Transcript: Mayor Adams Appears on Newsmax's "Rob Schmitt Tonight"

May 16, 2025

Rob Schmitt: All right, welcome back. The NYPD making close to 80 arrests of these pro-Hamas agitators, these people that everyone hates at Columbia University in Manhattan this week. This comes after a library was taken over at the university during finals week recently. 

They went in, they knew what they were doing. They wanted to screw up as much as they could and damage as much of the learning process as they could and take over a library during finals week when the kids really got to study. 

It was about a year ago when Americans got to look at just how ugly the left had gotten when these protests started at these universities and here in New York City, Columbia was a flashpoint of pro-Hamas, pro-terror filth that this country had never really seen before. You see people screaming for the death of the Jews right in the middle of New York City. 

The mayor, Eric Adams, helping the Trump administration in its goal of ending this nonsense. It's been far too long of this. Earlier today Adams established a new Mayor's Office to Combat Antisemitism and the mayor joins us now to talk about that. Sir, it's good to have you on. 

Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you very much. 

Schmitt: I want to start there with the arrests made. I love to hear that there's repercussions for this and implications for these people. Tell me about, are they being charged? We're seeing them being taken away. Are they being charged? Is there going to be a punishment? Is there going to be enough to stop this nonsense before it destroys this university? 

Mayor Adams: Well, there are various arrests that stem from the action that was taken, going on to the library grounds, destruction of property, and so the Police Department is going to process the arrests and the district attorneys will make the determination of exactly what the charges will be brought to justice for. 

Schmitt: Are you worried about Alvin Bragg in a situation like this? 

Mayor Adams: You know, there are professional prosecutors who are on the scene and on the case. They understand that we have to allow students to go to school, attend school, not be harassed. 

And as you indicated at the top of this interview, we're talking about young people taking their finals. You know how much stress that could be on someone. And the last thing you want to deal with is outside or any agitator that's going to get in the way of that. 

Schmitt: I walked by the Roosevelt Hotel the other day. I mean, this is 45th and Madison. This is a fantastic area of the city. But as you know, that entire block has been like a slum for two years after what Biden did to this country. That hotel was used as a migrant hotel here in New York City. 

You are shutting this hotel down and it took you a while to get there. But you've made a decision that I think New Yorkers mostly love. What led you to make that decision finally now? 

Mayor Adams: Well, we want to be clear. There is not one neighborhood, when you state you have to house over 230,000 migrants and asylum seekers, no one is going to raise their hand and say, “Put it here, put it here.” We need to be clear on that. 

We were given that obligation. We were not in control of the buses coming in. We were not in control of being able to stop the buses, allowing people to have a job to pay for their own room and board. We were mandated by city rules to house, feed, clothes and educate 40,000 children. So we had to find locations that were not going to be disrupted, disruptive to our local neighborhoods and communities. 

And so we knew that we were able to cycle out almost over 80 percent of the people who were part of the migrant asylum seeker crisis. And now we're able to close down these locations. So it was a Herculean task. At one time, we were getting up to 4.000 people in a week. And so you could only imagine how challenging this was for our team. 

Schmitt: When they started letting people into this country and moving them around and pouring them into New York. How incredulous were you at the Biden administration at that moment? 

Mayor Adams: The impact on our city– this cost us seven point five billion dollars. Those are dollars that should go to the resources of our city. We were coming out of COVID. We had a lot of fiscal cliffs that were associated with COVID dollars that were no longer going to be around. And so this is going to have a long term impact. And that's what angered me when I communicated to the Biden administration. 

And so I'm pleased now that we see a securing of our borders. The numbers have gone down to a dismal number that was so important to us. And that's what we were calling for. And I'm happy that this administration is doing just that.

Schmitt: Yeah, it's  certainly getting better. And we know the borders. I mean, the borders, there's nothing coming across now. It's like the best numbers I've ever seen. 

I want to talk just more about the city here for a second. We've seen these Tren de Aragua cartel gang types. You know, they're fighting with your cops in New York City. I mean, you were a cop. We've got little Hispanic kids running around Times Square robbing people with guns at 15 years old. Is this going to end? Is the NYPD going to be able to remove this from this city? 

Mayor Adams: Well, and that's what collaboration is about. Many people– I wouldn't say many people, let me correct that. A numerical minority are stating that we should not collaborate with our federal partners. The overwhelming number of New York, almost 80 percent, they identify with the position that I have taken. 

You commit a dangerous crime in this city, once you serve your time and are convicted, you should be deported from the country. And we have been collaborating and coordinating with our federal partners. 

HSI has been amazing. The ICE team, they have been amazing. NYPD and all our law enforcement partners have been amazing on identifying these gangs. As you know, we did a 27 person takedown. These gangs were not only preying on innocent New Yorkers, long standing New Yorkers, they were preying on other immigrants, you know, taking their documents, forcing some women into prostitution. This was a dangerous group of people. And so those who think this is going to be a safe haven for gang members in this city, they are wrong.

Schmitt: I want to ask you this. You spoke out against the migrant crisis. You were one of the early ones to say that this is unsustainable. I was proud to see you do that as somebody that lives in this city. The plan, I thought, was very clear what they were doing. They were importing a lot of people into the country to shore up a future Democrat voting base and the big cities were going to have to suffer through the pain. 

It seemed fairly obvious to me that when you were hit with charges by the DOJ that that was political. I think that you agree with that. You made, then, a move, though, politically toward Trump. I want to ask why that happened.

Mayor Adams: Well, it was very clear that my position on what was happening with dangerous gangs and the overflow of migrants and asylum seekers in the city was the same. Pre-election, it was the same. And I've always told people, I challenged them to find what was I saying pre-election that I didn't say post-election. 

What I want to do and what I did is thank the president. While he was on the campaign trail, he pointed out the unfair treatment that I was experiencing from Biden's Department of Justice. And President Biden stated his Department of Justice became politicized. The president stated, I stated, and others stated it as well. And I'm consistent on that. And when I went to Washington, I thanked him while on the campaign trail. He was willing to do so. 

You know what many people don't realize? I did not meet the President Trump prior to that, no more than a simple interaction at an event from time to time. But he knew it was wrong and he spoke about that. And I thanked him for that.

Schmitt: And that Southern District in New York, it can be really ugly. We've talked to Devon Archer about what happened to him, you know, and there's politicization in that, in that office. You agree?

Mayor Adams: Yeah, and think about this. They said they were sovereign. Think about this. Americans need to really understand what that means when someone believes they are sovereign. They believe they don't respond to anyone. They don't have to report to the president. They don't have to report to voters. No one is sovereign in this country. We all have to report to someone. And just the thought of that is problematic.

Schmitt: I want to ask you this. When you were elected, I, you know, even though I'm a pretty conservative guy, I was actually very excited because de Blasio was such a disaster. And what I saw was a Black cop that could come in here and clean this city up and nobody could, could say anything to him. And I really believe that.

You came in right as it was really ugly in 2020, 2021, a lot of crime after George Floyd. But, you know, I will say, we're looking at the numbers here for the seven major felony offenses in New York. The crime numbers have not moved a lot in your four years. We haven't seen the relief that I thought we were going to get. And I want to ask you why you believe that is. 

Do you think that you have made mistakes in the way you've run the city? Is it, is it Alvin Bragg and these DAs that are not prosecuting? What, what explains to people at home that are thinking about voting for you because you're running as an independent in this election here in November and you're going to go up against Cuomo. That's a pretty tough guy to beat.

To those that watch this show here in New York, and we do have a lot of viewers here in New York. How do you explain that? And what moves can you make to clean this city up further if you get reelected?

Mayor Adams: And you're right. It's about cleaning up further and if you do a real analysis of the numbers, look at what we went through. You saw in 2018, 2019, we saw Raise the Age. This did not allow us to go after those repeated offenders of people who were younger but committing a lot of our violent acts. 

You also saw during that time, Andrew Cuomo's bail reform and how recidivism impacted us. And you saw continuously how our prosecutors were being hampered with discovery laws. So there were a host of laws, but then when you do an analysis, you did see the crime decrease from the horrendous numbers that we saw at the beginning of this administration.

In continuation, on our subway system. We have 4.6 million riders on our subway system a day, and yet we only have five felonies a day on that system. We want to get rid of those five, but we knew we had to clean up the individuals who were dealing with severe mental health issues, 21,000 guns, illegal guns removed off our streets. This quarter, we had the lowest number of shootings in recorded history, second lowest number of homicides. When we covered all of our jobs, we broke the record.

Schmitt: You agree, though, I hear what you're saying, but you agree, though, that as far as these serious felonies, there's still a lot of crime. I mean, I thought that the city would be making more progress there. Is there one thing you can point to that you'd like to change if you get another shot?

Mayor Adams: Oh, yeah, without a doubt. We want to continue to lean into quality of life, and that's why we started a 1,500 police officer team that's going after the quality of life– 

Schmitt: Broken windows? 

Mayor Adams: That's not the same concept of broken windows, because it's not about only giving out summonses or making arrests. It's about correcting conditions. That's the theme of policing, correcting conditions. And I really want us to understand it's a city of 8.5 million people, 8.5 million people, and a small number are repeat offenders. 

We had an officer shot about two weeks ago. The individual who shot that officer, those two individuals were arrested over 10 times. When you look at the individual who shot a grandmother two weeks ago, that individual, about three weeks ago, that individual just stabbed someone last year in a robbery. We have a small number of people that the criminal justice system has created a safe haven for them and allowed them to be repeated offenders.

Schmitt: Over and over and over again. You're exactly right about that. That's the biggest problem I think we have crime-wise. Mr. Mayor, thank you so much for taking the time and coming on the show. I know you're very busy. Thank you, sir. 

Mayor Adams: Thank you. Take care.