Transcript: Mayor Adams Appears on School of Hard Knocks Podcast

July 4, 2025

[Teaser plays.]

James Dumoulin: You're 15 years old, you had been beaten by the police.

Mayor Adams: My brother and I got arrested for criminal trespassing. And the police officers that arrested us, they just said, you feel like a beatdown. They took us into the basement and they just kicked us repeatedly in our groins. We were urinating blood for like seven days.

Jack Dumoulin: You're the mayor of New York. How do you handle the pressure of running a city with 8.5 million people?

Mayor Adams: It is like every day you're waking up and you're drinking out of a fire hose.

Joshua Smith: Growing up, you were often on the brink of homelessness because you didn't know if you're gonna be evicted or not.

Mayor Adams: I learned that simple things matter. Just to have a house, a home, it's not just four walls. How do you go from being dyslexic, to arrested, to rejected? And now I'm elected to be the mayor of the most important city on the globe. I never stopped believing in myself.

James Dumoulin: What would your last message to the younger generation be?

[Interview Begins.]

James Dumoulin: What's going on everyone? And welcome back to the School of Hard Knocks podcast. I'm James, I'm here with Jack and Josh, and we have an incredible guest for you guys today. We're out in New York City with the man who is in charge of running the most powerful city in the entire world. Having to deal with a $100 million or a $100 billion budget.

Mayor Adams: $115 billion.

James Dumoulin: $115 billion budget, as well as being the global financial capital in the entire world, Mr. Mayor Adams. We're very happy to be here today. Thank you for being here.

Mayor Adams: Good to see you.

James Dumoulin: You know, I wanna kind of open these up today by going back to a time in your life, you know, you're 15 years old, you had been beaten by the police. And rather than turning your back on the system, you decided to embrace it and kind of almost take that pain and turn it into fuel and ultimately, you know, become a member of the system to change it, ultimately. You know, can you kind of talk to us about your thought process and how do you really process pain?

Mayor Adams: Yeah, no, no. And I love that. And matter of fact, I love the name of your podcast, School of Hard Knocks, you know, because I think it's important. It was an interesting time in my life. I was 15. I was struggling in school, undiagnosed dyslexia, and I didn't know it. And I just felt like, why was I going to school? And I just decided to spend time out of school.

I had a rough group of friends that, now that I think about it, they may have also had learning disabilities. And my brother and I got arrested for criminal trespassing and the police officers that arrested us for— it was no reason. We didn't run, nothing like that. They were processing the paperwork and they just said, you feel like a beat down. They took us into the basement and they just kicked us repeatedly in our groins and I was frustrated. We were urinating blood for like seven days.

And the feeling was, my spiritual leader, a man named Reverend Herbert Daughtry, he talked me into going into the Police Department. And it was just such a moment of, you have to turn pain into purpose. I don't care who you are. You know, my mother said that if you're fortunate enough to live long enough, you're going to experience pain. How do you turn pain into purpose? And that's what I did.

In order to get the pain out of me, I had to go inside the place where the pain came from. And it was the best decision that I made that he encouraged me to do. It changed my life. It allowed me to serve. And it also allowed me to fight for the policing that I thought was needed in our city.

Joshua Smith: Growing up, you were often on the brink of homelessness, even carrying your clothes on your back to school or when you were going out, because you didn't know if you're going to be evicted or dropped. What did that environment teach you about ambition and just being relentless?

Mayor Adams: Yes. And they used to call us the glad bag kids. That was the famous name for the glad plastic bags. My mom would have them line up at the door and she would have a change of underwear, a change of socks, t-shirts, some slacks, because she didn't want us not to have a change of clothing if the marshals came to throw us out. And we carried that around with us. And that housing insecurity was scary.

I used to turn the corner and I used to feel these butterflies in my stomach because I was saying, you know, [], are the marshals going to be there? The sheriff's going to be there? And it was such a relief just turning the corner and not seeing that truck. I remember a couple of times you turn the corner and you see a truck on the block or near the house and you're thinking to yourself as you walk into with your friends, you know what, this is going to be embarrassing.

But I learned that simple things matter. Just to have a house, you know, a home, it's not just four walls. And so when we had a housing plan that we develop more housing in individual years in the history of the city, I did it because I thought about that Eric Adams that was housing insecure and those who are living in homeless shelters, moving them from homeless shelters into permanent housing.

You know, we broke records on that because I brought that with me. I remembered what I felt like as a kid, but it taught me resiliency. It taught me compassion. It taught me don't ever look down on someone based on their circumstances, reach down and bring them up. And it just really fortified those hard times on how I had to give back to people in a real way.

Jack Dumoulin: You were a police officer for over 20 years. What made you decide to get into public service after your tenure as a police officer?

Mayor Adams: Oh, great question. He's an 11 year old child. I wish I could find that young man now. An 11 year old young man, arrested either two or three times in a week for armed robbery. And I used to do midnight tours of duty from 12 at night until eight in the morning. And I came in at the beginning of my tour and he was standing at the desk being processed. And he knew every four letter word you can ever think about.

He was cursing everyone out. They took him inside a juvenile room where they handcuffed him to a bar. I went in to see him. He cursed me out. He would spit at me and call me names. You know, you pig, you pig. And late in the night, around about 1:30, 2 a.m., I went in and I brought him snacks from the soda machine and I put it down and came back to ask him if he needed to go to the restroom. The snacks, he ate the snacks.

And then I sat down next to him and I said, you know, “Soldier, you've been arrested several times for armed robbery. What's going on?” He broke down and started crying. His dad was in jail on a homicide bid. His mother was on crack cocaine selling her body on the street. He was out of school for months and no one checked on him. He was 11 years old, raising himself. And I realized that I can't save him if I'm just arresting him. I have to do something else.

And I always thought about Archbishop Desmond Tutu's quote. “We spend a lifetime pulling people out of the river. No one goes upstream and prevents them from falling in the first place.” I had to go upstream. And upstream meant be the lawmaker, be the policymaker. I ran for state senate, ran for borough president, county executive. And then I ran to be the mayor of the City of New York. And now I'm doing upstream work, like dyslexia.

30 to 40 percent of the people who are in jail in our country have a learning disability like dyslexia. So now I'm going upstream and I'm testing them for dyslexia so I can give them the help they need and they won't go through what I went through. And those are what my policies are focused on.

James Dumoulin: Before we started the podcast, you mentioned that your ability to do geometry does not determine how successful you're gonna be in the real world, whether it's business or just life in general. But you said it's the ability to interact with and actually get along with people. It's all people in the business world. You know, they say it's not what you know, it's who you know.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

James Dumoulin: What are some things that you learned from being a police on the streets, having to interact with all walks of life to now, you know, at the height of your career, being the mayor of, you know, the most prominent city in the world. What have you learned about interacting with people, how to sell yourself to people and the best way to go about navigating, you know, that aspect of life?

Mayor Adams: Yeah, and, you know, here in New York, not only do you have to get along with people, you have to get along with people that's outside your comfort zone because I am socially awkward. I'm extremely shy. I don't feel comfortable around a lot of people. And so not only do I have to be around a lot of people, but I have to be around a lot of people with diversity.

This city is unbelievably diverse. You can walk into an Indonesian restaurant and have a Russian cook give you a recipe from his Cuban mom. That's how diverse we are. I mean, you got everything here. We have the most of just about every population, most Russian speakers, most Spanish speakers, most Chinese culture, most, most, most African-American. You go through the list, we're the most. And so you must be willing to interact.

And how do you do that? By being a deep listener. I'm a deep listener. I seek to understand so I can be understood. And I don't have to be right. And we learn from everyone. I don't bring the arrogancy, “Hey, I'm the mayor. You're a high school student or you are a elementary student. I can't learn from you.” No, the universe is changing. And all of us have different places, ways that we have observed that change in the universe. So it's no longer based on how long you've been on earth. It's based on the quality that you spent while you were on earth. And you can get that quality from anywhere.

Like I can learn from you how to have a successful podcast. I don't have a successful one. So if I'm arrogant to believe I can't learn from you, I'm gonna fall short. And what we failed in our country, our focus has always been on young people on how do you become academically intelligent instead of emotionally intelligent. Emotional intelligence would determine exactly what you're going to become in life.

Your attitude is your altitude. And if your attitude is a bad atmosphere, no one wants to be around you. No one is going to open doors. But if you have that right attitude, people want you to succeed. And that's what I found in my career. I'm not pretentious. I'm perfectly imperfect. You look in Webster's Dictionary and talk about the word imperfection, you're gonna see my bald head, earring wearing self standing there. I'm imperfect, but I'm dedicated. And that's all we have to do. And that's, I believe, that's my key to success.

James Dumoulin: It's safe to say our differences can make us stronger.

Mayor Adams: What is the— I'm sorry?

James Dumoulin: Like it's safe to say that our differences as individuals, as human beings, are ultimately gonna make us stronger.

Mayor Adams: Without a doubt, you know, if I walk into my various communities in that diversity, there's something in all those communities. I remember I was down in Alabama, where my family is from, and we were trying to move some hay across our barn. Across the yard, we have a lot, about 118 acres there, and the tractor broke down. And I hooked up the motorcycle to the wagon, and I drove it across. And when I finished, I say, I saw that in Thailand. They use something called tut-tuts because they don't have cars. That's how they move it across.

If you are trying to grow, and the persons that you are around look like you, sound like you, talk like you, eat the same food, listen to the same music, you're never gonna grow. You're going to be in this little silo. If you want to be a global leader, then the people around you must reflect the globe, and that's here in this city.

So, although we're a diverse city, people still live in silos, and they are missing the greatest opportunities. And I am outside the silos, and I'm learning from everyone. That diversity is our strength. That is how we solve global problems, by having a global mindset.

Joshua Smith: Something I love about you, Mayor Adams, is that you turned your pain into purpose. At 15, you said that you were beaten by police, and you decided, look, I'm not gonna try to change it from the outside. I'm gonna go inside and make a change myself. And when you went into the police force, one of your goals was to fix police injustice and reform it from the inside out. What was that first story where you realized, this is why I signed up?

Mayor Adams: Yes, I like that. And you're right. It was about, I wanted us to be safe. I saw what crime did in our community. I lost some good friends to violence, and I wanted us to be safe. It was a different time. It was during the crack era. A lot of violence was in the city. This was a different city.

It was a place where people were afraid. Parents used to put their children through routines of if you hear a gunshot, sometimes it could be a car backfire, you know to duck. There were drills that we were doing. And so I wanted us to be safe.

But, also, I wanted to fix and correct policing. I used to do courses on what to do when stopped by the police. There was a lot of misunderstanding. No one taught people, probably one of the most important encounters you could have is when you encounter a law enforcement person. No one was teaching young people in general, but specifically the city, on how you're supposed to react because both that police officer is afraid, and you may be afraid because of the interaction. So you should do classes on that.

And the moment when I realized, wow, this is the place for me, was when a parent came to me and told me about some of the courses we did that her young person, the son or daughter, was able to navigate an encounter or interaction with a police officer. I knew then that the work of being a police officer, I was saving lives, and I was building a better symbiotic relationship between the police and the community.

Jack Dumoulin: You're the mayor of New York, biggest city in the world. How do you handle the pressure of running a city with 8.5 million people?

Mayor Adams: 8.5 million people and 35 million opinions. Trust me when I tell you it's full. I cannot even tell you and properly express, I would do it an injustice to express the amount of income. It is like every day you're waking up and you're drinking out of a fire hose. It's so many places.

But when you look at that large volume of water, how do you control a large volume of water? You get a funnel. Then you control as it comes through. If you attempt to manage it all without controlling it, you'll be overwhelmed. I control it. I know what I must delegate to my team. I know what I must handle myself. And then I prioritize that in my day.

And then my day starts early. I'm up normally at 5 a.m. praying, meditating, exercising, doing a green smoothie, reading my papers, and then getting on with my day and it ends late. I'm a big person to boost. New York is known for its nightlife. This is the city that never sleeps, so I can't take a nap. I have to be focused.

It's a multi-billion dollar industry and I'm probably one of the first mayors that really focused on our nightlife industry. But, I know what I must control and what I need the team to control. And that is how I get through the day.

James Dumoulin: So how do you prioritize, like this is what I'm gonna go after today, this is what my week's gonna look like? Because like you said, there's thousands of things that are going on at the same time, right? At all times of day. What is your prioritization process kind of looks like that determines what you're gonna ultimately go after?

Mayor Adams: And that's a great question. Public safety is first. If it's something that's dealing with public safety that my police commissioner needs me to look in or make a big decision, because there's a lot of things happening with public safety now, particularly with some of the dangerous Venezuelan gangs, some of the terrorist threat that we're facing, the large number of protests we're seeing in the city. There's a lot of things that are happening in the city, so I make sure that it's managed. Are we doing everything we're supposed to do?

And then I look at how do we move the city forward in the areas of housing and employment. I look and see what we need to do with that. And then I have to deal with my international guests, because this is an international city. The UN is here, and there are many international leaders that come here that want to sit down and speak with me about what's happening in their countries, because often it impacts what happens here.

So it's a combination, but every day you are waking up to something new. And that goes back to your question about policing, because you could start your day as a police officer, and you could go somewhere, there's a missing child, and then you'll handle that, and an hour later you're dealing with a homicide, an hour later you're dealing with someone that committed suicide or a plane crashing on the Hudson.

So in one day, you could have all of these experiences, but you learn over time, your mental muscle allows you over time to manage all of those things. So by the time I became mayor, not only did I have to manage all those things, but I was the captain that had to supervise those who had to manage all those things.

And so now when I walk into City Hall, and all the things that are going on, my muscle memory is already in place. Just manage as it comes, and you build these systems internally that prepared you for this job.

Joshua Smith: As a mayor, not only are you managing millions of people, but you're also managing millions of opinions. And one of the things that you have to do is you have to make tough decisions. And not every decision you will make is gonna be able to please everybody. And so when you have a tough decision to make, whether that's about budget cuts or immigration, what goes into your thought process, and what kind of goes into your mind when making those decisions?

Mayor Adams: You are so right. Like I said, 8.5 million people, 35 million opinions, and you have to make unpopular decisions. And if you're going to base it by doing a Gallup poll to see where the opinions are, you're never gonna make the right decision. You have to do it from your heart, you have to be sincere, and you have to do it from a good place.

And I always reflect on an exercise that I say to myself as a Christian, what would Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John do? You know, how would they handle this? How would they handle homelessness? How would they handle if someone is a victim of a crime? How would they handle if someone is unemployed? I try to come from a Christian foundation, and my beliefs and my faith is strong and is real.

And I think from that place, you don't look back and regret. You're not gonna get it all right, I'm telling you. There are days that I just said, [], I wish I would have stayed in bed. And there are days I said, I wish I would have gotten up earlier. So there are good days, there are bad days, you don't get it right. And don't expect to get it right. I don't want to bat .400. I want to be able to bat a good .300 with men on base. Then I'm happy.

Jack Dumoulin: If you're batting .300, you're in the Hall of Fame. You know, we talked about this a little bit before we hopped on the podcast, and most school systems, especially in America, don't teach things such as financial literacy, entrepreneurship, success habits, how to work with your money in the real world, how to interact with people. But something that you enacted recently in New York City was that you want your schools to teach things like that.

What was your thought process implementing that? And where do you kind of see the impact of that going for the younger generation? Because that's something that we want to do with our channel and I'm really happy to see that in the schools. So I'm interested to hear, what was your decision to enact that and kind of what are the plans for it?

Mayor Adams: And that's good stuff, because you look at what will impact your life. You know, as I do look in my rear view mirror. Health, finance, and romance. Those would be the three major impacts to your life. And the beauty is, if you take care of the finances and your health, your romance is gonna fall in place, you know? But financial literacy, no one was teaching that.

My credit score when I graduated from high school and college, my credit score was terrible. And it's because I lived through the credit card syndrome and I was wearing my wealth. And if your wealth is on your body and not in your bank, then you're not really preparing yourself for the future. If you make the right decisions young, you could enjoy the discretionary spending later. And I was focused on that. To turn around my credit score, I was able to do so.

But far too many people go throughout their lives with terrible credit scores and you're paying more for everything because of your credit score. And I wanted to show my students how to invest, how to spend money, how to understand interest rates, how to understand how to save for buying a home, how to save for college. And we wanted to do that.

Then look into the new currency, cryptocurrency, Bitcoins. I want them to understand cyber wallets, digital assets, so they can be prepared on how to manage their money. That was very important to me. And it was not being taught. We were too focused throughout the years of just dealing with academics.

And you guys know, your podcast is successful not because you were good in geometry, you were good in how to interact with people. And that is where we must understand. I'd rather my son, when he graduated from American University, I always told Jordan, yes, get your good grades, but also be a good person that people love when you walk in the room and not cheer when you walk out.

James Dumoulin: And every dollar in the world flows through New York City. And you're overseeing a lot of that, the business that's going on. One thing that was fascinating you mentioned is that you took your first three paychecks in Bitcoin payment. What have you learned about the psychology of money?

Mayor Adams: Well, it's not how much you have, it's about common sense and not dollars and cents. Because you could have all the money you want, but if that money, you're not happy, then you are not going to enjoy it. So the goal is, wherever you are financially, to find peace within yourself. Because trust me, you look at Bernie Madoff, all the money he had, he was still hurting people.

You have millionaires and billionaires who commit suicide because they're in dark places and they're not happy. But if you learn no matter what you have to be at a place where you're happy, and that's why meditation is important. That's why breathing exercises are important. That is why taking moments of reflection and being around family, because as you move up and become more and more economically affluent, you should bring with you the attention you pay on making sure your bank account is strong. You have to have that same attention to making sure your body is strong.

When I say your body, I'm not only talking about your physical body, but the anatomy of your spirit. That needs to be healthy also because if you don't have a holistic approach to life, exercise, eat right, take care of your body, meditate, pray, reflection to take care of your mind and then take care of your economics. It all has to go together. If you don't have that trilogy, then you're never going to live the full life that you want to.

James Dumoulin: And if I'm correct, you like avoided being diabetic. And you went completely vegan.

Mayor Adams: Yes. I like to call it plant-based. The bulk of my diet is plant-based. I woke up and I couldn't see the alarm clock. I thought it was sleep in my eyes. And I went to the doctor. As you're going to find men, you got to drag us to the doctor. We just suck up the pain all the time.

And when I got to the doctor, I thought I was having a pain in my stomach. I thought it was colon cancer because a friend just died at that time from colon cancer. And when they checked my colon and my stomach, I had a small ulcer. But he said, your real problem is your diabetes. Your diabetes is out of control. You're going to lose your sight in a year.

This was many years ago. He said, you're going to lose some fingers and toes because I was having tingling in my fingers and toes. Diabetes is the number one cause of blindness, number one cause of non-trauma limb amputation, just a whole host of things. My whole body was breaking down. I looked fine, but I needed to take an internal selfie.

And I went and I learned from this doctor, Dr. Esselstyn and some other doctors, that it was about my food. When I changed my diet and went to a plant-based diet, my vision came back, my nerve damage went away, the ulcer went away. And I learned, people tell you that if your parents have these diseases, that you are going to have the disease. It's in your DNA. It was never my DNA, it was my dinner. And I changed my dinner and I changed my destiny.

Joshua Smith: Your life story is front and center on your leadership style. You don't shy away from your humble beginnings, but instead you embrace it and use that to inspire others. Why do you think that's so important for leaders to embrace by, or to inspire by example and really lead with their full story and really just embrace that?

Mayor Adams: Yeah, no, it's so important. What I've found in government that I dislike is that we try to pretend we are not who we are. And I just didn't want to do that. Sometimes I'll be out somewhere and I'll be smoking a cigar and drinking a glass of cognac and they say, well, you can't take a picture with that. I said, why? I smoke cigars and I drink cognac. If you don't hide who you are, you don't have to worry about someone looking over your shoulders.

I am who I am and I'm authentic about that. And people who are going to like you are going to like you based on who you are and not based on who you pretend to be. Because when you pretend to be something and then you’re exposed, now you have to go back and question it. And so if someone writes a story and say, “Hey, the guy drinks cognac,” I'm going to say, yes, I drink cognac. “Hey, the guy smokes cigars.” Yes, I smoke cigars. This is who I am. You don't have to sneak around. I'm going to tell you and I'm going to be transparent on who I am.

Now, does everyone like it? No, they don't. But like I said before, people who don't like you also don't like themselves. So why are you worried about people who don't like themselves if they like you or not? I like me. That's the most important thing. And my story says to others, where you are is not who you are.

If you're sitting in class right now struggling because you can't learn because you have a learning disability, you can now say, wait, my mayor has a learning disability. If you are in a homeless shelter, you can say, wait a minute, my mayor lived on the verge of homelessness. If you had a negative encounter with police and got arrested and you're sitting behind some jail cell somewhere, say, wait a minute, my mayor was in jail.

So a bend in the road is not the end of the road. You just got to make the turn. And I'm hoping when people see me, they say, “Wait a minute, this guy is not perfect. If he can go from where he was to where he is now, then I can do that.” And that's what I'm hoping people get the most out of my role as mayor, that you don't have to be perfect to be prosperous.

Jack Dumoulin: What would you say over the tenure of, whether it was in the police force and then taking public office, becoming mayor, the biggest city in the world, what would you say is your best leadership advice, especially when it comes to delegation? Like we talked about that a little bit earlier, how to delegate and things like that.

How would you give that to other young leaders that are coming up? Maybe they're starting companies, maybe they're in public office in today's world.

Mayor Adams: Yeah, you know, generals don't send their troops into battle and ask, how was the war? Generals lead their troops into battle. I'm gonna lead my troops into battle. You know, before I'm going to ask them to do something, I want them to see that I'm going to do it.

I'm going to pick up the broom and sweep up the garbage that's left on the street. I'm going to go in the subway system and talk to people who are homeless to see how challenging it is to talk them out. I'm gonna respond to that shooting, to look at the crime scene tape and hear the wailing voices of those who are the victims. I want to personalize and feel it so when I make policies or I send my troops into battle, I know what I'm sending them into.

And that is what I would say to young people who are moving into these leadership positions, lead your troops into battle, lead them into battle and be willing to be on the front line. And those are the words of great generals. I think about one of my favorite movies, Braveheart and Gladiators. There's a scene in Gladiator when he talks to his men and says, some of you are not going to come home. But he was the first one that was riding that horse into battle. And that's what we need nowadays.

Too many people are armchair generals and they don't have any soil on their uniform because they only bring it out for parades. When I'm finished with my role, I'm gonna have a lot of kinks and holes and scratches in my armor because I was on the field of battle. I fought like hell and I'm gonna be proud to put it up and hang it up and say I led my troops into battle.

James Dumoulin: I asked you about it earlier when we were outside about you're not afraid to work with both sides to get things done. But when you look at the general public's consensus of like, a concern that they have with a lot of public officials is that they don't get things done, especially at the federal level. And a lot of it's because they want to be very partisan and not work with the other side.

Why have you kind of embraced letting our differences kind of to the side, like let's work to get things done and how have you been able to make that happen?

Mayor Adams: Because I can sum that up in Joe, a 19 year old. He was my uncle. He died in Vietnam at 19, defending the country. He didn't agree with everything in the country. If you go back during that time, it was a difficult time, particularly for African Americans. But, when he put on that uniform, he only knew one thing, the American flag. It's the symbol that's important.

And so I'm a true blue Democrat, but I'm true blue collar. And I'm true red, white, and blue. And every time a president comes into office, it doesn't matter to me what party he's in. Once he's elected to office, he's representing the symbol of our strength. And if you desecrate that symbol, just because it wasn't the person you voted for, then you don't really love America. You love yourself.

I love America. And I'm unapologetic about that. No one is lining the borders to leave our country. They're lining the borders to come into our country. We have the best product going. No place like this country. And I believe clearly that no matter what happens, I can resuscitate the words over and over again. The rocket red glare gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.

And we've gone through some stuff, you know. Those bombs may burst in the air. The bombs may be the bombs of depression, the bombs of COVID, the bombs of race riots, the bombs of uncertainty. But when it's all said and done, that flag is still here. Greatest country on the globe.

And that is why, to me, I need to reach across the aisle. I need to reach in the same aisle. We need to do everything possible to do what's best for working class people in the city and working class people in the country because I feel the way goes New York goes America. If I get it right here, we're gonna get it right across the globe.

James Dumoulin: I love it. And we end these off with two super last quick questions. In one sentence, what would your last message to the younger generation be? One more guiding principle for the younger generation.

Mayor Adams: Be you. You're gonna find out throughout your journey, people are going to try to shape and mold you into who they want you to be. They're gonna attempt to tell you what you can do. Listen to the advice, but you make the ultimate decision. Be you. And reach for the sky.

You know, I know that's a metaphor that's used often, but you just have to really soak into a young man on the verge of homelessness, with dyslexia, who went through some hard times. How do you go from being dyslexic to arrested, to rejected, and now I'm elected to be the mayor of the most important city on the globe. I never stopped believing in myself.

Mother gave me something when I came home from being arrested. She gave me a sign that said impossible. And she said, “Baby, I want you to say the first letter first.” And I said, I. And she said, then you say this next letter. I said, M. She said, now say the word, possible. I am possible. I never forgot that. And I wanna tell them, put that impossible on the screen. Impossibility is for other people, but I want them to say, I am possible.

Jack Dumoulin: Our last question for you. If it's all said and done tomorrow, how do you wanna be remembered?

Mayor Adams: As a person that was compassionate, caring, and committed. And that he never quits, no matter what happens. Never quits, never give up, always fight on. I want that on my tombstone. He never quits.

James Dumoulin: You got amazing advice. This was a beautiful episode. Everybody watching, be sure to like and subscribe for amazing content every week, because we're going all over the world to bring you the most successful people, just like the mayor of New York City, Eric Adams.

We're gonna put all the links to your social channels below for everybody to follow you. Any other thing that they should know about coming up? Any elections, anything that's happening?

Mayor Adams: No, we have an election coming on. We're excited about that. But I tell people all the time, I look forward to re-election. But, I'm not going to judge myself on winning or losing. I'm judging myself on what God's plans are. As I said to you, I'm just telling young people, turn on your GPS, your God positioning satellite. Let go and let God.

James Dumoulin: I love that, let go and let God. Well, we appreciate you and everybody. We'll see you guys in the next video.

Mayor Adams: Thank you.

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