A federal judge said Wednesday that he would deliberate on whether to grant the Justice Department’s motion to dismiss Mayor Eric Adams’ federal corruption case after hearing arguments from both Adams’ attorney and a top DOJ official.
U.S. District Court Judge Dale Ho put both acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove and Adams’ criminal defense attorney, Alex Spiro, through a bevy of questions during a Wednesday afternoon hearing in Manhattan federal court aimed at assessing why the charges are being dropped.
The hearing took roughly 90 minutes to complete. Afterward, Mayor Adams moved quickly out of the courthouse and back into a waiting vehicle without taking questions from reporters.
Ho taking additional time before making a decision complicates matters for both Gov. Kathy Hochul and other top New York Democrats as pressure mounts on them to remove Adams from office. Adams has faced a torrent of backlash from fellow elected, fearful that he is now in the thrall of Trump following the DOJ’s move to dismiss his case without prejudice, meaning it could resurrect the charges at any time.
Hochul held a parade of meetings with top city officials and political figures on Tuesday to discuss whether to remove Adams following the resignations of four deputy mayors on Monday. But Hochul and those she met with all said they would wait to see what Ho decided before making any further moves regarding Adams’ removal.
It also puts pressure on a city panel that could be formed to oust Adams from office, known as the Committee on Mayoral Inability. However, there is disagreement about whether the mayor’s current predicament counts as something the committee can weigh in on.
Despite the turmoil at City Hall, Judge Ho maintained he would carefully examine all arguments presented on Wednesday and render a decision on his own schedule.
“I’m going to take everything said today under consideration,” Ho said during the hearing. “I’m not going to shoot from the hip right now on the bench.”
After assessing that Adams was mentally competent, Ho asked the mayor, who was under oath, if he understood the terms of the dismissal motion and that it was being sought “without prejudice,” meaning that the Justice Department could resurrect the case against him at any time. The mayor said he did.
Yet Adams has repeatedly claimed, including in a speech last week, that his case is over because the DOJ dropped the charges.
Bove made it clear that barring certain standard limitations, it is possible, at the “department’s discretion,” that the DOJ could bring back the charges at any time. He added that the motion to dismiss allows the Justice Department to keep investigating Adams if it wishes to.
Furthermore, the judge asked Adams, under oath, if he had agreed to the terms of the dismissal without being coerced into agreement, and that he did not engage in a quid pro quo. Adams said under oath, “not at all your honor.”
The mayor’s sworn comments contradict accusations by former acting Manhattan US Attorney Danielle Sassoon in a letter she sent to US Attorney General Pam Bondi last week, accusing both parties of engaging in a quid pro quo. Sassoon charged that Adams’ legal team and the DOJ traded his cooperation with Trump’s deportation agenda for dropping the charges against him.
Sassoon sent the letter after refusing to comply with Bove’s request to dismiss the case and resigning instead. Several other DOJ officials who were asked to write the dismissal motion also refused and resigned until one prosecutor finally volunteered to write it.
Spiro and DOJ officials have both fiercely disputed the accusation. Bove said Adams’ comments in court represented a “very clear record” that there was no quid pro quo.
However, after that point, the acting deputy AG also asserted that “even if there was a quid pro quo, there wouldn’t be a problem with the motion.”
Later in the hearing, Ho asked Bove to explain the main points of the DOJ’s Feb. 14 motion to dismiss the case last week. That followed a Feb. 10 memo authored by Bove in which he initially ordered Manhattan federal prosecutors to drop the charges.
Bove repeated that the motion to dismiss was based on the Trump Justice Department’s assertion that former Manhattan US Attorney Damian Williams appeared to bring the case for political reasons. He argued that Williams’ actions had an appearance of impropriety, which was in violation of Trump’s executive order, which was meant to tamp down on the “weaponization” of the DOJ.
Bove also told Judge Ho that the pending indictment prevented Adams from cooperating with Trump’s immigration crackdown, specifically because the mayor had certain security clearances revoked as a result of the case. He said it also prevented Adams from participating in certain task forces responsible for immigration enforcement and related to counterterrorism.
Spiro said Adams was stripped of his security clearances shortly after he was indicted in September on charges including bribery, soliciting foreign campaign donations, and wire fraud. Adams was accused of soliciting and accepting luxury travel benefits and illegal campaign contributions from Turkish nationals in exchange for expediting the opening of a Turkish consulate high-rise that failed fire inspections.
