Mayor Adams finds time to get lit with Cara Delevingne while dismantling unhoused people’s homes

‘I want New Yorkers to come back. We used to be the coolest place on the globe. We’re so damned boring now, man’

(Getty)

Perhaps you’ve seen it. The video floating around social media like escaped nightmare detritus. It is a scene from a New York City nightclub on a Monday night, where under the colored lights a grim-faced Cara Delevingne clutches a champagne bottle and bops alongside Mayor Eric Adams, who still looks pleasantly surprised that his gambit to gain entry into celebrity parties via the mayoralty has actually worked.

Meanwhile, somewhere under the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway in Brooklyn, unhoused people watched as city workers dismantled tent shelters (i.e. their homes), under Mayor Adams’ orders in fulfillment of his pledge to clear out 150 homeless encampments in two weeks. The mayor has also promised to add 350 beds to homeless shelters by the end of the week. Where will the unhoused people go in the meantime? Who’s to say?

If you are to believe Adams, the partying is part of his two-pronged approach to crime reduction: keeping unhoused people out of sight and getting lit. As crime rates, homelessness, rents, Covid-19 cases, and human rights abuses at Riker’s Island continue to soar, Mayor Adams cries, “Let them pop bottles!” Marie Antoinette comparisons may be hacky but what is one supposed to say about the leader of a city famous for its wealth disparity who unwinds from a busy day arresting people sleeping on the subway by partying at exclusive clubs with the rich and famous?

New York City is no stranger to horrible mayors, obviously. Giuliani comes to mind. Not to mention Bloomberg and DeBlasio. But Adams, the ex-cop and insincere vegan who may or may not live in the Bed-Stuy neighborhood of Brooklyn, brings his own special brand of gaucheness to disdain for the underprivileged and oppressed people of his city. He has referred to the servers, cooks, and dishwashers who wait on him at all of his fancy parties as “unskilled workers.” He exempted elite professional athletes and performers from vaccine mandates for reasons that remain both mysterious and suspicious. As restaurants, concert venues, and small businesses struggled to recover from the pandemic, Adams complained to Stephen Colbert, “I want New Yorkers to come back. We used to be the coolest place on the globe. We’re so damned boring now, man.”

Adams kicked off his tenure as mayor at an election night party at the members-only club Zero Bond alongside CEOs, restaurateurs, and Ja Rule. He sits next to Anna Wintour in the front row during Fashion Week. He attends Broadway opening nights. He told Colbert, “I am the mayor, this is the city of nightlife. I must test the product.” He told NY1, “When you’re out at night, it helps decrease crime. It attracts tourists to the city. That industry is a multi-billion-dollar industry.”

One might argue that if Adams was serious about boosting New York City nightlife tourism he might spend less time sampling the product and hobnobbing with models and more time getting Covid under control. He might spend more time with the people who actually live in New York City — the ones making under seven figures, that is — than with the billionaires and influencers. Even Chuck Schumer — hardly a man of the people — has done more for New York City tourism by pouring $16 billion in federal funds into the Theater District to help keep Broadway afloat.

Mayor Adams appears to be living in Anna Delvey’s New York City, a glittering sandcastle in Soho paid for with someone else’s Amex and supported by gullible billionaires. I’d wish him good luck with that but I don’t think he can hear me over the bass.