Mayor Eric Adams marches during the New York City Labor Day Parade, on Saturday, September 6, 2025, in New York City. © Giada Papini Rampelotto/EuropaNewswire/ picture alliance
(New York, NY) – Mayor Eric Adams has announced he is ending his campaign for re-election, as we are just under a month away from Election Day in New York City. Adams – who previously faced federal charges alleging bribery and corruption – never gained much traction in his bid for another four years at City Hall. He entered office as a former cop who had campaigned on police reform – but now a left-leaning socialist lawmaker, Zohran Mamdani, is considered the front runner.
Adams announced the news in a video posted to social media:
video courtesy of the Mayor Adams Re-Election for NYC Mayor Campaign
As the news was breaking, 77 WABC owner-operator John Catsimatidis joined radio host/political consultant Dick Morris, and news director James Flippin, LIVE on air.
After serving in the police department for 20 years, Adams also served as a state lawmaker and eventually was elected borough president for Brooklyn. He parlayed that into a successful run for mayor, defeating Republican Curtis Sliwa in 2021. Now, Adams has announced he’s ending the re-election campaign, something that’s been rumored for weeks.
Polling consistently placed Adams in the single digits, leading many to argue he had no path to victory. The mayor has also been increasingly taking on an independent feel as a politician lately – and true to that end he was running as an Independent – specifically after cozying up to the Trump Administration earlier this year. Some argued that was a way for Adams to convince President Trump he was being unfairly targeted by a biased law enforcement system. Either way, it reportedly resulted in a greater level of collaboration between City Hall and ICE during deportation operations. Some more left-leaning New Yorkers likely failed to appreciate those efforts.
There have been reports in recent weeks that Adams has been in talks with members of the Trump Administration, potentially so as to more or less see the mayor drop his re-election bid in order to get a job. If Adams took a role with the Trump Administration he’d seemingly have to leave his role as mayor, effectively ending his re-election campaign.
The remaining candidates now jockeying for position include Democrat Zohran Mamdani, Independent Andrew Cuomo, and Republican-Independent Curtis Sliwa. Sliwa’s campaign released a statement following Adams’ dropping out: “Curtis Sliwa is the only candidate who can defeat Mamdani. Our team, our resources, and our funding are unmatched. Most importantly, we have the best solutions to help working people afford to stay in New York City and feel safe.” – Daniel Kurzyna, spokesperson, Sliwa For NYC Campaign.
For Adams, he joins one of his avowed mentors – the late David Dinkins – as a one term mayor. It’s also just the third time New York City has had a one-term mayor in the last 50 years. In 1973, Abraham Beame was elected amid the city’s financial crisis. And after the infamous “Ford To City: Drop Dead” newspaper cover, Ed Koch was elected in 1977 – bouncing Beame after just one term.
