Embattled Mayor Bill de Blasio got a voice of support from his likely replacement, Democratic mayoral nominee Eric Adams, on Thursday as his administration attempted to tamp down the furor over Hizzoner’s “misuse” of his police detail.
The Brooklyn borough president — a former NYPD captain — offered his tentative support to de Blasio during at a political rally in Brooklyn, just hours after the Department of Investigation released its bombshell report.
“If his children, if his wife — if there were credible threats, then he must do everything that’s needed to ensure that they are safe,” said Adams, who cautioned he had yet to read the entire 49-page report. “He signed up to run for mayor; they did not.”
“Far too often, we don’t understand he may be a mayor but he’s still a father,” Adams added, “he’s still a husband and he must do everything that’s needed to protect his family.”
The DOI report revealed that the NYPD picked up at least $320,000 in travel expenses connected with de Blasio’s failed and much-mocked bid for the White House, which ended ignominiously in September 2019.
The city’s anti-corruption probers also revealed that de Blasio’s detail helped move his daughter, Chiara, from her apartment to Gracie Mansion in 2019 and regularly provided his son, Dante, with a driver — even as both declined official NYPD protection.
Adams’ Republican rival for mayor was not so forgiving. “One of the things they’re not is a moving company and a private escort service for your family,” said Curtis Sliwa, the GOP mayoral hopeful. “This is just so par for the course, they want to render the police impotent but use them as private servants.”
Adams is seen as the heavy favorite in the race as Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 7-1 margin in New York City and Adams has vastly out-fundraised and outspent Sliwa.
Both men have promised to rethink how the NYPD provides protection, if elected the next mayor.
Sliwa says he’ll go entirely without a detail.
Adams has also promised to downsize the detail or go without police protection, which he’s controversially argued he would not need because he can carry a handgun as a former cop — a fight Adams referenced again Thursday as he defended de Blasio.
“I’m really attacked for saying I want to limit the number of police officers around me who are detail,” Adams said. “So you can’t condemn him, and condemn me. Gotta have it one way or the other.”
