The US justice department has told prosecutors to drop the corruption case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams.
Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove, who was appointed by President Donald Trump, instructed federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York to end the case.
He alleged the indictment might affect the upcoming mayoral election and said it had damaged Adams’ ability to address “illegal immigration and violent crime”.
Adams was accused of accepting illegal campaign funds and gifts from Turkish businessmen in exchange for his influence as mayor. He pleaded not guilty to five charges of bribery, conspiracy and campaign finance violations in September.
“You are directed, as authorizied by the Attorney General, to dismiss the pending charges,” Bove’s memo to prosecutors states.
It leaves open the opportunity for the case to be reviewed again after the November 2025 mayoral election, but it says that no further “investigate steps” should be taken until then.
It also says that prosecutors should “take all steps within your power to cause Mayor Adams’ security clearance to be restored”.
Prosecutors have not indicated whether they intend to drop the case as requested. Any decision to do so will need to be formally submitted to the court and approved by a judge.
The memo followed a reported meeting between Adams’ lawyers and federal prosecutors in New York.
Adams, a Democrat, has recently moved to build a closer relationship with Trump and his administration. He attended the presidential inauguration last month and also flew to Florida for a meeting.
Adams has said that he has never spoken to President Trump about his corruption case.
Since those meetings, Adams has directed city law enforcement to cooperate with federal immigration authorities on New York City raids. Critics say that this undermines local New York sanctuary city laws, which direct city leaders to not cooperate with authorities unless they are aiming to arrest dangerous criminals.
Bove stresses the need for Adams to cooperate further, and it alleges that the corruption case has restricted the mayor’s ability to accomplish “the immigration objectives established by President Trump”.
The memo also alleges that Adams was targeted by the justice department under former President Joe Biden over Adams’ past criticism of the former administration’s immigration policies.
Bove did not provide any evidence to support this claim.
Bove, who once worked as a prosecutor in the Southern District and more recently as Trump’s defence attorney during the president’s criminal trial last year, makes clear the Justice Department wanted the case dismissed “without assessing the strength of the evidence or the legal theories on which the case is based”.
Bove writes in the memo that this order is not a challenge of the case, its merits or the integrity of the prosecutors or the office.
Instead, he stresses the importance of Trump’s executive orders regarding the alleged “weaponization of the federal government” and illegal immigration, and he alleges that Adams’ case affects both orders.
