Black Star Editorial
Photos: YouTube Screenshots\Wikimedia Commons
Eric Adams may now be headed to a new job created for him, by Donald Trump, as Adams announced the end of his scandal-plagued mayoralty in New York City.
Adams has caved to the pressure from wealthy donors, and likely to the money he will now receive from them. Or, perhaps, he was just holding out for the monetary deal he probably just schemed from these economic elites.
As Adams mayoralty recedes from memory (to an ignominious page in history) a particular adage comes to mind: “good riddance to bad rubbish.”
This is the sentiment many New Yorkers are no doubt now feeling—including Black New Yorkers, who were betrayed by this Judas mayor. The polling numbers tell us this as Adams fell, to last place, below third place challenger Curtis Sliwa.
Several months ago, a significant number of Blacks and Latinos were still supporting Adams. But as the serial scandals continued to mount this support started sinking faster than the proverbial Titanic.
During Adam’s announcement, that he was dropping out of the race, he griped about the “constant media speculation” and grumbled about the New York City’s financing board withholding funding from his reelection campaign—a decision that was no doubt linked to yet another scandal surrounding Adams.
It didn’t have to be this way.
Eric Adams entered Gracie Mansion at a time where, given the political temperature, he could have progressively advanced the agenda for regular New Yorkers, including Black people. But, this right-wing Republican, who dressed himself up in Democratic sheep clothing, clearly only cared about furthering his own petty interests.
One of the galling, laughable, claims Adams made was that his “campaign was for the underserved, the marginalized, the abandoned and betrayed by government.” What a crock of shit.
Where are the receipts to prove that he made the lives of “underserved” and “marginalized” New Yorkers better?
If this was really true, why did Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani’s message, about making the city affordable, resonate with so many including young Black New Yorkers? If Adams had fought for the “underserved” and “marginalized”, wouldn’t he be on his way to a second term, instead of dropping out in this humiliating fashion?
Here is a crucially relevant question: how are the lives of Black and Latinos any better as we wind down on this appalling Adams Administration which propelled austerity—while always finding more money to give to the NYPD?
A few days ago, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson made this statement: “I get so sick and tired of people believing that the only thing that Black and Brown and poor people get to get in this city are badges. People want jobs.”
Mayor Johnson is one hundred percent correct here. But all Adams pushed for was putting more police in Black neighborhoods. No serious strategy to infused economic empowerment into our cash-starved communities were considered by this co-opted Black tool of the NYPD.
Moreover, let’s keep this in mind, Adams entered office, in January 2022, after the COVID-19 pandemic had already done major damage by aggravating existing economic inequalities. Also, the world had just witnessed the horrific knee-lynching murder of George Floyd, in Minneapolis and New Yorkers, like many around America, protested their grievances voicing the need for police reform, within the NYPD.
Adams pretended that as a Black man, who was a police officer, that he understood how to foster positive change within the NYPD, on behalf of Black and Brown New Yorkers. But it was all a part of his conniving con-job to secure the votes of Black and Brown New Yorkers. And once Adams secured victory, he proceeded quickly to go to work for his NYPD massas, by making sure that while Blacks, Latinos, and the poor, got austerity cuts, his NYPD buddies got more money.
Is there any wonder then that Mamdani’s campaign message of affordability is having such resonance after Adams’ mayoralty of austerity?
In fact, Adams’ austerity policy, coming behind the ravages caused by COVID, including inflationary prices for everything, is a major reason why Zohran Mamdani is poised to again beat former Governor Andrew Cuomo—this time to be the next mayor of New York City.
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