Mayor Adams has been hitting red carpets and partying with the rich and famous at night while highlighting the realities of the working class and voiceless during the day. It’s a duality to how he handles his job.
“I can multi-task,” Adams said Tuesday. “This is the city of New York. I’m not drinking out of a garden hose. I’m drinking out of a firehouse and I can handle every drop of the water.
Adams was the self-proclaimed blue-collar candidate on the campaign trail. But he also appears comfortable hobnobbing with the city’s wealthy, switching readily between vastly different worlds making up New York’s complex ecosystem.
“You know my belief, If you’re going to hang out with the boys, you gotta get up with the men,” he said. “I was up early this morning, doing my job.”
On Thursday, Adams spoke to the city’s business elite, then partook in the performance arts scene.
On Tuesday, he promoted jobs training for foster kids, met with diplomats at the United Nations and marked the opening of a homeless shelter.
But on Monday, on the same day his sanitation department began clearing out homeless encampments, Adams was clubbing with rappers and models.
NY1 asked him about the bad optics.
“I must deal with my economy that can’t create homelessness because we don’t have people back to work,” he responded. “And nightlife, believe it or not, is a multi-billionaire and when they see their mayor out enjoying our city, it sends the right message.”
Democratic consultant Olivia Lapeyrolerie said any New York City mayor needs to straddle two worlds.
“But, how he is straddling the one that impacts working people, or in this instance, unhoused New Yorkers, is particularly damning and feels out-of-action with his purported values,” said Lapeyrolerie.
