Six months ago I detailed how the FBI’s investigation of New York City Mayor Eric Adams centered around his trading favors in exchange for free Turkish Airlines upgrades on both official trips and leisure travel.
Adams praised Turkish Airlines for its service, calling it “my way of flying,” and received upgrades both as Brooklyn borough president and as mayor.
Now that Adams has become the first New York City Mayor to face criminal prosecution while in office we learn a lot more detail – including that he basically behaved like an obsessed top status frequent flyer.
Adams and his partner bought coach tickets to India, and Turkish upgraded them to business for free 48 hours prior to travel. He took a relative to Europe and Asia in business class for free on Turkish. And he also accepted free business class tickets to Nepal and Beijing. He was given a two-night stay in the Bentley Suite at the St. Regis Istanbul for less than $600 and a free two-night stay in their Cosmopolitan Suite.
But this is priceless:
Because the Turkish Airline provided free travel benefits wo1th tens of thousands of dollars to ERIC ADAMS, the defendant, he flew the Turkish Airline even when doing so was otherwise inconvenient.
For example, during the July and August 2017 trip, Adams’s Partner was surprised to learn that ADAMS was in Turkey when she had understood him to be flying from New York to France. ADAMS responded, in a text message, “Transferring here. You know first stop is always instanbul [sic].”
When Adams’s Partner later inquired about planning a trip to Easter Island, Chile, ADAMS repeatedly asked her whether the Turkish Airline could be used for their flights, requiring her to call the Turkish Airline to confirm that they did not have routes between New York and Chile.
Adams and the airline negotiated over pricing, but it was a reverse negotiation. The indictment alleges that the Mayor sought to paper the transaction, so he had a staffer work with a Turkish Airlines manager to pay for the tickets.
- Turkish suggested $50
- The staffer, “No, dear. $50? What? Quote a proper price.”
- Manager: “How much should I charge? :)”
- Staffer: “His every step is being watched right now. $1,000 or so…. We don’t want them to say he is flying for free.”
So he and his partner paid $1,100 apiece and flew business class.
The airline also provided support for an Adams fundraiser that included, among other things, “free use of a VIP room in the Turkish Airlines business class lounge.” They also contributed a hotel stay but provided the Adams campaign with “a fake bill” to make it look like they’d paid.
Here’s an itemization through 2021, though favors are alleged to have continued after that:
As I speculated in my original post, the favors Adams did in exchange included code approval for the new Turkish consular building in New York. It would have failed fire inspection, but according to the indictment a Turkish official told Adams “that it was his time to repay” the favors he’d received. Adams is claimed to have threatened a fire official with dismissal if they didn’t sign off on the skyscraper before Turkey’s president visited.
The Mayor also, apparently, ceased association with opponents of the anti-democratic government in Turkey that had been sponsoring him, on their orders. He also agreed not to make reference to the Armenian Genocide in 2022. That relationship got him straw donations from illegal Turkish sources.
(HT: @cameronmattis)
He clearly ticked off the wrong people in the administration.
Because in a world where the Speaker of the House builds a $150M stock portfolio, off a $185000 income stream, by 40 years of insider trading? A world where a politician’s immediate family took tens of millions of “consulting and board gig” income from Ukrainian and Chinese CCP business fronts, didn’t pay taxes and claimed this was normal business?
Yeah, in that world it seems a little weird to get huffy over some airline freebies.
The FBI should go after this government individual and they should push to jail this bastard
I hope they remove him from office and throw him in prison,make an example out of him to show all these other politicians stop using your power and position for favors and money
@ Burt — Evidence, please? None, of course.
And let’s see, DJT accumulated billions by ripping off everyone he ever came into contact with (including low paid employees) and barely ever paid any taxes.
I wonder why only Adams is being charged, why not TK and its officials as well?
Corruption has become so widespread now. I’m afraid this is almost at the low end!
I guess we know who DJT’s boyfriend will be in prison, now.
@Gene
The income streams to the current president’s family from sketchy foreign government sources are well-documented.
So,, unless you’re committed to the obvious RetConning strategy your team is employing this time around (You know, where the Border Czar was never the Border Czar. The “I will ban fracking” candidates now appear on oil rig photo ops with Exxon logo shirts.)? I’d simply refer you to the reams of publicly available information about The Speaker’s Magic Investment Touch or the First Cokehead’s lucrative Board Compensation. Both stink to high heaven.
No excuses for Adams, but if some airline freebies are the core of the case? It’s hard not to conclude Selective Enforcement against political thorns-in-the-side isn’t part of the tableau of oppression.
@AKTCHI
Yeah, it’s pretty interesting to see how “Selective Enforcement” works, eh?
Adams was the administration’s favorite son, at least until he started to flag the crisis the illegal immigration problem was pouring onto the streets of his city.
Rather than fix it? The Dem Hammer always seeks the Obnoxious Nail to pound on.
It’s a funny post all the way around– “Site dedicated to gaming airline freebies” notes charges against “mayor who exploits airline freebies.”
Ahhhhh, I am reminded of the old Scriptural chestnut,” that “Money is the root of all evil.”
What are you smoking, Burt? I want to buy some so I can use it like you obviously do when reality is just too much to handle.
Corruption may be widespread but “in the club” democrats only get indicted when they piss off the wrong people. This is likely what happened here.
Adam’s was a Biden reelection chairman. Then he spoke out about the immigration mess. This is his punishment.
Very sad
Hold him to the same standards of supreme court justices.
@Bill Dwyer
Ah, go straight to baseless attacks when you can’t deal with the facts of the situation.
Corrupt state? Corrupt games.
“Site dedicated to pursuit of airline freebies runs piece on Mayor seeking airline freebies.”
No excuses for him, but in that District of New York? Selective prosecution is pretty obvious to those of us in the other 49 states. Even the former GOVERNOR of NY recently went on record about the political motivations involved in who gets prosecuted and who gets a pass.
As Dylan said? “Steal a little and they throw you in jail.
Steal a lot and they make you king”
“Eric, have you ever been in a Turkish prison?”
It seems like at least every other NYC mayor is a crook. Even “America’s mayor” who should have known better as a former US Attorney. And seemingly also the crooked NYPD alum who is currently mayor.
DJT should be housed with the apparently like-minded deviants Sean Combs and Sam Bankman-Fried. MDC in Brooklyn for the lot of them, including the mayor of NYC, if due.
Just another case of classic third world corruption
oh wait.
WAIT.
We’re talking a handful of business class tickets and some hotel rooms for a fast track through the fire codes for an embassy?
THAT’S IT???? Like where is the $50,000,000 wire transfer or the transfer of the actual airplane to a hidden LLC or trust??
Move along. This happens all day, every day in literally every town, city, county, country in the world.
@mike he bilked the city for millions of dollars in matching funds. why are you trying to minimize this?
It is hard to believe that someone gets prosecuted for free business class upgrades. You make it sound like he earned millions of dollars.
Should the new Turkish consular building in New York be shut down?
@cameron – where in the indictment does it say Adam’s stole millions? I’m with Mike on this one.
@Burt- you missed my favorite payoff- Kushner getting $2B from the Saudi’s for papering over the murder and bone sawing of Washington Post journalist, Khashoggi
@Gene: Just take your potty-mouth juvenile comments and leave this site for good.
All DemocRats should be investigated, starting with Pukelosi and Scrwmer. If done, we could rid America of all of these corrupt thieves and drain the swamp. When asked as what was the biggest thing he noticed when he took office, President Donald Trump stated is was/is the corruption. This indictment is proof. MAGA 2024!!!
I thought it was only United & the PANY/NJ allowed to be corrupt!
Why is the grammar so bad in the quoted text?
Business as usual in the world of politics. Some will say, Oh, there’s just a few bad apples”. No, they’re all corrupt, this just happens to be the one they decided to go after.
For a premium, Earth-forward travel experience from JFK, please choose Delta.
Democrats. The party of the rich.
Compare and contrast NYC and TK with another third world corrupt airline, Sri Lankan. I’ve had the pleasure of paying full price for my own leisure ticket on Sri Lankan several times.
Privatisation of Sri Lanka’s state-owned companies has been discussed for a number of years, especially since it began to accumulate colossal losses after the Mahinda Rajapaksa Government cancelled a profitable partnership with Emirates Airlines in 2008. Emirates owned a 43% stake in the national carrier at the time it pulled out following a row over ticketing between the chief executive of SriLankan Airlines and the Rajapaksa family in late 2007. The rest is a tragic story well known to all of nepotism, corruption and mismanagement which has left the airline with a debt of over $ 1.2 billion.