several top administration officials have had their houses searched and phones seized, it still remains unclear whether Adams or anyone in his orbit are the targets of any investigations. The mayor has not been accused of wrongdoing. Prior to Tuesday, Zornberg and Adams affirmed several times they had no reason to believe the feds considered either the mayor or anyone in his administration targets of their probes.
“Investigators have not indicated to us the mayor or his staff are targets of any investigation,” Zornberg said in a statement on Sept. 5 after federal authorities of five top Adams administration officials, including NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban, who has . Asked by the Daily News at Tuesday’s briefing how his new response might be interpreted, Adams said: “You should interpret it any way you want.
I’m not going to keep having daily updates over and over and over again.” Sources have confirmed one of the federal investigations that came to light this month are looking at whether the younger brother of Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Phil Banks and Schools Chancellor David Banks engaged in involving unregistered lobbying and kickbacks on city contracts as well as whether any city officials played a part in such activities. The second probe that emerged this month is looking at whether ex-Commissioner Caban’s twin brother in the city for cash in exchange for police favors.
Federal prosecutors are separately investigating whether Adams’ 2021 campaign received illegal donations from Turkey’s government. No one has been charged to date in the inquiries. Tuesday’s press conference came after Zornberg resigned late Saturday, writing in a letter to the mayor she could “no longer effectively serve in my position.
” As by The News, Zornberg stepped down because Adams declined to follow her advice to fire several top aides, including senior public safety adviser Tim Pearson and Deputy Mayor Banks, who were among the officials who got their cell phones confiscated and homes raided by the feds this month. Adams didn’t deny that Zornberg left because he didn’t follow her advice, but said he won’t discuss “private conversations” he had with her. “There was only two people in that conversation: chief counsel and Eric Adams,” he said.
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