FBI delivers reality check to ‘no distractions’ Eric Adams

NEW YORK — New York City Mayor Eric Adams proclaims to govern with “no distractions.” Sprawling federal probes this week are proving that pledge wrong, as agents continued to raid his political allies — searching electronic devices and issuing subpoenas to the highest levels of his administration.

Ahead of his 2025 reelection campaign, the moderate Democrat has sought to project himself as the type of efficient manager and steady hand needed to guide the city to prosperity through a second term. A cadre of FBI agents who visited a suite of top administration officials this week dealt a serious blow to that image and have made the mayor’s favorite aphorism — “stay focused, no distractions and grind” — harder to say with a straight face.

The current round of raids and interviews is the third to target top Adams aides. This time, the police commissioner, two deputy mayors, a shadowy consigliere and the schools chancellor were among those who received visits from federal investigators early Wednesday morning — placing a pall over a significant portion of city government. Several high-ranking police officials, including the commissioner’s chief of staff, also had their phones reportedly seized by the FBI, as did two relatives of city officials who appear to be key figures in the investigation.

The revelation that so many people in key leadership roles were being eyed by the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office — though none has been accused of any wrongdoing — led the mayor’s critics and even some of his allies to question whether the administration has a handle on the basics of governing.

“Adams likely needs to jettison every aide who now threatens to sink his mayoralty,” the editorial board of the normally Adams-friendly New York Post wrote Thursday .

Adams’ central pledge as mayor has been to restore a sense of public safety to a city that has been on edge since the throes of the pandemic. Wednesday’s raids struck at the heart of the city’s crime-fighting apparatus.

To start with, federal gumshoes descended on the Queens home of Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Philip Banks III at around 5 a.m., seizing electronic devices from the reclusive and explicative-prone former NYPD inspector — a move first reported by THE CITY that recalled an earlier brush with federal authorities.

In 2018, Banks was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in a sprawling corruption investigation into the de Blasio administration. In 2022, he generated a fresh round of scrutiny over Adams’ leadership picks when he was brought back into city government.

Investigators also nabbed electronic devices from NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban along with his twin brother, James, who runs a firm that provides security to nightlife establishments in the city. A report from NBC indicated the Internal Revenue Services has joined the probe , which is focused in part on any potential gain James Caban might have received from his brother’s position atop the NYPD.

FBI agents also seized phones from other police officials, including Caban’s chief of staff, Raul Pintos, according to a report in the New York Post . And in a new development, two people with knowledge of the situation said investigators also requested the phone of Deputy Inspector Robert Gault, who leads a Midtown precinct. Both were granted anonymity to disclose details of ongoing inquiry.

The NYPD declined to answer questions about Gault, only broadly acknowledging the probe and referring questions to the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, which did not comment.

“The department is aware of an investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York involving members of service,” the department’s press office said in a statement. “The department is fully cooperating in the investigation.”

And the feds also took electronic devices from and issued a subpoena to top mayoral aide Timothy Pearson, who along with Banks and Caban holds significant sway over the NYPD despite officially working for the city’s Economic Development Corporation.

Pearson, who runs a secretive mayoral agency tasked with municipal quality control, has been the subject of high-profile allegations since joining the administration in 2022. He is currently the subject of a city Department of Investigation probe into an altercation at a city-run migrant shelter. Allegations of sexual harassment and retaliation have spawned four lawsuits against the longtime Adams confidant, and the question of whether city lawyers should represent Pearson led to the ouster of the mayor’s previous corporation counsel. As POLITICO previously reported , Pearson also held up the opening of a migrant shelter in the hopes of scoring a security contract for a friend of the mayor.

With three top public safety officials embroiled in the probe, a City Hall spokesperson would not delineate how they would continue to manage their roles and work with federal law enforcement while simultaneously being involved in a federal investigation.

The spokesperson, Deputy Mayor for Communications Fabien Levy, said only that the administration was continuing to deliver for New Yorkers despite several federal investigations that have dogged Team Adams since November.

“For the better part of a year, the mayor has been absolutely clear that, as a former member of law enforcement, he will always follow the law, and in the same time he has stayed focused on delivering for the people of the city,” Levy said in a statement, referencing a decrease in major crimes overall and record job numbers in the city along with tax credits pushed by City Hall.

The investigation struck a nerve with the NYPD.

The deputy commissioner for public information referred to a New York Post reporter seeking information about the phone seizures as a “scumbag.” And department officials denied access to the agency’s press room to reporters from the Post and The New York Times shortly after news of the FBI actions became public. The Post reporter was allowed back into the building Friday, according to a report in the Times , while the reporter from the Times remained barred from entry.

Wednesday’s law enforcement actions provided a stark reminder of the longtime loyalists and familial connections that permeate the upper echelons of Adams’ City Hall.

Investigators also visited the home of First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright and her partner, Schools Chancellor David Banks, seizing electronic devices from both. David Banks is the brother of Philip Banks III.

“I remain focused on ensuring [1 million public school students] have [a] safe, academically rigorous and joyful school year,” David Banks said in a statement Friday. “I am confirming that I am cooperating with a federal inquiry.”

Privately, Banks has sought to distance himself from the core of the probe, according to a school official familiar with the chancellor’s discussions about the raid who was granted anonymity to relate sensitive information. Banks told colleagues at the Department of Education that his devices were seized only because they were sitting near those of Wright — who worked at United Way and ran a development corporation in Harlem before running Adams’ transition team and joining the administration.

A spokesperson for the education department denied Banks made the comments.

“That is false,” the spokesperson, Nathaniel Styer, said via email.

Officials also nabbed the cell phone of Terence Banks, the brother of both David and Philip Banks.

Terence Banks is a former MTA employee who started a consulting business called Pearl Alliance that counts several companies with business before the city as clients. The website for Pearl Alliance was taken down Friday.

Terence Banks also has a relationship with the mayor, according to two people with knowledge of their rapport, and is on record interacting with city officials on at least two occasions, according to a POLITICO review of public schedules for Adams officials.

Terence Banks was scheduled for a call with Adams’ chief adviser, Ingrid Lewis-Martin, in February 2022 and was set to meet with his brother Philip Banks in September of that year.

Timothy Sini, a former federal prosecutor and Long Island district attorney-turned white collar defense attorney, is representing Terence Banks.

“We have been assured by the government that Mr. Banks is not a target of this investigation,” Sini said in a statement.

Wednesday’s FBI actions are just the latest from federal law enforcement officials.

In November, agents fanned out across the city to conduct raids and interviews seeking evidence the mayor’s 2021 campaign allegedly colluded with the Turkish government and accepted illicit foreign donations.

And in March, federal authorities raided a Bronx home belonging to Adams’ longtime liaison to the city’s Chinese community, Winnie Greco, who was briefly placed on leave but is back working in city government.

Despite many longtime aides bringing unwanted attention to his administration just as he seeks reelection, the mayor himself has brushed off the investigations as irrelevant to running a bureaucracy of more than 300,000 city employees and on Friday said he had full confidence in each of his deputies connected to the probe.

“They know we have to continue to deliver for New Yorkers," Adams said during a television interview on PIX 11.

Maya Kaufman, Madina Touré and Timmy Facciola contributed to this report.