Transcript: Mayor Adams Appears on Smart Girl Dumb Questions Podcast

August 1, 2025

Nayeema Raza: I'm Nayeema Raza. This is Smart Girl Dumb Questions, and that is New York City Mayor Eric Adams. He's running for re-election in a local race that has captured the broader zeitgeist kind of like a Coldplay Jumbotron. These candidates have big personalities, divergent worldviews, and reputations that precede them. So as a New Yorker, I wanted to do a, wait, who's running for mayor series? Where I go beyond the headlines and the memes and what we think we know to understand the people in play. 

Today I'll talk to Eric Adams, and in future episodes I'll have on other candidates too. I'll ask them the questions we all want to know, pointedly and directly. Like I asked Mayor Adams, what is up with the whole Turkish Airlines thing? Is that still his favorite way to fly? If New Yorkers should trust him when it comes to Donald Trump. 

Why the city is so expensive, and why it feels less safe than the stats would tell us. Does he have a plan to fix that? Does he have a plan to fix dating in New York City too? Finally, we get into the dynamics of this race, and you'll find out if Eric Adams would rather be trapped in an elevator with Zohran Mamdani, Andrew Cuomo, or Curtis Sliwa. Here's my conversation with Mayor Eric Adams, taped on Thursday, July 24th. Thank you, Mayor Adams, for doing this.

Mayor Eric Adams: Great to be here.

Raza: You have called your job the second most important job. What's number one?

Mayor Adams: Being the president of the United States.

Raza: And then you think it's New York City. Not vice president, not secretary of state.

Mayor Adams: Actually, there are moments, I believe, for the individual person being mayor [that]  is more challenging than being president. 

Raza: Say more. 

Mayor Adams: Presidents are in a cocoon. They're surrounded by Secret Service. Their day is actually laid out. It's predictable. And a lot goes into it because of the security purposes. But mayors are on the ground. And people see you. They touch you. They feel you. Particularly if you are a mayor like me. Having the name of a nightlife mayor. 

Having the name of a mayor that's always hanging out with people in parks or what have you. I'm so visible. And I live being mayor. I'm not just going through the motion. I'm not in this bubble at City Hall. I opened Gracie Mansion up to all of these different ethnic groups and cultural groups. And so being there all the time. And New Yorkers are a different place. I tell people all the time, New Yorkers have five fingers. They love the middle one the most.

Raza: Yeah, I would say it's hard to be in a cocoon in New York City. 

Mayor Adams: Without a doubt. 

Raza: New Yorkers do not want to cocoon their mayor. 

Mayor Adams: No, no. 

Raza: You brought up being out all the time. You and I were both at Casa Cipriani this last Friday night. 

Mayor Adams: I didn't see you. 

Raza: I didn't want to interrupt you. 

Mayor Adams: Oh, man, you should have. 

Raza: I should have. So talk about being a nightlife mayor. You seem to take pride in this title. I think people level it as some kind of, you know–

Mayor Adams: Negative. 

Raza: We need a daytime mayor. What's nightlife mayor up to?

Mayor Adams: And that's what people miss. What I learned from policing, I did overnights as a police officer. I did 11 at night until like 8 in the morning. For several years. And what I learned is that New York is not a 9 to 5 city. There's a whole body of people who do day hours. They do these afternoons until 12 o'clock. And then this new group of people come. They sleep during the day. They're nocturnal. They're out overnight. 

And what has happened, mayors have never witnessed them. And so as this nightlife mayor, when I came into office, our nightlife industry was decimated. COVID. 

Raza: COVID, yeah. 

Mayor Adams: And people don't realize when you see that fancy Casa Cipriani, you're missing the fact that the cooks, the dishwashers, the waiters, the people who clean up after hours. And I knew I had to say this– 

Raza: But you weren't in the kitchen.

Mayor Adams: No, no, I actually go in the kitchen. When you go to these major establishments and you ask them, "You know, has the mayor been here?" And what happens when he comes in? He stops in the kitchen.

Raza: No, actually, the staff did tell me that you chatted [with] them.

Mayor Adams: Yeah, I've talked to them. And I knew I had to revitalize our nightlife. $30 billion industry. If I didn't get that industry back up and operating, working class people would have suffered. And so, you know, I took hits for it because people thought it was, okay, he just wanted to hang out and, you know, do X, Y, Z. No, it was part of my overall plan. I've got to revitalize my nightlife. I have to revitalize my business industry. I had to revitalize my 4 to 12s, as we call them. The whole city.

Raza: And now the city is? 

Mayor Adams: Humming. 

Raza: Humming. But you're still going because it's also fun. It's also fun.

Mayor Adams: You're meeting people. People want to see you. They want to see you out.

Raza: Are you a member of any of these clubs?

Mayor Adams: No, no, no. I have so many people that are members of different clubs. You come in as their guest. These are too expensive for me on my salary. You know what I mean? I'm a civil servant.

Raza: Yeah. But you, you know, every interview I hear with you starts with the story of, really, your first interaction with the cops and your teens. 

Mayor Adams: Yes. 

Raza: Being arrested. But also, you know, you were born in Brownsville. For people who don't know New York, that's one of the poorest parts of New York. 

Mayor Adams: Yes. 

Raza: You grew up in Jamaica, Queens. Single mother, right?

Mayor Adams: Yes. South Jamaica, Queens. And, you know, it broke my heart. I thought I was Jamaican because I grew up in Jamaica, Queens.

Raza: You did not think you were Jamaican.

Mayor Adams: Yes, I did. They say, "You're not Jamaican, Eric."

Raza: Different accent than Queens. 

Mayor Adams: Right, right. 

Raza: Different accent.

Mayor Adams: You know, people often look at, and I'm glad you asked that question, because people look at, okay, you're the mayor, second mayor of color, first person of color to be borough president, state senator, captain. That's my glory. And people don't realize sometimes, you know, they look at you, you're a big-time podcaster. That's your glory. You know, take a moment and dig into our stories. 

You know, my story is growing up and walking in the classroom and seeing "dumb student" written on the back of my chair and praying to God that I didn't have to read because of my undiagnosed dyslexia, and the students would mimic me throughout the day. Let's act like we're Eric reading and stumble over words. My story is my negative encounter with police officers living on the verge of homelessness. That's my story.

Raza: Just being in these fancy places and these fancy rooms, and I'm not judging you for it. I'm in them, too. I'm a big-time podcaster, as you said. I don't know about that. But does it change you? Like, does it make you part of the elite, or are you part of the group chat?

Mayor Adams: I think just the opposite. It is so important that you'd be surprised how people believe that they're not deserving of certain things, you know. And what I hope happens at the end of my tenure of being the mayor of the city, that people will look at me and say, "Wait a minute, you know, God made this perfectly imperfect person." I'm perfectly imperfect. 

And so the young person who's growing up dyslexic or with a learning disability, they say, "Wait a minute, the mayor had a learning disability." The young person on Rikers Island who felt that they hit the end of the road, it's just a bend in the road, he has to make the turn– I got re-baptized on Rikers Island. I went and sat next to the inmates and said, we're going to get re-baptized together. And so I want them to say, "Wait a minute, my mayor got arrested. My mayor lived on the verge of homelessness, lived in a domestic violence situation."

Raza: A lot of New Yorkers feel this city has become unaffordable, has become untenable, who sees the ceilings you're talking about. They don't think they're going to make it. They came here to make it. They don't think they're going to make it. 

All of these candidates, I mean, you know, by virtue of becoming mayor, becoming governor, you know, being able to run for this office, how should New Yorkers, working class New Yorkers, connect to these people? And do you feel like you are the mayor of all of the people or of the people who own the buildings?

Mayor Adams: Okay, and that's a great question because both matters. I want the person who drives the limousine to be able to afford to be in the city and a person who sits in the back of the limousine to understand their contribution. There's a financial ecosystem that we all need each other. 

If we don't have each other, we can't make it. If I don't have that billionaire to use their discretionary dollars to pay for nonprofits like the Robin Hood Foundation to put into our museums or do other projects, you look at the head of JPMorgan Chase, he and his wife, they have an amazing internship program.

Raza: Jamie Dimon. 

Mayor Adams: Jamie Dimon. So if you disconnect my discretionary dollars that are in the city and say, no, we don't need you here, people don't understand the economic ecosystem. We are connected, but I think what's important, because this is a great question you're asking, you're saying that people don't think they can make it here. That is untrue. 

Every day I'm hearing the stories of people. I came in with a dollar in my pocket and was a dishwasher, now owns a chain of restaurants. I came here as a person that didn't understand English. Now I'm running schools that teach English.

Raza: How much do you think a person needs to make it in New York? I know with the poverty line, the poverty line is something like $22,000 for a single person in New York. It's something like $45,000, I think, for a family of four. Well, what do you think people need to make it in New York and to make it in Manhattan? Dollar amount.

Mayor Adams: I'm loving these questions. I'm loving these questions. 

Raza: Thank you. 

Mayor Adams: I have friends who are making a half a million dollars a year and say, "I don't have enough." I have friends who make a million dollars a year and say, "Wow, I'm struggling." So really, what we must do as government and what we have done and the story has never been told what we've done in the city. 

When I go to town halls, when I do podcasts, speak to others, even my son, my son and I sat down and had dinner. Actually, it was breakfast, and I was sharing what we were doing. He said, "Dad, I didn't know that." I hear that all the time. People don't know that we put $30 billion back in the pockets of New Yorkers. We're paying off medical debt.

Raza: Yeah, you forgave medical debt for something like tens of thousands of New Yorkers.

Mayor Adams: But not only that, do you know low-income people in this city, because of what I did with Axe the Tax, they're paying no income tax anymore.

Raza: You have an opponent who's running against you on the subject of affordability. 

Mayor Adams: Right. 

Raza: But I really do want to get—we're going to get to this conversation to all those policies. 

Mayor Adams: I'm low-maintenance. 

Raza: Are you low-maintenance?

Mayor Adams: Yes, I am. 

Raza: I'm going to ask your team. 

Mayor Adams: I'm so easy, you know that?

Raza: No, but I want to ask you about these things and why you think people don't know. But before we get there, you have a candidate who's running against you. Zohran Mamdani, who's running on affordability. He's running on some idea of redistribution, which you're talking about, the billionaires, the limo drivers, the guy in the back. 

How do you look at that? Do you think that you're—actually, let me ask it this way. You did not run on the Democratic primary. If you had, and your supporters, who would put you as vote-ranked choice one, who do you think they would put as rank two?

Mayor Adams: Good question, because the party was so far left of me. You know, my mindset, I'm a pro-public safety, pro-business, pro-family person. And you can't—I don't check boxes. Like, I don't check, here's the box of what, you know, the left arm of the party believes is a good Democrat. Here's the box that the far right of the party believes. I just don't fall into that. My life experience doesn't allow me to just embrace, here's a list of rules. And that's what makes it difficult.

Raza: But you're out there talking to voters. You know your base, right? So do you think your base, you know, if they had to choose between the other two options— I know you're not going to drop out of it, as you said. But if they did, where do you—which way does it go, or how does it split up?

Mayor Adams: I think it has—there's a little piece of my base in many of the candidates, but not a lot. Same when I ran. When I ran in 2021, look at the talent that I was running against. And it was a different feeling. Maya Wiley was more left of me. 

Ray McGuire was just as moderate as I was. Shaun Donovan was moderate as well. And so my base, you know, is hard to really define. That's been a challenge for people. People want to put me in a box. And I can't be put in a box.

Raza: You don't have a sense of how it shakes out, like 80 percent would go this way.

Mayor Adams: I wouldn't have a clue where my number two, number three would go. Some people would probably just bullet vote. They would probably say, "Listen, we want to rock with Eric. We know Eric."

Raza: Write in. 

Mayor Adams: We know how he is. We're not going to go down the line and go with others, like people did before when I ran.

Raza: I usually ask my guests a [], marry, kill question. Are you familiar with that game?

Mayor Adams: No, tell me.

Raza: I'm not going to make you play that game, but I'll do a more PG version.

Mayor Adams: No, don't do no PG. I don't want PG. 

Raza: You don't want PG? 

Mayor Adams: No, no.

Raza: Well, I don't think you want to marry or kill. 

Mayor Adams: I love that. I love that. 

Raza: Let me ask you this. We're going to do tap, trade, and toss. It's Cuomo, Mamdani, or Sliwa. Who of your opponents would you tap to be part of your advisory, part of your administration in some future administration? Who would you trade to another city? You got to send them to Chicago. And who would you toss out of the race entirely?

Mayor Adams: Good Lord. I'm not going to be able to tap. I'm going to tell you that right now. I would definitely send Mamdani to Chicago. 

Raza: Mamdani to Chicago. 

Mayor Adams: I would send—Cuomo needs to just get out of the race altogether. And I darn sure won't tap Curtis. I would have to find maybe one of the cats in his house. I'll tap.

Raza: He's a different kind of cat.

Mayor Adams: Right.

Raza: Who would you rather be stuck in an elevator with of the three of them?

Mayor Adams: Probably Mamdani. We had dinner together. We had a good conversation. 

Raza: Oh, really? When did you have dinner?

Mayor Adams: I met him in Albany while he was in the assembly. And I was always interested in what Africa was like under Idi Amin and how Idi Amin purged many of the Indians who were there. And it always fascinated me when I read the stories growing up. And there was a movie about Idi Amin. 

Raza: Yeah, I remember that. 

Mayor Adams: And I learned that he was from Uganda and who his dad was. I said, "You know, I would love to have dinner with you and your dad and just, you know—"

Raza: So did Zohran bring his dad to dinner? 

Mayor Adams: Yeah, he did. His dad came. He came. We had a great conversation. You know, you could disagree without being disagreeable. You know, we just philosophically disagree. No, I think his policies are hurtful. I think they're not fully flushed out and they don't understand the ramification. 

But I'm not saying that I dislike a person. I get along with people. I like people. And I know we don't have to all agree. I don't agree with myself all the time. So how am I going to agree with someone else all the time? 

Raza: You don't agree with yourself? You don't agree with the past [inaudible].

Mayor Adams: Right.

Raza: This moment. Okay. That's interesting. Would you have a drink with Mamdani again?

Mayor Adams: Definitely.

Raza: Or sit down for dinner with him?

Mayor Adams: It would surprise you the types of people I sit in the room with. There's a guy named Hawk Newsome.

Raza: Okay.

Mayor Adams: He is from Black Lives Matter. Or he thinks he is. Hates me. He wakes up every morning and says, "How can I make Eric's life miserable?" And I enjoy talking to him.

Raza: Yeah. What would you ask Mamdani if you were to sit down with him?

Mayor Adams: I would love for him to pick apart his policies. 

Raza: So what don't you like about his policies?

Mayor Adams: It's not like because on paper they sound good. But growing up in South Jamaica, Queens, I remember clearly how people would come around and campaign with mom and they would promise things and they would never get them. 

People knew they were lying to us and we would still wake up the next day and say, "Mommy, didn't they say that we were all of a sudden not to eat this hard cheese anymore?" And so what his policies that he's doing, he's promising things he knows he can't deliver.

Raza: Can you be specific?

Mayor Adams: Yeah. Free buses. Which is one of his top priorities. It costs $3 billion. And he's saying that I'm going to get the $3 billion by raising taxes on our top 1 percent owners– earners in the city. Mayors don't raise taxes. Assemblymen raise taxes. He's an assemblyman. And the governor already said, I'm not signing off on that. So why are you running around and keep saying you're going to get free buses when you know you can't?

Raza: So you're not opposed to free buses. You're opposed to the promise of free buses when the hurdles to deliver them would be the state legislature and the- 

Mayor Adams: And mayors can't do that. And let's go even one step further. No, I'm not opposed to free buses. When he presented that to me at Gracie Mansion, I said, "Wow, that's a good idea. I'll support that and do a pilot in Albany."

Raza: People are getting stuck in this idea of, you know, obviously Mamdani runs as a democratic socialist.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Raza: Do you think he's a socialist?

Mayor Adams: Based on what he is, you know, expounding, based on what he's saying, that's his belief. And it is not up to me to say you're wrong for your belief. I hate when people tell me I'm wrong for my belief. That belief is not good for me, and it's not good for the city. You know, as you stated, that many people feel they can't make it here. 

They're not going to make it here by people saying, hey, let me just give you something. They're going to make it here the way your parents, my parents did. Grit. Hardworking. If someone would have just given me something, I would still be sitting there in school believing that, "Hey, I'm dyslexic, so I could never go any further." No. And I collect stories of New Yorkers, and I am blown away at the resiliency of New Yorkers.

Raza: It's funny to me because socialism gets thrown out a lot, but like a lot of these policies, you know, Bloomberg, who I would not call a socialist. Would you call him a socialist? 

Mayor Adams: No, I would not. 

Raza: Former mayor, Bloomberg. He wanted free crosstown buses. He campaigned on that in 2009. He did this grocery store fresh subsidy program that I think still runs today. You know, he did increase taxes on the wealthy at least a couple of times. 

Mayor Adams: Yes, he did. 

Raza: So I just always find that funny when that term gets lobbed around. And some of the things you did forgiving medical debt.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Raza: Axing taxes for the lowest income earners in New York City.

Mayor Adams: Giving people, subsidizing those who need help. We should always do that. But you should always maintain that pathway. You know, when I go to—I've been to Venezuela. I've been to Cuba. They still give out those ration books, and you walk into the grocery stores, and you're missing, you know, hey, we ran out for milk this week. And, you know, you're out of luck. 

So the goal is we never should take away the desire to move up. 

Raza: The capitalist instinct

Mayor Adams: Exactly. That's where we are. Let's, you know, don't apologize. We don't have to apologize for our way of life. We need to be compassionate capitalists. When you look at what affluent New Yorkers are doing for this city, the boards that they're on, the volunteers that they do, the foundations that they're part of. So, you know, we want to demonize. It's nice to demonize someone who earns $10 million a year. It's nice to demonize them. But without them, remove them from the equation. Take them out. Let's say all of a sudden.

Raza: Some of them have left. Some of them are going to Miami. 

Mayor Adams: Right. Some of them are fleeing. 

Raza: Connecticut, New Jersey, Florida.

Mayor Adams: So I don't want to divide our city. I don't want to say to billionaires, we don't want you here, because I know why we need them here. The money we make just on stock transfer taxes and bonuses, that actually impacts our budget.

Raza: You're famous for saying, you know, New York City is the Zagreb of America. 

Mayor Adams: That's right. 

Raza: The Istanbul of America. 

[Video Plays.] 

Raza: Do you ever think New York City could literally be the Havana of America or the Pyongyang of America?

Mayor Adams: Yes. 

Raza: Really? 

Mayor Adams: Because of the people. 

Raza: The socialism? 

Mayor Adams: No, the people. When I say New York City of America, I'm saying the people, because in New York we have the largest populations of people. We have the largest population of Dominicans outside of D.R. We have probably the second largest population of Chinese. We have the largest population of Haitians. So when I say that, I take the capital of those cities and say we're the largest here. That's what's great about this city.

Raza: But you don't think it's going to become Havana, Cuba, or Pyongyang because of the people, right? It could never become a socialist.

Mayor Adams: But here's the problem. The candidates break down into three groups.

Raza: Okay. Tell me how you see it.

Mayor Adams: Three of them don't have a record. One of them is running from their record. That's Andrew. I'm the only one on the record. That's why you can actually criticize and critique me. And so my concern is that we've come too far to go back. And when you look at some of these policies, they are going to take us back. 

You can't open Rikers Island and let out the inmates. So we have 7,400 inmates. You know how hard it is to get on Rikers Island because of bail reform that Andrew passed? And so now we're saying let's let them out. You know where they're going? They're going back to the communities that they preyed on. That's unfair to those communities.

Raza: It's funny. I think there is something about experience. You're talking about experience. Experience has been lauded as an asset. But these days in American politics, it feels like experience hurts you. People are like, I don't want more of the same thing. Look at Trump. People are like, I don't want the same incremental policy. I want some new person that isn't from the system. Do you feel like that hurts you, your experience?

Mayor Adams: Here's what hurts me and has hurt me. Our story has never been told. And so it's difficult for average New Yorkers to say I don't want more of this. But they don't even know what my this is. They don't know I paid off medical debt. If you walk down the street with a mic, you know how people check people on the street and say, "Hey, has the mayor paid off low-income medical debt?" No. "Has the mayor done universal child care for everyone they asked for and no one was able to do?" No. "Has the mayor built more housing in year one, year two, year three than de Blasio and Bloomberg?" They said no. People don't know my story.

Raza: Why don't they know it?

Mayor Adams: Well, I had a hostile media. You just go do an announcement. 

Raza: I'm part of that media. 

Mayor Adams: Here's a project to do. No, my podcasters, this long-form conversation has been a home run for me. I did 200 something podcasts when I ran for mayor. 

Raza: Now, I don't feel so special. 

Mayor Adams: But if you were to do an exercise, a classroom exercise. 

Raza: He's giving me homework. 

Mayor Adams: I'm going to flip through the paper for the last, don't even do for three years, just a year. I'm going to flip through the paper and see how this mayor has been covered. Did we talk about any of the good stuff that he has done? Or did we find a negative tint on whatever was done? I knew something was wrong on Dr. King's day when I was at Madison Square Garden. 

And they announced that I was there. And they gave me a standing ovation. And there was one drunk heckler that said, "F you, Eric Adams." That became the headline of the story. And I said right then to my team, I went back. I said, this is going to be a rough, you know, four years.

Raza: Well, what are you always saying? New Yorkers have five fingers, but their favorite one–

Mayor Adams: Is the middle one. First of all, our media, our reporters, not the media. Let me be honest. Our reporters are lefties.

Raza: But there's also, I mean, the media is not a monolith. No, no, without a doubt. There's a huge amount of information. People are getting their information from all kinds of places these days. They're going direct. I mean, TikTok, et cetera, look at that. I mean, you're doing it now in your campaign.

Mayor Adams: And we just started. We're going to amp up. City Hall has City Hall reporters. That's what a lot of people don't understand. I'm not talking about my editorial boards who have real level head, deep thinkers, and really go into the project. I'm talking about the people who are covering me. They're lefties. 

So they get happy whenever, if I don't do something they like about bike lanes, they enjoy it. We're going to rip them apart. So what you did, you're doing more pre-K seats in the history of it. Yeah, we're going to find one parent who's upset.

Raza: Don't you think they do that? I mean, that's kind of the job of journalists. 

Mayor Adams: I love that. I'm glad you asked that. 

Raza: I used to work at the New York Times, New York Magazine. I feel like our job is to report what's news, what's new. What do you think? 

Mayor Adams: I'm loving that you asked that question. There's not one mayor or elected official that says the media is unfair. That's it. But what I thought, and that was my biggest mistake, I said, they're going to hit me when I do something wrong. That's the nature of the beast. 

But you know what? When I settle 98 percent  of my union contracts with 98 percent ratification levels, when I build more housing than mayors in 20 years, when I pay off college tuition for foster care children, high-speed broadband for NYCHA residents, when I do all this stuff, they're going to at least have an article that, "Hey, the mayor just did X."

Raza: I think they have those articles, but no one clicks on them. 

Mayor Adams: No, they don't have them. 

Raza: No, they don't have them? 

Mayor Adams: They don't have them. 

Raza: But we're going to talk about all your policies because I want to get to that. Last question on Mamdani. I want to talk about the campaign and then get on to this. How do you make sense of the energy around Mamdani right now? What do you think that energy is? What does it reveal to you as a candidate? Do you learn anything from it? 

Mayor Adams: He was never a candidate. He was a social media influencer. He wasn't a candidate. When I ran and won in 2021, in my victory speech, I said social media does not win an election. People on social security win elections. That was flipped upside down. He did an amazing job this time that we're in. People don't read full body. They read headlines.

Raza: But he goes out. He meets with communities. He's doing the thing. I mean, isn't that what campaigning is and social media is just part of it?

Mayor Adams: But everybody went out and met with people. What made his name seem to be almost omnipresent? It was a well-run social media influence campaign.

Raza: And now you're trying to do that? Are you trying to do that now?

Mayor Adams: Here's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to utilize that mechanism that my experts are now assisting me with to get my story out. All I have to do is get my story out. All people need to know, "Hey, this is a mayor that can't be defined by the warfare he experienced, can't be defined by the narrative of saying he's anti-immigrant."

You know what's the most interesting part of this campaign? Tell me. All that I am has been hijacked. When you talk about a working-class mayor, you know, I wasn't born with a silver spoon. I was born with a wooden spoon and no food was on it. When you talk about a mayor that produced for working-class people, that's what I have done. 

So social media has successfully turned upside down who I was. And that's what happened in 2021 also. In 2021, people labeled me as pro-police reform. When all is police reform, that's what I cut my teeth on. But there was a whole narrative that "Eric doesn't want to do anything about police reform."

Raza: Sorry I thought you were anti-police reform.

Mayor Adams: Anti-police reform. Right. That was the whole narrative. And I would go to debates and I would say, wait a minute, what are we talking about here?

Raza: You feel misunderstood, mayor.

Mayor Adams: I don't know if misunderstood is the right term.

Raza: Misrepresented.

Mayor Adams: Yes, I like that better. 

Raza: You feel misrepresented. 

Mayor Adams: The beauty of campaigning is that you are allowed to use your resources to tell your story. Because remember when I ran in 2021?  I was losing to Andrew Yang by 13 points.

Raza: Andrew Yang, I forgot about Andrew Yang.

Mayor Adams: He was walking around with a tape measure, measuring the drapes. He said, you know, when I'm mayor, when I'm mayor. I was losing to Andrew Yang by Black men.

Raza: Wow, and he was in the bodegas. 

Mayor Adams: Right. 

Raza: Yeah, exactly.

Mayor Adams: He was saying, "Eric, we love you, but Andrew Yang is giving us $1,000 a month free. We don't love you that much." And so I had to get out and sell to them. Here's why what he was selling was bogus, and here's what I want to do. I'm going to cut unemployment. And we did by 30 percent.

Raza: I want to ask you about this narrative you think has been hijacked. I'm going to give you a chance to respond. Before we do that, very quick questions on one of the other people. So former Governor Andrew Cuomo, he lost the Democratic primaries, running as an independent. You said he called you and asked you to come to an agreement to come out of the race.

Mayor Adams: We both articulated our desires for [why] he wanted me out, I wanted him out, and we shared that.

Raza: And you guys had a phone call? Who called who?

Mayor Adams: I think I texted him, and then I called him and said, "Listen, Andrew, what are you doing? You lost by double digits."

Raza: This was after his video came out that he was rerunning?

Mayor Adams: No, this was before that. Before that.

Raza: And you were saying, okay, so you texted him.

Mayor Adams: You just lost. You spent $25 million. People heard your message, and they decided that they didn't want to go for it. And then he never wanted to be mayor. You have to campaign to be mayor. You can't come out and go to a Black church on Sunday and go eat fried chicken somewhere and all of a sudden act like you're campaigning. I mean, he took New Yorkers for granted, and it was unfortunate.

Raza: What did he say to you? What was the end of that call? What were the last five words of that phone call?

Mayor Adams: Listen, I feel like he could win. Everybody feels they could win. All nine of the candidates that won in the primary felt that they could win. Duh. But the fact that you lost, that's the fact. He lost.

Raza: Is that the last conversation you've had with him?

Mayor Adams: We probably exchanged texts from time to time. He complained about something I said. I complained about something he said. And I didn't want to go back and forth with Andrew. I said, "Listen, you're in the race. You're in the race. I'm going to run my race." 

When you start saying that failed leadership, when you start saying that the city is out of control, I'm like, "Whoa, what are you doing? You know?" Failed leadership is having 15,000 of our parents die in a nursing home. Failed leadership is spending $60 million on defending yourself for your lawsuit. 

I could go down a list of failed leadership, you know, from not– foreclosing psychiatric beds, and now we have people walking in our streets, et cetera.

Raza: Are you getting the—I mean, obviously, you've had these phone calls with the former governor, but are you getting pressure from donors directly to— 

Mayor Adams: Stay. 

Raza: To stay. 

Mayor Adams: Stay in the race. Yeah. Donors are telling me—and not only donors, I'm walking down the block, and people are saying, "Eric, don't you go anywhere. Stay in the race. Don't you go anywhere."

Raza: Do you think that's going to change closer to the fall as, like, if it's still this three-way race and people are—you know, especially in these rooms, like Casa Cipriani where we were both last Friday night, there's a fear in some parts of New York around— 

Mayor Adams: Yeah, the fear is real, but my fear is based on policies. I fear his policies, Andrew's, and I fear Mamdani's policies. But let me say this, because this is an important question that you're asking, that—remember, 9, 10 percent of voters voted. Ninety percent have yet to speak.

Raza: The primary turnout was incredible. It was close to the mayoral general turnout in 2021.

Mayor Adams: Because people slept on this election. Nine months ago, when I was telling people, Mamdani's going to win the primary, people were telling me, "Eric, what are you talking about?" 

Raza: Yeah, you called that. Okay, let me ask you a question. Let's move away from the race for a second. Just as a New Yorker, I have this, like, dumb question of, you know, this city—I love New York. I've lived in a lot of cities, London, wherever, but I love New York. I feel like such talented people all over the world, working hard, paying too much in rent to be here, and yet we are stepping over rats. 

We have trash in our streets. Things are expensive. Like, the city does smell like weed, although you are shutting down some of these illegal cannabis shops. Is this just a trade New Yorkers have to accept? I mean, for so long, I feel we walk around and we're just like, oh, this is New York.

Mayor Adams: No, I don't buy that. I don't buy that. And if we're honest in our analysis, because you have to use indicators to determine how well a city is moving, and it must be done based on an independent source. So, rat complaints are down. People told me I couldn't containerize garbage. It's impossible in New York to put garbage in containers and bins. Seventy five percent of our garbage is now in bins. And now we are going to reach 100 percent? They told me it was going to take me five years. I did it in three and a half years.

Raza: I walked by so many piles of trash bags. I'm just saying 25 percent.

Mayor Adams: People are now getting acclimated to the law to make sure it's done correctly. 

Raza: But these bins got bigger. These bins have to be half the size of the building. 

Mayor Adams: No, we are. We've done another project. The first order of business you have to do is have New Yorkers wrap their heads around we are now putting our garbage in bins. When I go to South America, Central America, Greece, you don't see garbage in plastic bags. They say plastic bags? What are you talking about? And so, our parks are cleaner. You're seeing more PEP workers and more park employees in what we're doing.

Raza: You've been in this job for a few years now. Why is it so hard to change this stuff? I feel like it feels like this is – I know you're saying things have changed. But, you know, we walk out of New York City right now. It's not going to smell like roses. Actually, we're on 28th Street. It might smell like roses. But, you know, probably it's not going to smell like that. Why is it so – what is the thing that is in the way of mayors doing the job?

Mayor Adams: I love that. I love that.

Raza: Is it Albany? Is it bureaucracy?

Mayor Adams: Bureaucracy is one, but at the same time, we first have to acknowledge where we were. And the way you determine how cities are doing is through a comparative analysis. Go look at L.A. Go look at San Francisco. Go look at Oakland. Over the weekends, 4th of July weekend, we had – 4th of July day, we had one shooting. Chicago had 50-something. 

So when you do an analysis of the complexities of running big cities with different languages and different cultures, you have to do a comparative and say, okay, let's see how well these cities are running and moving. And we're moving in the right direction. 

Record break decreases in crime. Broadway had the best 12 months in history. More jobs. We broke the record for jobs 11 times. One out of five of the small businesses started under this administration. So think about this for a moment because this is so important what you're asking. Okay, why don't we snap our fingers and we get to change for a moment? Because you know when I came in office, all my businesses were closed, and we had this thing called COVID. 

 Raza: Yes, I remember that. 

Mayor Adams: Nobody was coming back into their office. I had to manage us through that. And then as we managed us through that, out of nowhere I got 237,000 migrants and asylum seekers that came to our city. That cost me $7 billion. So I had to take money out of my budget that could have hired hundreds of more sanitation employees, that could have handled more rat cleanup. 

So all of that money that we would have normally used to put into services, we had to take because the federal government wouldn't give us the money that they should have given us to pay for these things.

Raza: Here's a question. If you're married to New York, because I feel like New York's kind of like your wife.

Mayor Adams: Yes, it is. She's a jealous mistress.

Raza: How is your relationship going right now? Do you say it's complicated? It's happily ever after? You need some therapy? What's the situation? 

Mayor Adams: With my marriage. 

Raza: With your marriage with New Yorkers?

Mayor Adams: Listen, I understand–

Raza: With your 8.3 million residents.

Mayor Adams: Exactly, with my 8.3 million shorties.

Raza: Yeah, exactly. What's the marriage like?

Mayor Adams: I know that relationships are ups and downs. I know that relationships go through good days. They go through bad days. They go through joyous moments. There's moments when you want to choke each other and there are moments that you want to hug each other. But at the foundation, I always say, what is the foundation of a relationship? 

Do you love the person you're in a relationship with? It's not a bumper sticker or T-shirt for me. I love New York. Listen, I wore a bulletproof vest for 22 years and I stood on street corners. I cried with family members who lost loved ones. I sat in hospitals when I was off duty after an incident that happened. I knocked on doors. I sat in living rooms. 

This is a city that I love. And so no matter the ups and downs, no matter when I walk by people and they say, "I hate you, Eric Adams." Or people say, "Oh, I love you. My mom loves you." Take a picture. No matter those emotions, I love this city. And we've come too far to go back. We can't go back.

Raza: I think, I'm not your couples therapist, but let me play one for a second. I think there's some trust issues right now with you and New Yorkers. And I want to let you address, you brought up the indictment. So I want to address that elephant in the room. Because a lot of rooms you go into, this comes up. I bring up that I'm interviewing Eric Adams, they say, "Oh, ask him about Turkish Airlines. Let's talk about what happened with the federal corruption charges." So talk about that.

Mayor Adams: Think about this for a moment. Many people didn't read the indictment. They heard the story, but they never read the indictment.

Raza: Indictments are not fun to read.

Mayor Adams: Right, right, right. So they really don't know the story. There are two aspects of the indictment.

Raza: But they read the emails, right? Like there was a lot of coverage of the correspondence and stuff like that.

Mayor Adams: Yeah, but look at the correspondence. The correspondence should have vindicated me. So there were two aspects of it, and I couldn't talk about it. I was so pissed that I couldn't talk about it while I was in the court because my attorney said, Eric, shut up.

Raza: Alex Spiro said—

Mayor Adams: Yes, shut up, Eric. There were two aspects of this indictment. One of the aspects of it was that I called the Fire Department commissioner and said, can you go do a building inspection because the president is coming here and you've got all of this darn bureaucracy that everybody complained on. 

I ran on the lack of having these building inspections. And I said to him, if you can't do it, let me know, and I'll manage their expectations.

Raza: This is the Turkish consulate building in New York for President Erdogan's visit?

Mayor Adams: And so what they said that, "Well, you have flown on Turkish airlines for years, paid, and when you flew, you asked for upgrades. When you go on official travel, it's alright for you to get those upgrades. But when you went on your personal travels, you should not have gotten those upgrades. And so we feel as though you were being bribed because one day you were going to call the fire commissioner, and so you were bribed for that, so we're going to charge you with bribery." Made no sense. Even legal experts that read it said, wait a minute, this is the sitting mayor of New York, and you indicted him on that? 

Now, what was the second aspect? We did hundreds of fundraisers, hundreds. A lot of volunteers. A lot of volunteers come out. Anyone that knows this, they know about this whole straw donor, what have you. It appears as though that a volunteer, not a staffer, not an employee, did something improper, and it appears as though to save her own rear, as they do all the time. I'm a former law enforcement officer. "Hey, if you tell something on him, we will let you go free." They never charged her. She was never charged. When the e-mails that you talked about showed she did something wrong, there was no e-mail showing that I did anything wrong.

Raza: The e-mails, there was correspondence about, oh, how much is their ticket going to be? It's going to be $500. There's some negotiation on that stuff. I mean, I think people read this. I want to get to the current situation, because there was a question of, like, was there quid pro quo on the Turkey question. And now the question is, was there a quid pro question mark with the dismissal of the case against you? So let's talk about that.

Mayor Adams: Let's peel that part back, and let's be honest about it. Let's be honest, people say, "Okay, was it a quid pro quo?" How much of that do you really believe had to do because it was Donald Trump?

Raza: Well, I mean, I don't speak for all New Yorkers. I will say this. I think that you were tough on immigration before. And I think that part of it–

Mayor Adams: Thank you. 

Raza: So I do recognize that you have been—

Mayor Adams: Not tough on immigration. 

Raza: Sorry, I should say, you were sounding the alarm on the migrant crisis in 2023. 

Mayor Adams: And I was tough on those who committed crime. 

Raza: Exactly.

Mayor Adams: I support immigration. 

Raza: Yes. And so we are going to get to that. But here, I want to quote. So Reverend L. Sharpton, friend of yours? 

Mayor Adams: Yes, yep, yep.

Raza: Ally of yours. He was quoted saying that he thinks the Trump people have compromised you and that you've put the city where we're hostage. This is a quote from earlier this year. I mean, New Yorkers–

Mayor Adams: When did he say that? Because there's more to that comment that he made. He was saying, don't put Eric in this position. His indictment should be dismissed with prejudice. It could never come back. And people cannot say, well, they're holding this over the mayor's head.

Raza: The Trump administration, when they dropped the charges, they wanted to drop it without prejudice. Without prejudice, right. Meaning they could have brought those charges again.

Mayor Adams: Right.

Raza: And the judge, the district court judge said, we're not going to do that. We're going to drop it with prejudice because otherwise it would create the appearance that you owe the president.

Mayor Adams: Without a doubt. But remember, even when they did, this was– 

Raza: But there was space between that. It was from February to April.

Mayor Adams: But this is going to be one of the most important chapters in my book. 

Raza: Do you have a book deal? 

Mayor Adams: Because the majority of times, overwhelming majority of times, when cases are dismissed on a federal level, they're dismissed without prejudice. This wasn't unique to Eric. So it wasn't like, "Oh, we're going to do this to hold it over Eric's head." No, it's dismissed without prejudice. So they always want to have the option, if something else comes up, that they can bring it up. But they made it unique for me. No one wanted to look at that's how they always do it.

Raza: So let me ask you straight. Do you feel that you owe Donald Trump something?

Mayor Adams: No.

Raza: A thank you card? 

Mayor Adams: A thank you. And let me tell you why I say a thank you. Those two incidents that I stated that the indictment was based on, I'm the sitting mayor of New York and that's what you're going to indict the sitting mayor of New York. Mind you, the prosecutor who indicted me, soon as he left office, he put up a website that looked like a campaign page, like he was running for office. So we're going to put a pin into that. 

But I didn't know Donald Trump. I lived in the city, but we never met. We never spoke. The first time I met Donald Trump was at the Alfred E. Smith dinner. 

Raza: So fall last year. 

Mayor Adams: Yes. While he was on the campaign trail, he was saying, "Look at what they're doing to that mayor in New York. It's wrong." I was saying this over and over again. So here you have a person that's acknowledging what they're doing to you is wrong. I was facing 33 years in prison. 33 years in prison. Millions of dollars in legal fees. 

So, if you were in my shoes and someone was saying that you knew you didn't do anything wrong and someone is saying this is wrong, what they're doing to her, you wouldn't say thank you?

Raza: You found an ally in Donald Trump.

Mayor Adams: No, but not only did I find an ally in Donald Trump, President Trump, I found it in President Biden. President Biden said the Justice Department under him was politicized. He pardoned his son.

Raza: Yeah, he made remarks that implied the politicization of his, yeah.

Mayor Adams: President Trump said the Justice Department was politicized. I said it.

Raza: I remember that New York Times headline you held up at a press conference.

Mayor Adams: And you know who else said it? Brian Benjamin, highest ranking African-American in the State of New York as lieutenant governor. They indicted him for receiving campaign contributions from someone associated to a nonprofit. The judge dismissed the case before it went to trial.

Raza: So talk about here and now because New Yorkers, I mean the worry would be, okay, the mayor is getting pressure and there's federal demands that are going to overwhelm New Yorkers' needs. So are you actually getting pressure? 

We know Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy is on the MTA complaining about the MTA, he doesn't like our congestion pricing in New York City. Donald Trump doesn't seem to like it either. You know, there's the ICE of it all. How many calls are you getting pressuring you to do something? And does your gratitude to Donald Trump, to President Trump, extend to helping him on these calls when you get them?

Mayor Adams: So let's peel this back for a moment because this is important. That's why I like these long-form conversations. Do you know that when the federal government does something that a city believes is inappropriate, unfair, you go to court and you sue? Do you know I have taken this administration to court more than any mayor in the country?

Raza: The Trump administration? 

Mayor Adams: Yes. More than any mayor in the country.

Raza: What are you taking them to court over? Can you rattle off a few things?

Mayor Adams: Yes. We took them to court when they went inside and took the young student that was following the process. We took them to court when they clawed back $80 million from our FEMA money. We took them to court for that. We took them to court when they took finances out of some of the health benefits. So there's a whole list you can see. 

Now, you'll never read that. That doesn't fit into the narrative because the narrative is Eric is under his thumb. Then what are the other mayors in the other cities? What thumb are they under if they're not going to court like me? That doesn't fit into the narrative of Eric is under the thumb. 

But, at the same time, when I needed the president for the city, they were getting ready to put a stop work order on a multi-billion dollar project we had in Sunset Park. It was a wind farm. 500,000 homes were going to receive electricity, 1,500 jobs. They would put a stop work order. I flew to Washington. I said, Mr. President, this is a union job. Can you please take another look at it? He lifted the stop work order and allowed the projects to go, and those union jobs are going to happen, and we're doing an environmentally important thing right now. 

But no one wants to look at that. They don't want to look at when I go to Washington and fight on behalf of the city. The governor goes to Washington to fight on behalf of the city. Others go. I'm the mayor of the largest city in America. I went to Washington 10 times under President Biden. I met with him twice.

Raza: So, in New York, I know you have taken, well before this administration, you called out the migrant crisis. Exactly. A lot of money. You see it as a crisis for our streets, for crime, et cetera. New York is, of course, a sanctuary city.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Raza: Will you go to Washington to fight on immigration if you disagree, or are you and Donald Trump actually aligned on how you see immigration as it comes to public safety?

Mayor Adams: Listen, he has his beliefs on immigration. I have mine. He doesn't support the concept of sanctuary cities. And that's not a law, by the way. It's a status.

Raza: Yes.

Mayor Adams: He doesn't support that. And I've made it clear of my support of sanctuary city and what it means. Because if someone from any country comes to New York and they walk in the store and buy a loaf of bread, they're paying those taxes. No one is saying, let me see your documentation so you don't have to pay taxes. 

Raza: Right. 

Mayor Adams: So, if you pay taxes, those taxes go to the delivery of goods and services. So, you have a right to send your children to school. You have a right to get health care, medical care when you need it. You have a right to call the police if you're a victim of a crime. I support that. I believe that. Because if children aren't in school, they can be victims of crime. If people wait in overcrowded emergency rooms, that's a problem.

Raza: So, you're going to hold that line for a long time.

Mayor Adams: Without a doubt. Without a doubt.

Raza: And when it comes to ICE going to Rikers, ICE going onto campuses to get students, how do you fall?

Mayor Adams: If they're not breaking the law– we don't coordinate with ICE on civil deportation. We don't. Period. Never have. Never will. That's what the law is. But if you are a dangerous gang in the city, like the Venezuelan gang we took down, Tren de Aragua and others, what people are missing, those dangerous gangs were preying on migrants and undocumented people. They were forcing women into prostitution. 

Everyone is wrapping their arms around these groups without realizing they're preying on immigrants. And so, when people say, well, ICE shouldn't be on Rikers with other agents to go after these guys, I disagree with that.

Raza: Okay. Let's talk about crime for a second. Before we do, do you think Donald Trump will endorse you? Because he said very flattering things about you, but he's also said it's good that Andrew Cuomo is in this race. He thinks he has a shot. Do you have a sense of how that shakes out?

Mayor Adams: No, but it's interesting when he said Andrew had a shot, no one had an issue with it. But when he said something nice about me, it led just about every headline. We've got to show the inconsistency. No one wants to acknowledge the inconsistency. So, when he said something nice about Cuomo, it was okay. But when he said something nice about me, it was a problem. We have to be honest about the inconsistency. 

One does not have to like me, but come on, we're intelligent enough to say, wait a minute, something's not right here. Why are we upset when he says something about Eric Adams, but we're not upset when he says something about Andrew Cuomo? That doesn't make you say, hmm.

Raza: Do you think that actually, though, an endorsement from Donald Trump would be good for any candidate, or would it be an ad for Mamdani?

Mayor Adams: Listen, I might— 

Raza: In New York City. 

Mayor Adams: My desire are working class New Yorkers, and all this other stuff is just noise and distractions. They want to pull you into—I feel like Al Pacino in The Godfather. Every time I get out, they want to pull me back in.

Raza: Which Godfather? One, two, three, all of them?

Mayor Adams: I think that was the last one. I love that. I love that docu-series, you know. If you allow this– when I ran for camp for 2021, they would come up with all of these real questions. I say stay focused, no distractions, and grind. 

All this stuff is to pull you off your game. I'm talking about working class people. I'm talking about how am I going to make sure they can remain in the city that I love and they love. All that other stuff– 

Raza: You're trying to save your marriage, to use the analogy. 

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Raza: Let's talk about crime. I really want to talk about crime. This is an important issue for me as a woman who loves walking home from places at one in the morning in New York City. You campaigned on public safety. Violent crime is down in your administration. But the city, the vibes, the vibes are not with you. 

The vibes feel unsafe. I mean, and, you know, some months ago I saw a woman hit on the street. A friend of mine, Canal Street Station, somebody threw a cup of urine on her at 5:30, 6 p.m. on a Thursday night. And then, you know, much more serious, we have people lit on fire or a woman lit on fire on the subway. We have shootings on the subway. What do you think is happening here?

Mayor Adams: Three things. Three things. One, severe mental health issues. Throwing urine in someone's face, pushing someone to the subway, those actions, people are dealing with severe mental health issues. We removed over 8,000 people off our subway system that should not be on the subway system because of that. Got a lot of pushback. 

We want involuntary removal where we can compel people to go in for service and stay longer so they can get the help that they need. I can't tell you how many times we have fought with the City Council, we have fought with Albany. Getting a lot of pushback to deal with the severe mental health issue, particularly since the psychiatric beds were closed by Cuomo. That's number one.

Raza: Okay.

Mayor Adams: Severe mental health issue.

Raza: Mental health.

Mayor Adams: Yes. Number two, random acts of violence. Nothing strikes us to the core more than random acts of violence. You're walking down the block, someone punches you for no reason at all, someone slashes you. Those random acts just cut to the core. And often there are people with severe mental health issues that are causing those acts. 

Number three, revolving door. You know, I cannot tell you the revolving door of criminal justice.

Raza: Oh, because this is bail reform. 

Mayor Adams: Yes. Andrew, state lawmakers passed these bail reform bills and they did other things that the public is not aware of such as Discovery Law. But these revolving doors, go look at who's committing these crimes. They got records of seven, eight, nine times. Yeah. And they're back on our streets.

Raza: I had a situation where I was, you know, I was grabbed by somebody on the street and I told a police officer. He said, look, you know, and I saw the guy. He was just there afterwards. And he said, "I can't even take him and he's going to be right back out here two days later with a grudge against you."

Mayor Adams: Yeah. That should not have happened. That wasn't appropriate by that police officer. Yeah. It's not his job to say what failed criminal justice legislative policies may be. That's not his job. His job is to do his job. He should have grabbed that person and brought him in. And if he comes back the next day, that's not up to him to decide. He needs to do his job. 

And so, but he's right in his assessment that we have 542, I think, people who are arrested for shoplifting that were arrested 7,600 times. Oh, wow. We're having people who are arrested for grand larceny, arrested 50, 60 times. Of those two guys that shot the Custom Border Patrol officer, they had long arrest sheets from stabbings, for robberies, for kidnapping.

Raza: Can you, these three things, mental health, the revolving door and the random acts of violence, what can you fix by the time, by the months you have left guaranteed in office? And what could you fix?

Mayor Adams: Well, we're already on the road to do so. And then when you add those three items with a fixation, if it bleeds, it leads, you know. If you're reading about madness on our subway system and you go downstairs and you hear somebody yelling and screaming, you're going to say, oh, my God, I'm not safe. I'm not safe. 

Raza: Yeah, it's Gotham. 

Mayor Adams: Right. But think about this. We have 4.6 million daily riders. We have five felonies a day on our system. Five. We want to get rid of all five. But look at what those police officers are doing.

Raza: How many misdemeanors do we have?

Mayor Adams: I don't know the exact total, but the serious crimes, someone pushing someone, that's a misdemeanor. Someone spitting on someone, that's a misdemeanor. You know, you could have misdemeanors, but those serious crimes were 4.6 million daily. I don't want to go to work riders. 

And so looking at those three things that you're talking about, we won some victories in Albany around severe mental health. We didn't get what we wanted, but it's going to take us closer. So we're taking more and more people off our system that are dealing with severe mental health. We are really going after the random acts of violence. 

Commissioner Tisch put something in place called the Q-teams, 1,500 officers that are focused on quality of life. Open drug use on our streets, abandoned vehicles, the wild scooter rides, things like that.

Raza: You obviously came up as a cop. You did this video that I love from 2011. 

Mayor Adams: Searching the room?

Raza: Searching the kid's room. 

[Video plays.]

Raza: I got to ask you, in your 20-plus years of working at the NYPD, is that correct? 

Mayor Adams: 22.

Raza: 22 years. Did you ever find a gun in a throw pillow?

Mayor Adams: No, but I heard about guns being in throw pillows.

Raza: Did you ever find drugs in a baby doll?

Mayor Adams: No, so it was an accumulation of all the stories that I heard. 

Raza: Really? 

Mayor Adams: It was an accumulation of people coming in, saying, holding the baby doll, throwing it on the desk where I was the sergeant or lieutenant. I said, what's this? They said, inside, we found crack cocaine. Or coming in with an automatic weapon and they vouchered a pillow that it was found in. So all of those things that I show are stories that I heard. 

Now, you have some communities that say, "Oh, you're violating the child's right. You shouldn't be doing that." Listen, inside your house, my mother used to tell me, boy, you don't have no rights in my house. You don't have rights when you get in your house. 

And people don't realize, you find a gun in someone's house, you find drugs in someone's house, the whole house is going. The kids are going to child protective custody. Mom and dad are going in. Grandma is going in. So you'd rather police your own home than allow the police to come in and do it.

Raza: Okay. I want to do—that was the main part of policy I wanted to focus on, crime. I want to do two lightning rounds. 

Mayor Adams: Yes, yes. I like lightning rounds.

Raza: Alright. So, the first, I'm going to do a policy lightning round.

Mayor Adams: Okay.

Raza: Okay. I know there's a lot to say. You've spoken about what you've done. But let's start with housing and affordability.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Raza: Dumbest thing that we do in housing policy right now. 

Mayor Adams: Takes too long. When you have a person in a low-income house, putting them in the apartment takes too long. Sometimes it could take up to a year. When you could have an immediate turnaround when it's non-affordable units. Takes too long.

Raza: Okay. Takes too long. Healthcare. You relieved medical debt for thousands of New Yorkers. Do you plan to do more of that?

Mayor Adams: Yes. And what we have done, revolutionary. Everyone told me we couldn't do it. We are connecting what we eat with what our diet. Everyone knows my diabetes journey changed my diet, was able to reverse my diabetes. 

Raza: You're vegan? 

Mayor Adams: Yes. It's not, plant-based, I like to call it. It's not your DNA. It's your dinner. We're now having plant-based food as a default menu in all of our hospitals. And it has been a success. And so we want to do that more. We want to be proactive in health, not reactive.

Raza: Got it. Okay. I want to talk about Israel and Palestine. Hard to do in a lightning round. But there's a lot of talk about Israel and this mayoral race. What role does the mayor actually have when it comes to the Middle East, to Israel and Palestine and the communities who support each of those communities?

Mayor Adams: Again, probably the only mayor that has visited Palestine. Visited Palestine and Israel. And I think that what plays out on the international stage, it plays out on our streets in New York. What we must do is make sure we bring people together, like what I do with my Breaking Bread, Building Bonds. 

We did 19,000 dinners, 10 people at the table from different walks of life, ethnicities, and they're doing something revolutionary. They're talking to each other. I don't think that we have to hate each other. We have to coexist in the city, and I've done it over and over again.

Raza: From my point of view, it's like two things. It's hate crimes, antisemitism, the Islamophobia, policing those, making sure that that doesn't happen. And the second is protests.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Raza: Protecting the rights of protesters and free speech for all New Yorkers. I taught a class at Columbia last term. Columbia students still feel the after effects, the shock of having NYPD on their campus, I think. I'm not speaking for Columbia students. This is what I've heard from some students. Were the cops there because you wanted them there or because donors wanted them there?

Mayor Adams: Here's why they were there. We cannot go on a college campus as the police unless we are invited. I would have gone on day one because you should not disrupt those who want to go to school for their education. I saw some of the videos, spitting at the Jewish students, harassing them, surrounding them. I saw those videos. I wouldn't want Jordan to go on a college campus. 

Raza: This is your son. 

Mayor Adams: My son, Jordan, to go on a college campus and people are calling him the N-word, surrounding him, threatening him, and him coming home and saying, "Dad, you're paying $80,000 a year and I cannot sit in my school?" No. 

If you want to protest, protest peacefully. You don't target students based on their ethnicity. I wouldn't want it to be done to a Black student. I saw what happened to the Asian students during COVID. It was wrong then and it was wrong for it to happen to the Jewish students. We went on because we were invited on when they broke into Hamilton Hall and it got out of control.

Raza: Do you feel like there's some Islamophobia around Mamdani's race right now?

Mayor Adams: Yes, there are people who are saying very hurtful and harmful things. Listen, there are people in New York who have hate in their heart. We can't lie about that. But look where I have been on this subject. When a young woman was attacked for wearing a hijab years ago, I went out and visited her and took the bus into Staten Island to say this can't happen. 

When someone put out a flyer saying kill a Muslim day, I walked the street with my Muslim brothers and sisters and said, this cannot happen in our city. And during 9/11, I was a police officer at the time. On Coney Island Avenue during 9/11, there were major sweeps in that community that young men were picked up. I went to 3rd Avenue and 30-something Street where the federal penitentiary is located and called for their release. I said, this is wrong what we're doing to these young men. 

So there's a history that just as I stood with Jewish brothers and sisters, Sikh community when they attacked, AAPI community. There's a history of me saying hate has no place in New York. 

Raza: Hard pivot, congestion pricing. Sean Duffy doesn't like it. Governor Hochul says she's going to keep it. Where does Mayor Adams stand?

Mayor Adams: I think we could have done it differently. I would love to have witnessed some more waivers for New Yorkers, but I don't control that. Many people don't realize that that's controlled by the MTA and the Governor's Office. 

I wish the mayor and the City Council would have mapped out that plan because these are our streets, but we are creatures of Albany. Albany is the big brother, and we have to listen to what Albany states.

Raza: But it sounds like you like congestion pricing with some tweaks.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Raza: Is that fair? Okay. Bikes. New York City cyclists are apparently getting 10 times more criminal summons in recent weeks. This is just reported by Gothamist. Are they dangerous? I kind of think an e-bike is going to kill me. Like an e-bike with some Chinese food. It's going to kill me.

Mayor Adams: That's funny. 

Raza: It's the last thing of my life. 

Mayor Adams: Listen, what happened after COVID, the use of our streets have changed. We did not have all the mopeds, the delivery foods, the bikes. It has changed. Now, we have to modify our streets to fit this new norm because it's going nowhere, and we need to do it right. Now, we removed over 100,000 illegal mopeds, dirt bikes, cars.

Raza: I know. You rode them over in that social media video.

Mayor Adams: That's right. 

Raza: Why didn't you donate them to somewhere else?

Mayor Adams: Because we don't want our streets. They're dangerous.

Raza: Some other faraway place. 

Mayor Adams: No one wanted them. Those batteries are dangerous. We don't want the explosion from the bootleg batteries. We wanted to make sure that they could never terrorize New Yorkers again.

Raza: Okay. Cannabis. You say the city can be the cannabis capital of the world. You've closed down how many illegal– 

Mayor Adams: 1,400. 

Raza: Is this like being the bouncer at your own block party?

Mayor Adams: No, not at all. When it comes down to cannabis, there are two areas that give me a great deal of concern. I talked about it at the debate when I was running in 2021. One, illegal shops. We don't know what's in the cannabis, spiked with things. I'm concerned about what's being sold. That's number one. 

Number two, our children are high all the time. You know, the science is clear. Early use of cannabis, teachers have told me all the time. They say, "Eric, these children are coming into school smelling like cannabis. They are high all the time, and they're self-medicating themselves." 

I'm really concerned about that. It impacts brain development. The science is clear. We need to have a real dividing line between sending a message out that cannabis is okay without the health problems that come with it.

Raza: Very quickly on schools, New York City's public schools as of this week are going to follow the cell phone ban in New York State, which is a new thing. You've also implemented meditation in schools, something that you do yourself. Can you talk about that?

Mayor Adams: You know, we often judge our children by how academically smart they are. We need to have indicators of their emotional intelligence and how they manage crises and manage stress. I think this generation, because of the influx and the incoming from social media and others, we're seeing increases suicidal ideations. We're seeing suicide cases, depression, how girls feel about themselves. 

We have to really start giving our children the tools they need to go inward and survive. I'm a breather. I do Wim Hof breathing. 

Raza: Wim Hof? 

Mayor Adams: Yes, Wim Hof, W-I-M-H-O-F. He has a whole breathing routine. As you know, I do also transcendental meditation.

Raza: Yes, the mayor and I were both at the Transcendental Meditation Gala in 2022.

Mayor Adams: We need self-healing. People are hurting, and hurt people hurt people.

Raza: Okay. Does meditation make the sirens go away?

Mayor Adams: What I'm finding, I was a big meditator until I transitioned into breathing.

Raza: Now you're breathing.

Mayor Adams: Yes, I enjoy breathing so much.

Raza: Does breathing make the headlines go away?

Mayor Adams: Yes, they do.

Raza: Got to breathe more. Okay, dating. New York is known as the worst place for women to date in the country. 

Mayor Adams: What? 

Raza: That's what they say. That's what they say. 

Mayor Adams: Who said that? 

Raza: People report it's a numbers issue. It's a Peter Pan issue, actually. You never got married. Do you have a policy to fix that?

Mayor Adams: Yes, go out more, nightlife. That's why I'm the nightlife mayor. New York is one of the top places. And the beauty of New York is the diversity of who you can choose. I see interracial couples, mixed marriages. No one is living within these barriers anymore. If you can't find a boo in New York, then it's you.

Raza: That's not going to help you get some voters in this situation. That's funny. I think that's fair. The problem is you get so many boos, you got to choose. That's the New York dating problem, actually. 

Okay, a different kind of rat. The war on rats. This is where I want to end this. How is the war on rats going, you said?

Mayor Adams: Good. Decreasing rat complaints and rat mitigation areas.

Raza: Okay, I got to ask you a story I heard. Somebody gave me a tip. I could never run this out. But apparently, decades ago, New York City had this rat birth control plan. You heard this story? 

Mayor Adams: Yes, yes, yes. 

Raza: Okay, I was told, and I do not know if this is true, but I was told that they wanted to use rat birth control. They had used it successfully in India. In Bombay, Mumbai, they had given curry-flavored birth controls. In Italy, they had given tomato and garlic-flavored birth controls to the rats. 

But this person told me that in New York City, the rats were too picky. They could not find a flavor that would get all the rats. Is this true, or is this just false?

Mayor Adams: That's probably an urban myth, urban legend. I know we're trying. We're exploring different things. The rat czar has been unbelievable. 

Raza: This is Kathleen Corradi. 

Mayor Adams: Yes, yes. She has been unbelievable, and, you know, she has performed beyond our expectations. She has rat schools to tell people what they need to do. I hate rats.

Raza: I do, too. By the way, I feel there are fewer of them, but there are still a lot.

Mayor Adams: They've got to go. And those guys have been around a long time. They're smart, you know. You try to trick them. I had a rat in my backyard one day, and I put out a trap, and he put something in his mouth and dropped the rock on the trap, and when it went off, he ate the food. And I swore that I can't contest it, but I swore he gave me the middle finger.

Raza: You've got to get these rats to respect you, mayor. Once you get them, are you going for the squirrels or the pigeons? What's next?

Mayor Adams: Love squirrels, love pigeons.

Raza: Okay, great. Last lightning round. These are five quick questions. Favorite vegan slice?

Mayor Adams: Pizza with vegan cheese.

Raza: Favorite slice of pizza in New York City?

Mayor Adams: There's a place in Williamsburg, I forgot the name of it, they do a great vegan pizza, but I make my own. I do a cauliflower crust pizza with vegan cheese, some tomatoes, some seasoning, and avocado, and it's the bomb diggity.

Raza: Avocado on your pizza? 

Mayor Adams: Yes. 

Raza: That's wild. I've never heard of that. That's like, okay. Favorite curry in the city?

Mayor Adams: Curry?

Raza: Yeah, you got a curry spot?

Mayor Adams: Oh, yeah, there's a couple of them. I go up to Uptown Veg, they have a nice little curry, mixed vegetables that I love. 

Raza: You love, okay. Favorite dim sum? You got a dim sum spot?

Mayor Adams: Not really. I'll bounce around.

Raza: You'll bounce around. Favorite members club? Zero Bond, Casa Chill?

Mayor Adams: Everybody says Zero, you know, I get in trouble if I say which one, so I'm just saying all of them. They're all popping up now.

Raza: There's so many coming. Yeah. Chez Margaux. I saw you at Chez Margaux the other day. I got to start saying hi to you when I see you at these places. 

Mayor Adams: Yeah, you got to do that.

Raza: Okay. I know you don't like free grocery stores, but how do you feel about free nightclubs?

Mayor Adams: If they let folks in, friend, we lost our nightclub industry. Remember, this was a city that never sleeps. We used to go to the Paradise Garage, the Warehouse, you know, so many great clubs. People like to go out and dance, you know, but they're coming back. They're coming back. 

To be able to hang out with your friends, celebrate an event, and just dance off all that stress, that's a great experience in New York. Okay.

Raza: Free entry for nightclubs. 

Mayor Adams: Yes. You know what— 

Raza: So that we can meet our boo. That's the policy that you need. 

Okay. Got to ask, favorite airline?

Mayor Adams: Oh, got to be, it's a combination. I love Turkey. I always say that. Turkish Airlines. I love their service, but I also, I'm a Delta guy as well. I love Delta.

Raza: Delta. Alright, okay. Thank you for being a good sport. 

I end every interview asking my guest a dumb question they have. Something that they have been like, they have been wanting to ask out loud, or maybe it's just they can't figure it out. Maybe it's if that rat gave you the middle finger, but do you have such a question, a question that you have that we could find out? 

Like Mark Cuban asked, why do people chew with their mouth open? Neil deGrasse Tyson was like, how do you get the cranes up there at the top of the building? Anything that plagues you?

Mayor Adams: Oh man, that's a hard one because anything that, you know, that I'm curious about, I go and explore. I am an explorer.

Raza: You go to dinner with Zohran Mamdani and his dad to find out.

Mayor Adams: That's right. You know, so that's a tough one. I'm like still in my why years, so I go explore wherever curiosity I may have.

Raza: Alright. Thank you so much, Mayor Adams. 

Mayor Adams: Thank you. A lot of fun. 

Raza: I really appreciate it. This was fun. 

Alright. I'm going to wait to debrief these conversations until we've had more of them, but I want to know what you think. So drop me a note at NaimaRaza101@ at gmail.com. 

Also, to the mayor's point, he did actually have a question that he asked out loud when he came into the room. And I think it's a question a lot of people have. I'll give it to you before the credits.

Mayor Adams: I always hear the term producers. What exactly do they do?

Raza: What do you do? 

Producer: Everything, I guess.

Mayor Adams: You coordinate everything?

Raza: They produce the product, the outcome. That's what they do. Really. I came up as a producer.

Mayor Adams: Love it. Love it. Love it.

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