Democratic New York City Mayor Eric Adams said Wednesday that he has not personally asked President-elect Donald Trump for a pardon in connection to the federal indictment against him.
The Southern District of New York indicted Adams in September on five federal charges relating to allegations that he “sought and accepted improper valuable benefits” from wealthy foreign businesspeople and at least one Turkish government official for nearly a decade. The mayor told Fox News’ Martha MacCallum that he has not sought out a pardon from Trump after the president-elect said Tuesday that he is open to the idea of pardoning Adams.
“Have you asked for the president-elect to pardon you?” MacCallum asked.
“I did not ask him that and [in] our conversations, we’ve both expressed our love for [New York City] and the years he was in office, they were combative,” Adams said. “I’m working with [President Joe Biden] and his administration and I’m warring with him. I say that quote over and over again. And my attorney is an excellent attorney, he’s going to hand-do every avenue to pursue justice. I should not have been charged, no American should go through what I’m going through right now. This country believes in fairness and what I’m experiencing is not only a professional tragedy, it’s a personal tragedy.”
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Adams has been charged with “conspiracy to commit wire fraud, federal program bribery, and to receive campaign contributions by foreign nationals,” along with one count of wire fraud, two counts of solicitation of a contribution by a foreign national and one count of bribery.
A Turkish official who sent straw donations to Adams’ 2021 mayoral campaign allegedly gave the now-mayor free or discounted travel on a Turkish airline to several international locations in exchange for Adams agreeing to have a Turkish diplomatic outpost established in the city, according to the indictment. Adams allegedly failed to divulge the travel benefits on his financial disclosures.
Adams has maintained his innocence since being charged and has accused President Joe Biden’s administration of retaliating against him for criticizing their “broken immigration policies” in a Sept. 26 statement. The mayor criticized the administration for allegedly providing no relief to city officials as they have dealt with “overloaded” shelters, along with a rise in crime and homelessness across New York City as a result of the migrant surge.
Trump said during a Tuesday press conference at Mar-a-Lago that Adams has been “treated pretty unfairly” and stated that everyone in the room had “probably been upgraded on an airplane,” at some point.
The New York City mayor met with Tom Homan, who Trump appointed to serve as the upcoming border czar, on Thursday where they discussed the migrant crisis and agreed that all illegal immigrants with a criminal history should be deported.
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