When a younger journalist tried lately to ask Mayor Eric Adams a query about pro-Palestinian demonstrations, Mr. Adams took the change in an uncommon route.
“You seem like you’ve been figuring out, man,” the mayor mentioned at his information convention on Tuesday. “You’ve bought that summer time physique going.”
One of many mayor’s high feminine advisers sitting close to him at Metropolis Corridor shook her head in disbelief. One other deputy mayor appeared down and lined her eyes.
For Mr. Adams, the remark was hardly extraordinary. He usually remarks about folks’s bodily look or clothes at work occasions, and everyone seems to be honest recreation: reporters, constituents and even members of his administration.
As he speaks with satisfaction on what number of of his high cupboard officers are ladies, he has additionally famous how they lead whereas carrying excessive heels, mentioning Louboutin sneakers with their signature purple soles.
“These are big sneakers to fill, however these two women of their purple bottoms, they’re going to convey their very own pair,” he mentioned.
As Mr. Adams praised the town’s outside eating program final summer time, he recommended an ancillary profit.
“It’s possible you’ll drive by and you might even see eye sweet sitting down someplace,” he mentioned. “It’s possible you’ll wish to park and are available and slip them your quantity.”
Mayor Adams is much from the one notable elected official who has been criticized for making feedback that appear inappropriate. President Biden has made remarks about folks’s bodily look. Former President Donald J. Trump usually mocks folks’s bodily look and has been accused of sexual misconduct.
The Division of Justice discovered that former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo subjected feminine workers to a “sexually hostile work setting,” made undesirable feedback and gave preferential therapy to some workers based mostly on their bodily look.
Mr. Adams, a Democrat, was himself accused in a lawsuit of sexually assaulting a colleague in 1993 when he was a police officer.
Fabien Levy, a deputy mayor and the chief spokesman for Mr. Adams, mentioned the mayor “would by no means deliberately make somebody really feel uncomfortable. He’s a heat and fascinating one that talks to New Yorkers the way in which any common New Yorker speaks to 1 one other.”
Not everybody agrees. Marissa Jackson Sow, a legislation professor on the College of Richmond Faculty of Regulation and a former deputy commissioner at New York Metropolis’s Fee on Human Rights, mentioned the mayor’s feedback violated the town’s personal steerage on sexual harassment. Metropolis workers are offered coaching about not making a hostile work setting.
“When you find yourself placing consideration on somebody’s physique and look, it could actually make that individual uncomfortable of their office,” she mentioned. “It doesn’t matter if it was in jest — it’s not about intent. It’s about impression.”
Ms. Jackson Sow mentioned that it doesn’t matter if the individual was personally offended or of the identical gender, and that others who witness the conduct may fear about receiving comparable feedback. It additionally sends the fallacious message, she mentioned, to metropolis staff who is perhaps emboldened to make comparable feedback to others.
Erica Vladimer, a co-founder of a group that combats sexual harassment in Albany, mentioned the mayor’s feedback have been “tone deaf and pointless” and “make it tougher for folks to do their job.”
This was not the primary time that Mr. Adams had singled out the younger reporter, Pete Cuddihy, a school intern at Fox Information, for his look. At a information convention in March, Mr. Cuddihy requested Mr. Adams in regards to the metropolis’s housing disaster.
“I like that turtleneck — folks don’t put on turtlenecks anymore,” Mr. Adams mentioned earlier than suggesting that he would possibly “rock” one himself.
A spokeswoman for Fox Information despatched an announcement from Mr. Cuddihy that mentioned: “Talking solely about my interplay on June 11 with Mayor Adams, I felt his feedback in direction of me have been pleasant, and I didn’t really feel uncomfortable.”
A few of the mayor’s feedback on folks’s appearances would possibly derive from his identified enthusiasm about well being, weight-reduction plan and his personal physique. He has usually referred to his honed midsection and is fond of claiming “I don’t have a six pack, I’ve a case. My physique’s tight.”
However when his observations heart on others, the cringe issue can escalate.
Jessica Ramos, a state senator from Queens who would possibly run for mayor subsequent yr, mentioned it was the mayor’s job to set a tone of professionalism.
“Any mayor ought to know there’s no swagger in making inappropriate feedback about an individual’s physique,” she mentioned. “It’s offensive, distracting, antiquated and pointless.”
The town’s sexual harassment coaching consists of an instance the place a supervisor at a clothes retailer tells an worker: “Your physique seems to be superb in that costume!” The coaching identifies the remark as sexual harassment.
Latest historical past suggests the mayor reveals no signal of adjusting his methods. At a city corridor within the Bronx in January, a lady stood to ask Mr. Adams a query about psychological well being providers. When the mayor requested her how she was doing, she responded: “I’m high quality, thanks.”
Mr. Adams took the chance to flirt: “I didn’t say the way you look.”
The lady laughed and replied: “All proper, you higher watch your self there. Watch your self!”
