NYC Official Moves to Skirt Adams and Sue Trump Administration
As New York City Mayor Eric Adams cozies up to Donald Trump and his immigration henchman Tom Homan, Comptroller Brad Lander is working to stop the president and his minions from ransacking the city’s FEMA coffers — even if it means jumping over Adams’ head to get it done.
In a statement issued Friday, Lander wrote that New York City “cannot afford to waste any more time” in moving to recover $80 million in FEMA funds that Elon Musk and his so-called Department of Government Efficiency pushed to retrieve from the city earlier this week. Adams’ office says it has “engaged with the White House about recouping these funds,” but city officials are understandably wary given the mayor’s apparent supplication to the president.
“If the Mayor would prefer to spend his days advancing President Trump’s agenda instead of fighting for New Yorkers, then the Law Department must allow me to do so,” Lander wrote. “Today, I sent a letter urging the Law Department to immediately initiate legal action to secure the return of these funds from the federal government, and I am demanding that the Law Department confirm their intent to file suit, along with the anticipated filing date.” He added that if the city’s Law Department refuses to commit to moving forward with a lawsuit, “then for the sake of New Yorkers, they must authorize my Office to engage outside legal counsel to represent the City.”
Earlier this week, the Trump administration ordered FEMA to reclaim two grants totaling $80 million from the city of New York. The money had been allocated to the city in order to house undocumented migrants in hotels, many of which had been ferried to the city by Republican governors of border states as part of anti-immigration publicity stunts.
Musk — an unelected billionaire whom Trump is allowing to futz with federal spending, congressional allocation be damned — accused the city of using the funds to house migrants in “luxury” hotels and accommodations.
“This is money that the federal government previously disbursed for shelter and services and is now missing. This highway robbery of our funds directly out of our bank account is a betrayal of everyone who calls New York City home,” Lander said on Wednesday, adding that his office had not been notified that the funds were withdrawn from city accounts.
Lander clarified that the city had negotiated special rates with local hotels, and did not pay luxury pricing to house the immigrants. In a July report, the comptroller’s office wrote that “the City has opened emergency shelters for asylum seekers in several different types of spaces, including hotels, large tents, repurposed office, warehouse, and industrial spaces, religious institutions, and other public buildings,” noting that it “estimates that 77 percent of asylum seekers are sheltered in hotels, with the City leasing approximately 15,750 rooms across 157 hotels in New York City.”
The city can’t exactly count on Adams helping the cause.
Earlier this month, Trump’s Justice Department ordered New York prosecutors to drop a corruption case against Adams, claiming that the prosecution of the mayor would restrict his “ability to devote full attention and resources to the illegal immigration and violent crime that escalated under the policies of the prior Administration.” Danielle Sassoon, a federal prosecutor in New York whom the Trump administration recently appointed, resigned on Thursday over the order to drop the charges, writing in a scathing letter that she attended a meeting where Adams’ legal team “repeatedly urged what amounted to a quid pro quo, indicating that Adams would be in a position to assist with the Department’s enforcement priorities only if the indictment were dismissed.”
“Our Mayor’s freedom is in Donald Trump’s hands — any reasonable person can see how that impacts his decisions,” New York City Councilmember Erik Bottcher wrote Thursday on X. “Now that Trump has clawed back $80 million in federal migrant crisis funds, what will Adams do? This conflict of interest is unacceptable!”
Adams claimed on Fox News the following morning that he had not engaged in a “quid-pro-quo” with the Trump administration, although he was almost immediately undermined by Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, who threatened that if Adams “doesn’t come through” he’ll be “up his butt” about the “agreement we came to.”
With Adams’ ability to effectively counter the Trump administration in question, Lander says he has no choice but to take matters into his own hands. “Recovering these funds is imperative, and any action, or non-action, allowing the Trump administration to proceed without consequence would set a dangerous precedent and make our City a target for the next four years,” he wrote Friday.
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