Hochul appears open to removing Donald Trump’s sock puppet
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Murc had an interesting point in comments about when public officials resigning is an appropriate act of principle and when it’s just capitulation. Top executive officials with job protections resigning rather than continuing to fight Musk and Trump strikes me at least on its face to be the latter, although it would depend on the circumstances. Eric Adams’s deputies resigning en masse, on the other hand, was a smart move to put pressure on the governor who has the chance to end a completely unacceptable situation:
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Monday she will meet with “key leaders” to discuss removing embattled New York City Mayor Eric Adams from office.
As governor, Hochul has the power to remove Adams, and she has come under increasing pressure from fellow Democrats to exercise it amid Adams’ numerous scandals, including an alleged quid-pro-quo with the Justice Department to drop criminal charges against him in exchange for Adams aiding the Trump administration’s immigration policies.
“In the 235 years of New York State history, these powers have never been utilized to remove a duly-elected mayor; overturning the will of the voters is a serious step that should not be taken lightly,” Hochul wrote in a statement late Monday.
“That said, the alleged conduct at City Hall that has been reported over the past two weeks is troubling and cannot be ignored,” she said, adding she had summoned “key leaders” to her Manhattan office on Tuesday to discuss “the path forward, with the goal of ensuring stability for the City of New York.”
A legion of high-profile figures in New York politics have expressed doubt that Adams can continue as mayor or outright called for him to resign, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Hochul’s own Lieutenant Governor Antonio Delgado and New York City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams.
Four of Mayor Adams’ deputies resigned Monday over concerns that he is doing President Trump’s bidding.
To reiterate what I said when I first wrote about this, Hochul’s instinctive reluctance to use this power make sense. But this is a genuinely extreme set of facts — Adams making an explicit quid pro quo deal and the Trump administration not even moving to dismiss the charges with prejudice to ensure that the blackmail conspiracy is ongoing means that he is not in any meaningful sense the representative of the people of New York. If there was ever a justifiable case for using the governor’s authority here this is it.