Transcript: Mayor Adams Appears Live On MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”

July 22, 2024

Willie Geist: Here on set in the studio is the mayor of New York City, Eric Adams. Mr. Mayor, always great to have you at the table. 

Mayor Eric Adams: Great to be here.

Geist: Your reaction to the news yesterday, first the decision, the act undertaken by President Biden, and also your enthusiasm or your hopes for Vice President Harris at the top of the ticket. 

Mayor Adams: First, and I'm just so happy so many people acknowledge the level of patriotism that came from our president. It is very challenging when you are moving to the next step, you believe, and all of a sudden you have to make the decision to relinquish that. That shows a great level of patriotism. 

A person has gone through so much trials and tribulations throughout his life. He's just once again showing us how he's the average Joe. I was proud, as long as he was in the race, I made it clear I was riding with Biden because I believe he navigated us out of this. 

I'm looking forward to moving towards a convention, seeing the Vice President Harris becoming the nominee. In 2020, I endorsed her in the entire primary field. I'm clear everyone knows who I am about public safety, and she was very clear on the campaign trail. I think that she is the voice that the party needs right now, that we're hemorrhaging African Americans. We're hemorrhaging Hispanic voters. We're hemorrhaging those working class people who don't realize the Democratic Party has a good product. We have to get a clear message on getting that product out there. 

Reverend Al Sharpton: Mr. Mayor, two issues on that. One is, as you said, both you and Vice President Harris come out of a Black community, but that were pioneers in moving toward law and inside dealing with law enforcement in a corrective way. Talk about how important it is that you have someone with that background when we're dealing with having to deal with police reform and fighting against criminality at the same time, having that background if she were to be the president. 

Secondly, how you've had to deal with as other major mayors, particularly Black mayors, the migrant crisis, and how you feel that President Harris would be better than bringing back a Donald Trump into the White House on that issue.

Mayor Adams: We need real clear leadership. She understands it. She was in the position of look over the border issue, so she understands some of the things that we need to do. But I think the key is what you just stated, Rev. The Democratic Party, they have basically went after assault rifles. They went after some of the criminal aspects in the communities of color in general, but the countries, communities of color in general, the country in general, but specifically the communities of color. 

Those communities are pro-public safety. We could have the balance of public safety and justice. I think having a presidential candidate that is going to be forceful with her prosecutorial background, with a law enforcement background, I think it’s the right message right now, because some of the reasons we're losing many people in these communities, working class communities, is because they don't believe we are connecting with those real issues with them. Affordable housing, affordability in the country, dealing with securing our border, all of these important issues. 

Jonathan Lemire: Mayor Adams, you just went through some of the issues, but let's take a moment and talk about the intangibles. Democratic Party was pretty bereft and depressed since the president's poor showing at the Atlanta debate. 

Are you sensing now, since his announcement to step aside and Vice President Harris coming to the forefront, a burst of enthusiasm? You were out talking to New Yorkers last night and this morning. It's obviously one of the deepest blue cities in the nation. Are you seeing a groundswell of optimism now from the party? 

Mayor Adams: I see the VP as the racehorse that we just got to let the reins go. Let her naturally. I saw in the debate stages during the 2020 and I would sit back and say, wow, let her be her. I thought Claire [McCaskill] said something that's important. When you hear the critique of her, it's about, I don't like the way she laughs. I don't like the way she does this or does that. Listen, let's stop to silliness. 

These are real issues and allow her to do what she does well. She can articulate these issues. She could sell her case. I think you're going to see that enthusiasm. You're going to see the real VP Harris move up to the level of President Harris. That's a step that you do when you're placing these positions. The person I am now was not the person I was as Borough President. You move into these very important positions. I think she's ready for it. 

Joe Scarborough: Let me ask you, Mr. Mayor, about we talked about public safety. How's New York City doing on crime, on homelessness and on the migrant crisis? 

Mayor Adams:I think the analysis is clear. Decrease in homicide, decrease in shootings on the subway system. We have the lowest record of robberies on our subway systems in the history of the city. We witnessed for the last few months a substantial decrease for over four million riders on our system, average of five felonies a day. 

We have a steady decrease after that bump in January. Then when you look at the almost 17,000 guns we've removed off our streets, everything from removing illegal mopeds. We're seeing a city that went from a 40 percent increase in crime in January 1st, 2022 to, we're seeing, decrease in these major crime areas. 

Scarborough: What about homelessness? What about… and when I talk about homelessness, I'm talking specifically about mentally ill people on the street, because when I talk to tourists and I talked to another one when I was flying into New York last night, they were saying how dangerous New York was. I said, no, crime is down. But then they tell stories about people approaching them. 

I said, there are two things here. You've got crime. Right. Then you've got homelessness. You have people that are out on the street who are mentally ill that'll go up and charge people, two different things. At the same time, a lot of people visiting the city don't feel as safe as, say, they did in ‘19. I know you're fighting hard to find the shelter, to find the treatment for the homeless. But there's still a ways to go there, isn’t there?

Mayor Adams: Oh, no, without a doubt. When you look at the fact that… do an analysis of other cities, you don't see the encampments, you don't see the tents, you don't see that. 

Scarborough: And why is that? 

Mayor Adams: Because I'm clear that's not the city we're going to live in—

Scarborough: Yeah but… Why can't you go to Washington, D.C. and you just see tents all over the place? You go to Los Angeles. It's just it's crazy. You go to San Francisco, which has gotten better. San Francisco has gotten better over the past six months ago. Portland, let's not even talk about Portland. It's crazy. Crazy. 

Why do other cities allow these encampments that are not only unsafe for tourists and others, but are unsafe for those people in the encampments? Unsanitary. 

Mayor Adams: Well said. And that's why we push with the involuntary removal, because we were clear that if a person does not realize they need care, it's inhumane to allow them to stay in that condition. January, February, the first year of my administration, I sent a message out to the team. We are not going to walk by people, and we're not going to have a city where people are sleeping on long highways under underpasses and train stations. The message was clear.

Scarborough: There's nothing humane about that. Rev and I've talked about that all the time. Oh, it's inhumane that you don't just let people sleep on grates when it's zero degrees. It's insanity. Some left-wing radicals have decided that letting the mentally ill sleep on sidewalks is somehow humane. 

Mayor Adams: And they sued us. They attacked us. They criticize us. Look at our city. It doesn't exist in those three areas. You're right. This is what tourists have the perception of severe mental health illness. If you don't start removing and giving people the care they deserve, that's going to be an impression of your city. 

Then we have recidivism, these repeated offenders. The person who shot Detective Jonathan Diller, he was arrested 20 times. Each time these repeated offenders, it hurts us a lot. Then random acts of violence. Those are the overshadowing messages. But when you look at this city, we're the safest big city in America.

Scarborough: No doubt about it. One final question. You talk about recidivism. Are you finally getting the cooperation that you need from Albany, from City Council, from others about this sort of revolving door that was created on the bail issue?

Mayor Adams: We should be doing so much more, particularly discovery. Attorneys that understand this, they know what discovery is doing. Bill Clinton once said to me that I live by, no one elected you to define the problem. They elected you to solve the problem. I'm solving the problem. The city's not coming back. The city's back. 

Scarborough: Yes. All right. Mr. Mayor, thank you so much for being with us. Greatly appreciate it. Mika.