I was skeptical about the federal investigation of New York City mayor Eric Adams as details leaked out in the news media over the past year. The case involved free airline upgrades—which didn’t seem like the kind of gift that called for the FBI to seize a target’s phone in a street search, as occurred in Adams’s case.

I was reminded of the time I covered a trip that New York mayor Edward Koch took to Eastern Europe in 1987. My editor at New York Newsday had insisted that I book a first-class ticket for the return (those were the days in the news business!), and as I sat in my seat, I watched as Koch entered the jet with the presumption he’d be seated in first class as well. Not on Swissair: the attendants escorted him to the back, and as he passed by, he looked at me with a wonderfully sheepish grin. It wasn’t like the flight over—British Airways bumped the whole group of us onto the supersonic Concorde to London after our scheduled flight was canceled because of snow. It was quite the upgrade.

But the very detailed, fifty-seven-page indictment that federal authorities unsealed at U.S. District Court in Manhattan on September 26 did in fact allege what should be considered criminal misconduct: an ongoing, systematized conspiracy for the Turkish government and others to buy off Adams with free travel, luxury lodging, and campaign contributions. Prosecutors packed the indictment with quotes from incriminating emails, evidence designed to show that the gifts were given and received with the understanding that Adams would use his position to help his benefactors. The alleged payback comes when Adams pressures the fire department to clear the new Turkish-consulate high-rise for occupancy even though it hasn’t met safety standards.

As New York political corruption goes, this is small ball. Adams’s defense will try to portray his freebies as common courtesies extended to elected officials, and there is a grain of truth in that; Turkey was a popular destination for New York politicians’ junkets. The indictment homes in on two ethical hotspots—campaign fundraising and gifts to elected officials—that have been difficult to police. State and local ethics codes and disclosure laws are notorious for loopholes. And the Supreme Court has made it increasingly difficult for federal prosecutors to step in and frame influence-peddling as the bribery it tends to be (even as the court has struggled with how to report the lucrative gifts its own members, especially Justice Clarence Thomas, have accepted).

How the case plays in court remains to be seen. The charges revolve around the actions of a “senior official in the Turkish diplomatic establishment,” described in the indictment—more than a hundred times—as “Turkish Official.” The indictment says that this official came to believe Adams might someday be president of the United States. (That is improbable; no New York mayor has ever become president, although many have aspired.) Protected by diplomatic immunity, it’s unlikely “Turkish Official” would be a witness (and the Turkish government maintains nothing improper was done). That leaves another player, “Adams Staffer,” as the chief witness. Adams’s lawyer, Alexander Spiro, says that the case against Adams rests on this witness, who, he asserts, has told contradictory stories and is now lying.

It’s a somewhat daring case for Damian Williams, the first Black person to serve as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, to bring. But it’s a hazardous case for the defense as well. Jurors would be unlikely to sympathize with defense arguments that gifts to Adams were just politics as usual—as a Pew survey found, Americans are politically united in the belief that monied interests have too much influence on their elected officials.

The systematized mechanics of the Turkish airline freebies, as alleged in the indictment, become a framework for greed. The indictment alleges that Adams tried to cash in by routing all his foreign travel through the Turkish airline—for example, for his personal trip to Ghana just before he became mayor. As Adams ascended toward the mayoralty, Turkish Official wrote to an Adams aide, remarking that “at this point,” the Foreign Minister of Turkey “is personally paying attention to him.” And the day after Adams won the Democratic primary for mayor, Turkish Official tried to set up a meeting for him with a deputy minister in his government, writing, “This is very important. He is the person who makes all the arrangements with one phone call in Turkey. Flight, yacht tour, hotels, rental cars.” Adams allegedly accepted free business-class tickets for two on Turkey’s national airline to France, Turkey, and China (twice), free and heavily discounted stays in fancy suites at the St. Regis Istanbul, and upgrades to business class for two to Ghana, Turkey, and Hungary.

Whatever the outcome, Adams leaves New Yorkers with dashed hopes. As he took office on January 1, 2022, there was at least the hope that, as a former police captain who challenged NYPD injustices against the Black community, he could find the elusive path to fighting crime effectively without alienating constituents. But, like predecessors, Adams was mainly driven by the pressure to keep down crime statistics, and further mismanaged the police department by failing to support a popular commissioner, Keechant Sewell, who resigned. His new commissioner, Edward Caban, resigned after the FBI seized his phone in connection with another of the four federal corruption probes of the administration. (Similarly, the schools chancellor, David Banks, announced he is resigning at the end of the calendar year. FBI agents confiscated his phone, and those of his wife, First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright, and his brother, Philip Banks III, the deputy mayor for public safety.)

There have been some pluses for Adams. As the rare mayor who grew up in the city’s working class and attended its public schools, Adams came to office with a new perspective on education. On his watch, the school system is switching to phonics-based literacy programs, replacing approaches that left many students behind—a switch influenced by Adams’s own experience with dyslexia.

Adams is also the first mayor in memory who manages to get along with the governor. The usual toxic rivalries—the one between former Governor Andrew Cuomo and former Mayor Bill de Blasio is a prime example—are a disservice to the public. And he is moving ahead with a zoning plan that could lead to construction of much more housing, even though the proposal is unpopular in middle-class homeowner neighborhoods that have been his political strength.

This hasn’t added up to a cohesive vision for the nation’s largest city, and even without the indictment and continuing corruption investigations, Adams would face a difficult reelection campaign next year. He’s a charming, charismatic, and religious man who trimly embodies the upwardly mobile hopes of many New Yorkers living in neighborhoods far from the centers of wealth and power—making his tenure as mayor all the more disappointing.