Storm approaching?

To the editor:

For the second time, a cloud has been cast upon Mayor Eric Adams’ successful 2021 run for office. The first cloud appeared in May of this year when the Adams campaign was fined $20,000 by the city’s Campaign Finance Board for taking donations from people with business before the city and failing to timely file paperwork. 

Now, it is being reported that six individuals, some also with business before the city, have been indicted in a straw-donor scheme whereby large individual donations were spread among dozens of their employees, without the employees’ knowledge. The scheme also leveraged public campaign funds using the 8-to-1 matching permitted under law.

One of those involved in the illegal scheme, Shamsuddin Riza, has a criminal history going back to a 1993 conviction for extortion and a 2021 charge of accepting kickbacks by scamming the city’s minority business enterprise (MBE) rules. 

Another of those indicted, Rachel Atcheson, serves as Adams’ deputy director of food policy.  While yet another, former NYPD Inspector Dwayne Montgomery, an Adams friend from his days at the NYPD, has been tabbed as the scheme’s mastermind. Even worse, it’s been reported that Montgomery allegedly told Riza in a phone conversation that “[the Candidate] said he doesn’t want to do anything if he doesn’t get 25Gs.” 

This raises serious issues regarding the integrity of the mayor. Far too many individuals with questionable backgrounds seem to be linked to Adams. If it can be proved that Adams actually indicated to Montgomery an openness to pay-for-play politics, he must go now. In any event, the Democratic Party must look to someone with less baggage in 2025.

Joseph Cannisi