Transcript: Mayor Adams Calls in for Live Interview on GMGT Live's "The Reset Talk Show"

July 19, 2024

J.R. Giddings: Welcome back. This is the Reset Talk Show. Tell a friend to tell a friend, audience. New York City Democratic Mayor Eric Adams is joining us right now. Good morning. Good morning, Mr. Mayor. How are you? 

Mayor Eric Adams: How are you, brother? Good to see you. 

Giddings: Always good to see you, Mayor Adams. I know that you've been very busy this morning with this technology power outage, and for you to take time out to come back in and make sure that you bring all the latest briefings and updates to us is so important.  

There are a couple of things that we could talk about, but let's finish off where we were, and then we could talk about some of the other topics. Mayor Adams, could you give us your takeaway on the attempted assassination of former Republican President Donald Trump? What is your message toning down the rhetoric in this country? 

Mayor Adams: I believe you have heard me say it over and over again where we are as a country, and it plays into many of our concerns. I want people to detach their feelings towards the former president, because sometimes the way we feel about someone gets in the way of what is the underlying issue.  

Just replace Trump with any other president that you may have liked or that you may have respected. You saw what happened with President Kennedy. You saw what happened with his brother. Even going as far back as we saw what happened, what hate does with the assassination of President Lincoln.  

When you look at the climate that we are creating, particularly the radicalizing of our young people, I've been talking about the radicalization and the role social media is playing in this radicalization.  
When you have a 20-year-old who was a loner, who basically lived on social media, get access to a gun, that goes back to the easy accessibility of firearms, and he has enough hate to climb on a roof in a premeditated fashion, point the gun at someone that he hates because he has a philosophical, political difference with them.  

He didn't care about not only taking the life of the former president, but remember, we lost an innocent person who was just sitting there exercising their right to support a candidate that they want while he was protecting his family. That is what we need to view this through that lens of, where are we as a nation?  

When as… Councilman Borelli, who I just thought really laid it out when we stood together to talk about deescalating some of this terrible terminology, he said, anger is one thing, hate is another. I was angry when I did not get the support I was as a child because I was dyslexic. I used that anger to turn into passion to do dyslexia screening.  

I was angry when I was arrested by police officers and assaulted by them. I turned that anger into opportunity with One Hundred Blacks in Law Enforcement. I can give you a list of things that I was angry at, the betrayal of my mother and my family, not getting the services they need. Mommy working three jobs, my sister losing her childhood because we didn't have adequate childcare. She had to raise us, my mom was out.  

That's how you turn anger into purpose. Hate is another thing. Hate makes you want to destroy someone. Hate makes you want to hate your country and want to use arson to burn down the country. Some of the stuff that you're seeing that's playing out not only on October 7th in Israel, but we're seeing it playing out even in Haiti, playing out in the Sudan, playing out in other parts of the globe, in Ukraine. That's what hate is. We need to move away from hate and use anger to be a tool for change. That is what I'm hoping that we do. 

Giddings: Mayor Adams, well said. The way you broke that down, the way you laid that out, okay, it really pulls at your heartstrings and makes you realize that you could use what you have in a positive way rather than in a negative way. I truly appreciate that.  

Mayor Adams, before I bring in Dr. Giddings and possibly the rabbi, I know you have a quick out this morning. There is all of this conversation and all of this talk with the Democratic Party. It seems like everything is upside down.  

What do you want to tell New Yorkers? What is your message to New Yorkers as we get ready, okay, for the big convention to figure out who the nominee is? There are so much, so many, let me correct myself, moving parts. People are confused because we don't know where we are. We don't know who's our nominee. We don't know who will be representing us. What could you say to our audience? What kind of message could you give us as we try to pivot from President Biden to possibly another candidate? 

Mayor Adams: You said it clearly, confusion. Anytime you have confusion, you should get clarity. What you saw in the last few days at the Republican convention, you saw clarity of message and presentation of that message.  

The Democrats have a convention coming up. In spite of all that is taking place, we need to go to that convention and give a clear message to the American people and build a case on why we should continue to lead the country.  

We have a great narrative and we allow far too often the minor things to get in the way of the major things. If we are clear on our message and our track record of leaning into public safety, we support police, yet Democrats are ashamed to say that they support police.  

We're not the one that is holding back the assault weapons that are shooting police officers in our country. We need to put that front and center. We support programs that prevent crime in the first place. We support senior care, healthcare. The president has stabilized our economy and not allowed it to be in free fall.  

We should be very clear in our message and do the right presentation that shows that we can continue to lead this country. We must come up with a real border plan to deal with the migrants and asylum seekers, and we need to be clear on what that plan is. Because if we lack clarity and people don't walk away from the convention saying, I know what the Democratic Party stands for and how they plan on executing their plan, then we're going to surrender to the message that is coming from the Republican Party. We can't blame them for having clarity. We must make sure we have clarity on our message. 

Giddings: Thank you. Thank you so much, Mayor Adams. What were you going to do? I know we have a lot to talk about— 

Mayor Adams: Also I want to share this to those who listen, the large number of people that listen to this show. This is democracy and this is healthy democracy. Democracy is not supposed to be a frictionless process. We're supposed to have many voices and we're supposed to debate them. We're supposed to have passion towards these issues and we should not be ashamed of that.  

In fact, we should lift our country up as a clear example, how we do smooth transitions of power. We have a long record, 400 year history of doing that. That's very impressive. Having healthy debate is part of the process. We should disagree without being disagreeable and without being mean spirited in the process. 

Giddings: Thank you, Mayor Adams. Pastor Straker followed by Dr. Giddings. This is such an important topic and conversation. Mayor Adams, I really hope that you could be with us for a little bit. This is important where we are right now. Welcome in Pastor Straker. Your question for the mayor. 

Pastor Louis Straker: Good morning, Mr. Mayor. Always great to have you with us. Thank you so much for your remarks. they're spot on and they're rooted in the scriptures. The Bible says, be angry and sin not. There's some principles there we should all live by. Even if we say that we are angry or we hate our brother, that in itself is the onset of murder. Jesus taught us that in the Sermon on the Mount.  

So when the climate of and the tension that we have in this political climate that we live in, are you concerned at all about your safety? I know we live in New York, pretty much democratic in New York City, but then you do have these extremes that are here. Are you concerned about your safety given what happened to the former president and what is your security or NYPD doing to secure that safety? 

Mayor Adams: That's a great question, pastor. I always use sports as an analogy. When a quarterback sits in the pocket, his offensive line must protect him. If he spends his time worrying about if he's going to be sat or in any way harmed, you'll never move the ball down the field.  

You must have faith in your offensive line. My detail, they were all hand-picked and I have a great deal of faith in them, especially a person like me, an elected like me. I like to be among the crowd. I like to be among the people. I don't want to be in a bubble. Sometimes that brings great challenges.  

My style of play on the football field of life is to move in a very free fashion. I don't always remain in the pocket, and it exposes me. There's a lot of footage of people coming to me voicing some real hatred towards me, but I just keep it moving.  

I was on a plane and a woman came up and just uses just a bunch of vile words. I was out last night having dinner, sitting down at an outdoor table. These two young ladies came up and they was just using vile words that was just really inappropriate.  

I just maintain my discipline to make sure that I don't lose focus and I don't become what they are, and try to show them the proper way of communicating. It's a concern. It's more, I think it's more of a concern for my family that is really concerned about this. They often, communicate with me. It's frightening for them.  

Many of them, many of my family members are dealing with the PTSD of when someone shot out my car windows. They still, whenever something happens to someone in public life or they hear some threat to me, they relive that how close it was that I could have lost my life. 

Giddings: Okay, Dr. Giddings, quickly, the mayor has to run. This is a very important topic. Your question for Mayor Adams. 

Mayor Adams: Dr. Giddings, you should be proud of me. I'm drinking my smoothie. 

Dr. Shellyanne Giddings: Good job, good job. Good morning. Thanks for being here. Thanks for all that you do. Yes, it's got to go be scary being in the public eye. This young person that, first of all, I'm glad that former president is okay. Also President Biden suffering from COVID, I wish him the best in these difficult situations.  

But, yeah, that young Trump rally shooter, he was exposed to a lot of social media, the access to guns, et cetera. I know that you guys in New York are working towards maybe putting a warning label on social media. I wondered how that is going and, addressing big tech, et cetera. They're the ones that are responsible because of, all this access, it's radicalizing them and not to mention the mental health problems. 

Mayor Adams: Well said. This is simple math. Readily accessible, high powered weapons, as you just indicated, mental health issues, particularly impacting our young people. We're seeing an even increase after COVID, post COVID. Social media platforms that know how to use algorithms to pull young people into dark places. There are just so many warning signs here. You touched on some of them.  

One, we have been aggressively dealing with the accessibility of handguns. We moved 17,000 guns off our street and we will continue to do so. Two, we are suing social media platforms to tell them they must do better. We're educating children and families on how to better handle this just introduction into our lives.  

Think about the last 15 years, we have this major shift in our existence on what social media does to us and how much we rely on it, both children and adults. Thirdly, going after this mental health issue. Doctor, we have with Dr. Vasan from Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, we have this new platform called TeenSpace where young people are able to get mental health assistance and using their phones with video conferencing. We are really pleased of the results. Overwhelming number of Black and brown children are using it and many of them are saying they feel better after speaking with someone.  

Sometimes it's just a basic conversation with a mental health professional that can either give you that immediate care or refer you to where you need to go. Because we all know it in our communities, we sort of dismissed mental health issues in our communities. Basically, hey, listen, just sort of toughen up. This has been taboo in our community for many years and we really started to acknowledge it. It's the combination of those things that you talked about, doctor, that is really what we need to go after. A full frontal on guns, mental health, social media. When you add them up together, they equal crises. 

Giddings: Oh, Mr. Mayor, you're on fire this morning. I love it. What's important is perspective here. There are so many components to where we are right now. Rabbi Cohen, the mayor has a hard out. Your question has to be very short and direct. 

Rabbi Eli Cohen: Yes, I got a good question. I think you're one of the top political strategists, Biden in or Biden out? 

Mayor Adams: That's a good question. Number one, he has to make that determination because he is the president of the United States. I think that if there's one thing people would say about me is that I'm not a fair weather friend. When I'm with you, I'm with you. Once you show me that you are an individual that come from a good moral compass and I say that I'm with you, I'm with you until you tell me you no longer need me to be with you.  

I'm rolling with Biden. If he reaches the point after his family members, after he does some soul searching and he says, Eric, I'm deciding to do something different, then okay, then do something different in the meantime. So all those who are calling for him to leave, I don't have that number, so I'm not making that call. I have the same number that this is Eric Adams that supports the president.  

When I needed the president around public safety, he came to New York, he assisted in ATF, he assisted in some of these economic issues. Even when I disagree with how the border issue was handled, that's alright, because we don't know who agree with anyone all the time. Any of you that's married, if you're honest that you don't agree with your spouse all the time, but you still love him. I'm going to stay focused and he will make that determination on if he's going to stay in the race or out of the race. He'll sit down with the leaders of the Democratic Party and make that determination. 

Giddings: I could attest to one thing, Mayor Adams, you're not a fair weather friend. We started this journey together and you just continue to open the avenues, not only for me, but for the Reset Talk Show and all grassroots media. Listen, facts are facts. 

Mayor Adams: Sir, you know, and we just have to be real, I say this all the time, JR, you were here, the narrative, well, he dressed too fancy. He hangs out late at night. He's not competent enough to do the job. That's not Eric Adams, that's David Dinkins. That's what they said about David Dinkins. Go look at the old newspaper articles about him. 30 years later, they're using the same narrative. Their goal was to erode the support in David's base. We had his own base buying into that narrative. That's what you're doing right now.  

We have been one of the most successful administrations in the history of this city. The diversity, it's just unprecedented when the number of people of color who are running these major agencies. We have the first Jewish woman to lead Intel. We have the first Trinidadian to be a deputy mayor, the first Caribbean American to be a chief of staff in the city, first African American woman to be a first deputy mayor, first African American Panamanian to be a chief advisor, first Filipino American deputy mayor, first Indian American deputy mayor, first Korean to head a small business services, first Spanish speaker to be the commissioner of this Police Department, first woman to be a police commissioner, first woman to be a fire commissioner.  

When you look all that we've done past, it's a Matthew 21:12 moment when Jesus went in the temple and saw them doing wrong in his temple. He didn't sit down at the table and participate. He turned the table over. I went into City Hall not to participate in the denial of those who are being denied. I went in to turn the table over. When you turn the table over, there's a lot of [inaudible] that's going to get upset about you turning the table over.  

This city won't be the same when I finish being the mayor of this city. We are changing M/WBEs. We're dealing with those children who are being denied and left out. We put the city on the right path. Mayors normally deal with one crisis in the administration. Bloomberg dealt with 9/11, de Blasio dealt with COVID. I dealt with COVID and 207,000 migrants and asylum seekers, and you don't see children and families sleeping on the street because how we have managed that. We're doing it. We should be proud that you have a first woman of color to be the speaker and a second mayor of color.  

We're showing the globe that we can manage complex situations. So we shouldn't buy into the narrative. They are duping us. I never thought I would use this terminology in my life, but I'm going to use it. We’re being hoodwinked. We’re being bamboozled to think that we don't have a mayor and a speaker who can manage this city.  

Coming on this show is crucial because I'm able to speak directly to people to get past all of that noise that's out there that's making us believe that this city is not coming back. The city is back. I did it in two years. They said it was going to take five years. We have more jobs in this city and the city history. More small businesses in the city history. Build more, put more people at a homeless shelter into permanent housing in one year in the city's history. Robberies in the subway system is the lowest in the history of the city. We have turned around this city in two years. Unbelievable when you think about what we have accomplished. 

Giddings: Mayor Adams, the Reset platform, as we deal with diversity and inclusion and you also represent a representation of that as I look at your team and your staff. We advocate for you. We support you for that reason. With you saying everything that you just said, I'm going to underscore it. The mayor has been the best mayor for New York City in the last 20 years or so. This is a fact.  

When you could have the Reset talk show sitting every Tuesday in a presser with ABC, CNN, FOX 5, NBC, and for us to be able to pose questions and rub shoulders, that hasn't happened. It never happened. Yes, we will be supporting you next year, okay? Mayor Adams, you're on board. Now we have all political analysts before you leave. Deidre Hines, just say hello to the mayor. This is great. Hi, mayor. 

Mayor Adams: How are you? 

Deidre Hinds-Rasheed: I am really good. I think the last time I saw you was at my aunt's, my cousin's wedding. 

Mayor Adams: Yes. 

Hinds-Rasheed: Yes, you're looking good, sir. I am proud of the fact that there is somebody who stands by their word. That comes very rare here. An you know they say, my saying, I told Pastor Straker, a coward dies a thousand deaths, a soldier dies but once. 

Mayor Adams: That's well said. 

Hinds-Rasheed: We ought to honor those of us who are patriots and stand by the votes of 14.1 million voters. That's right. Disenfranchisement is disenfranchisement even when Democrats do it. 

Mayor Adams: That's right. Well said, well said. 

Giddings: The mayor has to leave. He gives us time once a month, sometimes twice a month, but Mayor Adams, we're going to need more of you as we get ready for this pivotal election. You might have to double up. 

Mayor Adams: That's right. I look forward to it, Thank you. Good seeing you all.  

Giddings: All right, see you soon.  

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