Outgoing mayor’s reported last-minute move is a cynical effort to block Council reforms, and disrupt the incoming administration

Citizens Union calls on Mayor Adams to step back from this power grab

New York, N.Y. (December 31, 2025) – Grace Rauh, Executive Director of Citizens Union, today released the following statement in response to outgoing Mayor Eric Adams’s reported plan to establish a new charter revision commission on the final day of his term:

“A charter revision commission created in the final hours of an outgoing mayor who has lost the confidence of New Yorkers will have no public mandate and no credibility and makes a mockery of our city’s constitution. Nominees should refuse to serve on this Commission and Mayor Adams should step back from his power grab.

“Mayor Adams’s anticipated action appears designed to achieve two goals. First, it would block the City Council’s Charter Revision Commission from reaching the 2026 ballot, where it had planned to present accountability and anti-corruption reforms aimed at preventing a repeat of the power abuses and ethics failures seen under Mayor Adams. Adams’s last-minute charter commission, which had been rumored for months, would not have been able to interfere with the Council Commission’s proposals if not for Governor Hochul’s recent veto of legislation that would have removed the mayor’s authority to ‘bump’ ballot questions.

“Second, this action is intended to disrupt the incoming Mamdani administration by creating a body with the legal authority to review and propose sweeping changes to the city charter, guided by a former mayor who has failed to maintain the confidence of voters.

“Citizens Union is strongly committed to the goal of open primaries, but this is the wrong way to achieve them and risks killing the idea without building a broad coalition of support. In addition, by reportedly trying to tie a necessary reform like open primaries to a removal of New York’s sanctuary city status is unwise, impractical and divisive.

“This is the fourth charter commission announcement in the last twenty months. It has never been clearer that the laws and rules governing the charter revision process must be reformed so the system serves the public interest, not political opportunism.”