N.Y.Adams Been a Good Student on Stealing from Voters in talks With Trump Team/Get Ambassadorship

Mayor Eric Adams has told allies he is considering a range of options but at the same time has publicly insisted he is staying in the race for a second term.Credit...Dave Sanders for The New York Times

 

By Dana RubinsteinWilliam K. RashbaumNicholas Fandos and Maggie Haberman

Sept. 5, 2025

Updated 9:26 a.m. ET

New York Times

Close advisers have been crafting a plan for President Trump to nominate Mayor Eric Adams to be ambassador to Saudi Arabia, in an effort to end the mayor’s long-shot campaign for re-election in New York City, according to four people familiar with the discussions.

The conversations could still fall apart for a variety of reasons, the people cautioned. But Steve Witkoff, a billionaire real estate investor and adviser to Mr. Trump, has actively pursued the matter in recent days, meeting personally with Mr. Adams earlier this week in Florida and speaking with other people close to him.

It remains unclear if the White House or Mr. Witkoff, whose first role in the administration was as envoy to the Middle East, has formally committed to Mr. Trump nominating Mr. Adams, or offered any other job.

Mr. Adams, a Democrat, has told allies he is considering a range of options but at the same time has publicly insisted he is staying in the race for a second term. His final decision could hinge on the details though, including whether he could end his campaign but serve out his remaining months in office or would be asked to resign early. 

The extent of Mr. Trump’s direct involvement in the talks is also cloudy, and people close to Mr. Adams were uncertain whether the idea of him being nominated to the ambassadorship had the president’s backing. But Mr. Trump said on Thursday that he would prefer two candidates to “drop out” to enable a third to take on Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee and front-runner, in a head-to-head matchup.

 

Todd Shapiro, a spokesman for Mr. Adams’s campaign, did not immediately comment, nor did the White House.

On Friday morning, the mayor canceled his one scheduled public appearance. His City Hall spokeswoman, Kayla Mamelak Altus, said Mr. Adams had a “scheduling conflict."

Privately, to several associates, Mr. Trump has indicated that he believes former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, 67, is best positioned to win a one-on-one race.

While Mr. Cuomo and Mr. Trump tangled at various points during the first Trump presidency, the two men have known each other for more than 40 years and have had what the former governor privately joked to donors is a “dysfunctional marriage.” 

The New York Times reported this week that Mr. Trump’s allies had been discussing ways to persuade both Mr. Adams and Curtis Sliwa, the founder of the Guardian Angels, to drop out of the race, which would clear the field for Mr. Cuomo’s third-party candidacy.

Mr. Sliwa, for his part, has insisted that he has no interest in a job in the Trump administration and plans to stay in the race until the end.

Mr. Adams, also a Democrat, opted out of the primary, in an apparent concession to his unpopularity among fellow Democrats who looked askance as his courtship of the president while Mr. Adams was under federal indictment on corruption charges.

Mr. Trump’s Justice Department dropped the case against Mr. Adams in February, saying they needed his help on their immigration crackdown. Mr. Trump, who was convicted of felony charges of falsifying business records and has insisted that he was prosecuted strictly for political reasons, has since said of that move, “I helped him out a little bit,” and that the mayor was “unfairly” pursued.

Now, both Mr. Cuomo and Mr. Adams are running on independent ballot lines. Their bases of support overlap. 

Ambassadorships are subject to Senate confirmation, a process that can take months or longer to complete. But the role of envoy to Saudi Arabia is a significant posting that would give Mr. Adams a window into new relationships globally. The position has often gone to a political figure, rather than a career diplomat, although many ambassadors have had some national security or foreign policy experience.

Were this plan to go through, Mr. Adams would represent a striking departure from the most recent ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Michael Ratney, a career diplomat who formerly served as the U.S. special envoy for Syria and the U.S. consul general in Jerusalem. He resigned in January.

Mr. Adams has traveled to the kingdom, something he noted on Thursday at an unrelated event celebrating the 1,500th anniversary of the birth of the Prophet Muhammad, where the mayor praised people of Muslim faith.

“And when I visited Saudi Arabia, when I visited Jordan, when I visited Oman, when I visited part of the African diaspora, and watched the Muslim population there, they truly believe in peace,” he said. “They believe in forgiveness, and they believe in the prosperity of the countries they are in.”