‘I have been this racehorse that has been held back,’ says NYC mayor
Eric Adams (cropped, Mike Coppola/Getty Images)
New York City mayor Eric Adams will leave the Democratic primary and run for reelection as an independent, as internal tensions and a broader identity crisis roil the Democratic Party.
“Though I am still a Democrat, I am announcing that I will forgo the Democratic primary for mayor and appeal directly to all New Yorkers as an independent candidate in the general election,” Adams announced in a video Thursday morning. He argued that New York City needs “truly independent leadership, not leaders pulled at by the extremists on the far-left or the far-right.”
Adams had been weighing an independent bid for weeks, as his high-profile corruption case dragged on in court, sources close to him told the New York Post. A federal judge on Wednesday permanently dismissed Adams’s criminal case.
The mayor, who faced charges of bribery, wire fraud, and soliciting illegal campaign contributions, has repeatedly accused the Biden administration of bringing the charges against him in retaliation for his criticism of former president Joe Biden’s handling of the migrant crisis, according to the New York Times.
