2 weeks ago
23
New York|The Complicated Legacy of Eric Adams
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/23/nyregion/eric-adams-mayor-legacy.html
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Four years ago, Eric Adams stood in front of Brooklyn Borough Hall, flush with victory and promise, after emerging as the winner of a heated Democratic primary for mayor of New York City.
In a flash of swagger, he boldly pronounced that his brand of leadership would not only benefit the city, but the rest of the nation.
“I am the face of the new Democratic Party,” he told reporters, drawing cheers from civil servants as they headed to work. “I’m going to show America how to run a city.”
New Yorkers were largely rooting for Mr. Adams, the city’s second Black mayor and a charismatic cheerleader for the city after the dark days of the coronavirus pandemic. Even his progressive critics were hopeful that he would help working-class neighborhoods, like the one in Queens where he grew up.
Much of that good will has been squandered.
Mr. Adams, 65, will leave office at the end of this month after a single tumultuous term. He delivered on some campaign pledges, fell short on others and suffered the ignominy of becoming the first modern-era New York City mayor to be indicted.
There were achievements: the city’s economic recovery from the pandemic, fewer shootings, progress on affordable housing and moving trash off the curbs. His administration also navigated an influx of more than 200,000 immigrants from the southern border with little assistance from the federal government, and a city mandate to find them housing.
