NYC Mayor Eric Adams on calls for his removal from office: "I'm not stepping down. I'm stepping up"
Calls for Gov. Kathy Hochul to remove New York City Mayor Eric Adams from office are growing.
They continued Sunday in Lower Manhattan at a protest to reject federal prosecutors' move to drop the corruption charges against him.
"I am going nowhere, nowhere"
Adams had a message for New Yorkers. He visited two churches in Queens and then posted some video on X, formerly Twitter, and wrote, "I'm not stepping down. I'm stepping up."
But that's certainly not how some who were protesting see it.
Immigrant rights groups rallied in Foley Square, calling on Hochul to remove Adams.
"We're calling it an emergency march because the mayor of the most important city in the world is being held hostage by Donald Trump," said Alice Nascimento, political director of the group New York Communities for Change.
The group said it will be protesting again on Monday at 10 a.m., and will do so every day outside City Hall until the mayor is removed or steps down.
"The voters voted for Eric Adams and now they want a chance to put somebody else in the seat. We don't want to wait until June," added Perla Silva, the political coordinator for the group Make The Road Action.
"It's a city of immigrants and we protect each other's rights," Assemblyman Harvey Epstein added. "He's beholden to Trump every single day."
The mayor, however, remained defiant at one of his stops in Queens.
"I am going nowhere, nowhere," he said to applause. "I'm the second Black mayor in history of this city."
As for all the rallies calling on him to resign, Adams said, "There are 8.3 million people in this city. Are there going to be 8.3 million there? Thank you."
"I need some time to process this"
Hochul's team referred CBS News New York to comments she made on MSNBC on Thursday, in which she admitted she's in conversations with elected officials on what to do next.
"I need some time to process this and figure out the right approach," Hochul said.
Hochul on Sunday stood right next to state Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins at the 2025 caucus reception, one day after the Westchester Democrat said it was time for Adams to resign. Stewart-Cousins said she supports the governor looking at her options, but Hochul didn't address Adams. Instead, she spoke about Mr. Trump's policies on immigration and abortion.
"I'm used to being the eye of the hurricane. That's my place where I live. So we're going to calm it all down, okay? We're going to be okay, because you have strong leaders who know how to take it to the mat," Hochul said.
You can bet there will be many more follow-up questions on the mayor to the governor come Monday.
Adams' meeting with the "border czar"
The calls for the mayor to step down come after federal prosecutors moved to drop corruption charges against Adams. A judge still has not approved it.
Several top prosecutors in the Southern District of New York refused to sign off and resigned in protest, claiming it is a political deal between the mayor and the White House in exchange for cooperation with immigration enforcement.
Last week, the mayor met with Tom Homan, President Trump's "border czar," and agreed to allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents onto Rikers Island.
Critics say doing so skirts sanctuary laws first passed in 2014. Homan spoke about the meeting on CNN on Sunday.
"I don't really think this has anything to do with what's going on with the Justice Department. We never talked about that. It's kind of out of my lane. I've been talking to the mayor for months about Rikers Island and that's what we talked about," Homan said.
