Feds Allege Mayor Adams ‘Delivered’ When Bribed By Turkish Official in Bombshell Presser: ‘Grave Breach of the Public’s Trust’

Damian Williams, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, spoke to the press after indicting NYC Mayor Eric Adams on Thursday on five counts related to a campaign contribution scheme, bribery, and other crimes.

The FBI raided Gracie Mansion on Thursday morning and seized the mayor’s phone ahead of the indictment becoming public. Adams subsequently held a defiant press conference, in which he vowed to fight the charges.

Williams laid out in detail many of the gifts Adams allegedly received, including over a $100,000 in foreign travel from a Turkish official, who he later did favors for.

“Sometimes created fake paper trails to try to cover up the travel benefits he solicited and received. Let me give you one example,” Williams explained, adding:

Adams wrote emails to his staff suggesting he paid for his 2017 business class flights on the Turkish airline when, as we allege, he did not, those flights were worth a lot of money. Just one ticket alone cost more than $10,000. But months after taking the flights, Adams wrote an email to a staff member and told a staff member that he had left cash in her desk drawer and that she should send the money to the Turkish airline to pay for a trip he had already taken. As the indictment makes clear, that’s just a clumsy cover up.

Williams went on to detail what Adams did in exchange for the travel, alleging he abused his office to favors in exchange for the bribes.

“Now, just because Adams received benefits for free, that doesn’t mean that there weren’t strings attached. As we allege, a particular Turkish government official behind many of the benefits Adams sought and accepted gave Adams all these things to gain influence over him,” Williams continued, adding:

We allege that Adams knew that and took the benefits anyway. We allege that when the Turkish government official needed him, Adams also took corrupt official action in exchange for some of the luxury travel benefits. In 2021, the Turkish government official was trying to open a brand new high rise building in Manhattan that would house Turkey’s consulate.

There was significant time pressure because the Turkish official desperately needed the building to be open in time for a visit from Turkey’s president. This building was important to the Turkish official and it was important to Turkey. But the FDNY, as fire safety professionals, wouldn’t let the building open because the building hadn’t passed an inspection. And not just that, some of the people of FDNY thought the building had so many issues and defects that the building was not safe to occupy. So the Turkish official sent word to Adams that it was, quote, his turn, unquote, to support Turkey.

And as we allege, Adams delivered and pressured the fire department to let the building open. The FDNY professionals were convinced that they would lose their jobs if they didn’t back down. And so they did. They got out of the way and let the building open. The Turkish official got what he wanted.

Williams concluded by highlighting the gravity of what Adams allegedly did and how he took advantage of the voters who put him into office. “And as we explained in the indictment, just four days after Adams held up his end of the bargain, he went right back to soliciting more travel benefits from the Turkish airline. Now, I want to make three things crystal clear,” Williams said, concluding:

First, the conduct alleged in the indictment, the foreign money, the corporate money, the bribery, the years of concealment is a grave breach of the public’s trust.

Public office is a privilege. We allege that Mayor Adams abused that privilege and broke the law. Laws that are designed to ensure that officials like him serve the people not the highest bidder, not a foreign bidder, and certainly not a foreign power. These are bright red lines, and we allege that the mayor crossed them again and again for years. That is the only reason we are here today.

Second, this investigation continues. We continue to dig and we will hold more people accountable. And I encourage anyone with information to come forward and to do so before it is too late. And third, the Southern District of New York remains committed to rooting out corruption without fear or favor and without regard to partisan politics. We are not focused on the right or the left. We are focused only on right and wrong. That is our duty and we will fulfill it now.

Watch the clip above via ABC News.