By Katie Honan, Gwynne Hogan and Samantha Maldonado, THE CITY | Editorial credit: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY

New York City Mayor Eric Adams was denied city-funded matching funds on Monday in the latest blow to his flagging reelection bid.

Other candidates were able to boast about their recent fundraising efforts.

Former Governor Andrew Cuomo raised what he said was a “record-shattering” $1.5 million plus in his first 13 days in the race.

Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani’s campaign brought in $845,000 over the roughly two month-filing period, mostly from small donors, a “jawdropping” total he said showed that he has “the momentum, the movement and the money to win.”

But the mayor’s campaign team hadn’t submitted its paperwork as of Monday evening.

At a press conference earlier on Monday, Adams put on a brave face despite his record low approval numbers, federal corruption charges that are still pending and an avalanche of criticism from other Democrats for seeming to cozy up to President Trump while aiming to have those charges dismissed.

“Everyone is catching up to me. You know, everyone is catching up to me,” said Adams, who had raised $4.3 million in private funds before the latest filing period, significantly more than any of his other challengers, though many have made up the difference through public matching funds which the mayor has failed to qualify for.

“I started raising early, and I was pleased with the team, so they catching up to me.”

A text message and call to his campaign lawyer, Vito Pitta, was not returned.

The latest preliminary fundraising data was being released throughout Monday by individual campaigns as the data was added to the Campaign Finance Board’s public website. As of Monday evening, every Democratic mayoral candidate had filed except Adams, whose fundraising haul could be posted up to midnight and posted online by Tuesday morning.

The latest preliminary fundraising data was being released throughout Monday by individual campaigns as the data was added to the Campaign Finance Board’s public website. As of Monday evening, every Democratic mayoral candidate had filed except Adams, whose fundraising haul could be posted up to midnight and posted online by Tuesday morning.

Adrienne Adams, who jumped into the race at the end of February, had yet to meet the threshold to qualify for matching funds. State Sen. Jessica Ramos and Blake have also not yet qualified for matching funds, meaning they can’t yet collect money that’s crucial for building out a campaign operation and promoting a candidate.

To tap into the city’s public financing program, which matches the contributions of some donors by as much as eight to one, candidates have to amass at least $250,000 from at least 1,000 eligible donors.

Ramos, who raised an additional $70,061 in the filing period, bringing her to a total of $232,292, appeared to fall just short of the necessary threshold to begin collecting matching funds on the donations she’s brought in. But she’s spent around $881 more than she’s brought in to date, according to CFB data.

‘It’s Not Personal’

In denying the mayor matching funds since December, the Campaign Finance Board has cited multiple failures including non-compliance with the system’s rules, failure to submit personal financial disclosure and discrepancy between reported donations and filed receipts. Notably, the criminal corruption charges against him are related to his alleged abuses of the system in his previous, successful run for mayor.

Although many candidates are cited for various filing errors, Adams is the only one the CFB has cited for non-compliance.

The mayor said Monday his compliance team was “looking at all of our options to get the justice we deserve,” referring to the generous matching-funds program he has been locked out of so far.

The board also met Monday to discuss distributions from the last filing period, which ended Jan. 11, and doled additional matching funds to mayoral candidates including Lander, Mamdani, Myrie, and Stringer.

Other contenders for Democratic nomination could see payouts of public matching funds when the board meets in April, for their filings from this month.

Mayor Adams’s campaign has also been skeletal, only recently launching a website but using the same photos from his 2021 campaign. Asked last week when he’d start on the campaign trail, the mayor said “soon, and very soon,” suggesting he would proceed after some resolution to the criminal case against him.

But some of the mayor’s longtime defenders have already defected, the latest being longtime ally Assemblymember Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn, the head of the Brooklyn Democratic Party. Although she defended him as recently as last month, on Sunday she announced her support for former Governor Andrew Cuomo, calling him “battle-tested and visionary,” joining a number of other Democrats from his home borough to abandon the embattled incumbent.

On Monday, Adams said Bichotte Hermelyn was still a “dear friend.”

“This is politics. It’s not personal,” he said.

  Mayor Eric Adams