NEW YORK (BLOOMBERG) -- Mayor Eric Adams told a group of civic and business leaders that he’s conducting his own polling to decide the future of his reelection campaign, hinting at potentially dropping out just days after he vowed to stay in the race.
Adams, running as an independent, told the group of about 20 members of the Association for a Better New York that he’ll ultimately do what he views as best for the city even though he dislikes former Governor Andrew Cuomo, one of his opponents in the race, according to people who attended the meeting. Adams said he would conduct polling in the coming weeks, one of the people said.
Meeting attendees were stunned by what two people in the room interpreted as Adams expressing willingness to exit a race, in which Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee, holds a large lead in polls. While polls show a more viable path for Cuomo to beat Mamdani if both Adams and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa exit the race, the mayor insisted last week that he’s running and “going to beat Mamdani.”
Todd Shapiro, Adams’ campaign spokesman, said that the mayor “never alluded to leaving the race.”
“He clearly indicated that he will be spending resources to get his message out and will then look at his own independent poll to make a decision,” Shapiro said. “Nothing he said should give any indication that he has abandoned the race.”
Adams, elected as a Democratic Mayor in 2021, had vowed to continue his campaign at a press conference Sept. 5 outside Gracie Mansion. That came after a week of reports that he was weighing a variety of job proposals from the Trump administration and the private sector in exchange for bowing out.
A flurry of polling released this week shows Adams firmly stuck in fourth place in a four-way contest, with Mamdani, a democratic socialist, maintaining a clear lead.
An Emerson College poll released Wednesday shows Mamdani with 43% support compared with 28% for Cuomo, 10% for Sliwa and 7% for Adams. But in a hypothetical head-to-head race with Cuomo, the margin narrows significantly — Mamdani would win by seven points.
Donors and private sector executives concerned about a Mamdani win have separately been in talks with Adams about potentially finding a job and dropping from the race, according to people familiar with the discussions.
Mamdani has stoked concerns on Wall Street and among business leaders with his pledges to raise taxes on corporations and the wealthy to help pay for programs such as free bus rides and government-run grocery stores.
Former Governor David Paterson, a close adviser to Adams, said he believes the mayor may still be open to accepting a job and dropping his campaign.
“I would say that if there was an offer that made him realize that it would put him in a completely different tax bracket, I wouldn’t be surprised if he took it, and I wouldn’t have a problem with it either,” Paterson told Bloomberg News earlier this week.
Sept. 11 marks the day the general election ballot for November’s city elections will be certified, and is the last date by which Adams could have tried to remove his own name from the ballot.
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