Asked to sum up 2023 in New York City, the mayor, Eric Adams, chose to give New Yorkers a bizarre warning that they could “wake up” to another 9/11 terrorist attack on any given day.
Asked by the WPIX-TV host Dan Mannarino to sum up a “very eventful” year in one word, Adams offered two: “New York”.
Then he said: “This is a place where every day you wake up you could experience everything from a plane crashing into our trade center through a person who’s celebrating a new business that’s about to open.
“This is a very, very complicated city, and that’s why it’s the greatest city on the globe.”
On 11 September 2001, Islamist terrorists crashed two hijacked airliners into the towers of the World Trade Center in downtown Manhattan. The death toll was 2,977. Thousands were injured and thousands have since died of illnesses related to crash site toxicity.
Hijacked planes also crashed into the Pentagon in Virginia and a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The attacks fueled 20 years of war, including US-led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Adams was not pressed on his bizarre remark to WPIX, though he was later asked what he needed to improve in 2024.
“Probably communications,” he said.
The Democrat, a former police officer, became the second Black mayor of New York when he took office last year. This month, beset by scandal, he recorded the lowest approval rating ever recorded for a New York mayor by Quinnipiac University polling.
Just 28% of respondents said they approved of Adams’s performance.
“There’s no good news for Mayor Adams in this poll,” said Mary Snow, assistant director of the Quinnipiac poll. “Not only are voters giving him poor grades on the job he’s doing at city hall, their views on his character have dimmed.
“As the city faces across-the-board budget cuts while dealing with a migrant crisis, headlines about a federal investigation into the mayor’s 2021 campaign and an accusation of sexual assault leveled against him from 30 years ago are taking a toll.”
