Eric Adams loses lawsuit against local election body — and his team is thrilled
Despite the loss, the mayor's legal team was thrilled.
In a 61-page decision, United States District Judge Nicholas Garaufis sided with the New York City Campaign Finance Board, which opted to withhold the matching funds from Adams in December.
'The court finds that the CFB provided two independent valid grounds for denying the Adams Campaign public matching funds,' Garaufis wrote in his decision.
Those two reasons were: The Adams camp did not respond in a timely manner to a records request from the board and blew through a deadline to file a financial disclosure form.
The Campaign Finance Board had also cited the federal bribery case against Adams that was dismissed in April at the behest of President Donald Trump's Department of Justice.
Garaufis did not agree with that line of reasoning, even as he alluded to the unusual nature of the dismissal, which led a former U.S. attorney on the case to quit and the judge to suggest a bargain was struck between Adams and the Trump administration.
'The Board's attempt to shift the burden of proving his innocence to Mayor Adams is inappropriate and goes against the centuries-old American legal principle that presumes the criminal defendant's innocence until proven guilty,' Garaufis wrote in Friday's decision.
That line buoyed the hopes of Adams' attorney, who suggested the campaign would be able to submit the required documentation and attain the matching funds at a future board meeting.
'We are confident now that Mayor Adams will receive matching funds and therefore be in a position to bring his record of success for working-class New Yorkers and their families for the general election this November 4th!' Frank Carone, the mayor's attorney and campaign chair, said in a statement.
CFB spokesperson Timothy Hunter said the board is reviewing the decision.
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