U.S. Inquiry Into N.Y. Mayor’s Foreign Ties Said to Include 6 Countries

Federal prosecutors investigating Mayor Eric Adams and his campaign’s ties to Turkey issued subpoenas in July for records related to 5 other countries.

Federal prosecutors investigating whether Mayor Eric Adams conspired with the Turkish government to funnel illegal foreign donations into his campaign have recently sought information about interactions with five other countries, people with knowledge of the matter said.

The demand for information related to the other countries — Israel, China, Qatar, South Korea and Uzbekistan — was made in expansive grand jury subpoenas issued in July to City Hall, the mayor and his campaign, the people said. The prosecutors’ focus on the other five countries has not been previously reported.

The full scope of the inquiry into the mayor is not publicly known, and it remains unclear why investigators were seeking information about the additional countries or whether Mr. Adams has had dealings with them. But the investigation has focused at least in part on whether, in exchange for illegal donations, Mr. Adams pressured the Fire Department to approve a new, high-rise Turkish Consulate in Midtown Manhattan despite safety concerns. Investigators have also examined free flights and flight upgrades the mayor received from Turkish Airlines.

The New York Times first reported on the July subpoenas last month, weeks before a burst of investigative activity focused on five of the mayor’s highest-ranking aides.

On Sept. 4, federal agents conducted searches and seized the phones of the police commissioner, the first deputy mayor, the schools chancellor, the deputy mayor for public safety and a senior adviser who is one the mayor’s closest confidants.

Those actions brought to four the number of federal corruption inquiries swirling around Mr. Adams’s administration, and prompted the resignations of the police commissioner, Edward A. Caban, and the mayor’s chief counsel, Lisa Zornberg, who left the administration after Mr. Adams resisted her advice to clean house.

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Several federal corruption inquiries have reached into the world of Mayor Eric Adams of New York, who faces re-election next year. Here is a closer look at how people with ties to Adams are related to the inquiries.

On Friday, F.B.I. agents also searched the homes of the interim police commissioner, Thomas G. Donlon, whom the mayor appointed on Sept. 12. Mr. Donlon disclosed the search in a statement late Saturday in which he said agents had taken 20-year-old “materials.” But several people with knowledge of the matter said the materials were classified documents and that the search was unrelated to the four other investigations of the mayor and senior members of his administration.

Current and former prosecutors said the searches and seizures of phones of so many senior mayoral aides — and the seizure of the mayor’s own devices 10 months ago — were highly aggressive steps that suggested investigators believe there is a significant level of corruption around the mayor.

But because no charges have been filed against the mayor, his aides or anyone else as a result of the investigations, prosecutors have not had to disclose anything about the evidence they have collected or whether it might support bringing criminal charges.

A spokesman for the mayor’s office, Fabien Levy, said City Hall officials had been asked not to comment on the content of the subpoenas, “but, as we have repeatedly said, we will continue to fully comply with any law enforcement inquiry.”

The fund-raising investigation into the mayor and his campaign appears to have been going on the longest. It is being conducted by the office of the U. S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, Damian Williams, along with the F.B.I. and the city’s Department of Investigation. Representatives of the three agencies declined to comment.

The July subpoenas in the fund-raising investigation sought communications and other information related to the five nations, as well as records related to tickets to the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, which the mayor attended, and additional information about Turkey.

The subpoenas demanded information about the Police Department’s placement of security booths, which are sometimes installed outside foreign consulates, and the mayor’s use of the encrypted messaging app Signal, several of the people said.

Investigators also sought information related to a number of people, including the former Turkish consul general in New York, Reyhan Özgür, whom Mr. Adams, during a flag-raising ceremony for Turkey in 2022, described as a “good friend” he has known for years.

A year earlier, the Turkish consulate’s Instagram account posted a photo of Mr. Özgür clasping the mayor’s hand during a tour of the consulate’s new Midtown high-rise.

Mr. Özgür, when he was deputy consul general, was on the guest list for a December 2017 dinner Mr. Adams was hosting for Turkish officials and executives from Turkish Airlines at a Brooklyn seafood restaurant run by Mr. Adams’s close friends, according to emails reviewed by The New York Times.

Mr. Özgür later served as consul general in New York from August 2020 until last month. He could not be reached for comment.

Another person named in the subpoenas was Arda Sayiner, a self-described brand adviser, influencer and journalist who does business in Turkey and whose website touts an interview he once conducted with Mr. Adams.

“I have known New York Mayor Eric Adams for nearly 10 years,” Mr. Sayiner wrote in the Turkish newspaper Hurriyet last year. He added that the two had met while Mr. Adams was Brooklyn borough president and that he had accompanied Mr. Adams “on many of his trips to Turkey.”

Mr. Sayiner was involved in arranging Mr. Adams’s itinerary for a December 2015 trip he made to Turkey while he was borough president, his second official visit to the country in four months.

Among his stops on the trip, Mr. Adams met with a developer and promised to introduce him to contractors in Brooklyn, according to a Turkish news report.

Emails show that Mr. Sayiner forwarded Turkish Airlines ticketing information for Mr. Adams to Rana Abbasova, who was Mr. Adams’s liaison to the Turkish community in the borough president’s office at the time and went to work for him when he became mayor. Since then, Ms. Abbasova has turned against Mr. Adams and is cooperating with the investigation.

At least once, Mr. Sayiner attended a private dinner with Mr. Adams, members of his staff and the Turkish community in New York to discuss travel to the country, according to a person who was at the dinner.

Mr. Sayiner could not be reached for comment.

The July subpoenas were issued eight months after the investigation into the mayor first spilled into public view. In November, federal agents searched the homes of Mr. Adams’s chief fund-raiser, Brianna Suggs, Ms. Abbasova, who was an aide in his international affairs office, and a former Turkish Airlines executive who served on the mayor’s transition committee, Cenk Öcal.

Susan C. Beachy contributed research.