Sources within the FBI tell the New York Times that in 2021 then-Democratic New York City Mayoral nominee Eric Adams – who was effectively the mayor-designate at that point because that Curtis Sliwa dipshit had absolutely zero chance of winning – pressured then-FDNY Commissioner Daniel Nigro to sign off on the Turkish government’s new high-rise consulate in Manhattan despite safety concerns with the building, pressure that appears to be one of the policy concessions (or maybe the only one) the Turks got in exchange for allegedly illegally funding Adams’s campaign.
Accepting foreign campaign contributions is against the law and antithetical to principles of American sovereignty, full stop. There is however a pretty wide spectrum of possible damage inflicted upon American sovereignty, a spectrum that if Donald Trump and the Russians, Saudis, Chinese, etc are at the top while Bob Menendez and the Egyptians are not very far behind, Adams and the Turks sit on the opposite end. THIS is the scandal here? A goddamned building code issue?
We knew it had to be something this stupid (again, there could be other favors involved), but seeing the other end of it is just… Jesus Christ, Adams is a moron, the Turks are morons, and we feel embarrassed for the FBI agents and federal prosecutors having to investigate this.
As we had anticipated, the MAGA assclowns were already pretty much universally claiming that Adams is the victim of the “Biden Regime’s” retaliation for complaining about immigration policy and a fucking fire code violation being reason the FBI seized Adams’s phones and iPad is about the last thing that would’ve disabused them from that notion. How many times between 1993 and 1997 did Donald Trump call Rudy Giuliani and order him to cut the red tape on this or that project, making it clear to Rudy that he would support his reelection campaign if he delivered? It’s just everyday cronyism most people do not and should not like but nevertheless accept as part of the fabric of political reality… elevated to a crime simply because the Turks are definitionally not Americans.