Eric Adams Is Indicted After Federal Corruption Investigation

Eric Adams, a retired police captain who was elected as New York City’s 110th mayor nearly three years ago on a promise to rein in crime, has been indicted in a federal corruption investigation, people with knowledge of the matter said.

The indictment remained sealed on Wednesday night, and it was unclear what charge or charges Mr. Adams will face. But the federal investigation has focused at least in part on whether Mr. Adams and his campaign conspired with the Turkish government to receive illegal foreign donations.

When the indictment is made public, Mr. Adams, a Democrat, will become the first New York City mayor to face a federal charge while in office.

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Mr. Adams struck a defiant tone in a video statement issued Wednesday, insisting that he had done nothing wrong.

“I always knew that if I stood my ground for New Yorkers that I would be a target — and a target I became,” he said. “If I am charged, I am innocent, and I will fight this with every ounce of my strength and spirit.”

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Even before he was indicted, Mr. Adams’s administration had been battered not just by the investigation into him and his campaign but by three separate inquiries involving some of his highest ranking aides and advisers — investigations that included a drumbeat of searches and seizures that destabilized City Hall and made it difficult for him to govern effectively.

Calls for Mr. Adams’s resignation had been steadily accumulating over the past several weeks.

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On Wednesday night, the news of the indictment fueled the criticism. Scott Stringer, the former New York City comptroller who is among the Democrats running against Mr. Adams in next year’s mayoral primary, said that the mayor was presiding over “a broken-down train wreck of a municipal government” and that he should step down.

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It grew out of an investigation by the F.B.I. and federal prosecutors in Manhattan that began in 2021 and was focused at least in part on the possible foreign donations, and on whether Mr. Adams pressured officials in the Fire Department to sign off on the opening of a new high-rise consulate building for the Turkish government despite safety concerns.

The investigators were also examining whether Mr. Adams accepted pricey flights and upgrades on Turkish Airlines, which is partly owned by the Turkish government. And they sought information about a Brooklyn construction company run by Turkish Americans, and a small university in Washington, D.C., with Turkish ties.

Mr. Adams has said he has visited Turkey at least six times and that he met Mr. Erdogan when Mr. Adams was Brooklyn borough president.

The inquiry remained secret until late last year, when an F.B.I. search of his chief fund-raiser’s home thrust it into public view. After searching the home of the fund-raiser, Brianna Suggs, last November, federal investigators left with two laptop computers, three iPhones and a manila folder labeled “Eric Adams.” Ms. Suggs has not been accused of wrongdoing.

Days later, in a dramatic scene on a Greenwich Village street, F.B.I. agents told the mayor’s security detail to step aside, climbed into his S.U.V. with him and seized his electronic devices.

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