The 57-page indictment against Eric Adams (D) was released Thursday and contained a litany of serious allegations against the New York City mayor.
Adams has been indicted on a slew of federal charges relating to contributions to his 2021 campaign, “including from wealthy foreign businesspeople and at least one Turkish government official seeking to gain influence over him.”
Overall there are five district criminal counts in the Adams indictment including bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign donations that prosecutors said began when he was a top elected official in Brooklyn and continued after he became mayor.
The indictment alleges Adams defrauded the public matching funds program by submitting inflated donation figures boosted by the Turkish money and receiving eight times that amount in matching public funds.
“As Adams’s prominence and power grew, his foreign-national benefactors sought to cash in on their corrupt relationships with him, particularly when, in 2021, it became clear that Adams would become New York City’s mayor,” the indictment alleges.
A further page notes an Adams staffer deleted messaging apps during an FBI interview.
The counts are:
Count one: Conspiracy to commit wire fraud, federal program bribery and to receive contributions by foreign nationals
Count two: Wire fraud
Count three: Solicitation of a contribution by a foreign national
Count four: Solicitation of a contribution by a foreign national
Count five: Bribery
As Breitbart News reported, Adams has already responded to the indictment from a grand jury noting the charges against him would be “entirely false.”
“My fellow New Yorkers, it is now my belief that the federal government intends to charge me with crimes,” Adams said in a video. “If so, these charges will be entirely false, based on lies. But, they would not be surprising.”
Eric Adams Indictment Unsealed on Scribd
Adams is the first sitting mayor in the city’s history to face criminal charges.
The charges come after the mayor had his home raided by the FBI earlier this year, and multiple deputies‘ homes were searched earlier this month.
Further details are expected to be revealed at an 11:30 a.m. press conference coming just hours after his phone was seized by the FBI.
More to come…
