Federal authorities hit Mayor Adams’ asylum seeker operations director, Molly Schaeffer, with a subpoena Friday — making her the latest senior city official to face scrutiny from the feds amid multiple corruption probes swirling around the upper echelons of the mayor’s administration, the Daily News has learned.
Schaeffer, a 10-year city government veteran who was tapped last year by Adams to lead his Office of Asylum Seeker Operations at City Hall, was served with the subpoena at her home in Brooklyn, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
It wasn’t immediately clear if the subpoena is seeking electronics, records, testimony or all three. It also wasn’t immediately clear which federal corruption the subpoena was issued as part of.
Reached by phone early Friday, Schaeffer asked The News, “what is this about,” and then ended the call.
Fabien Levy, Adams’ spokesman, declined to comment on the subpoena, but said in a statement: “As we have repeatedly said, we expect all team members to fully comply with any ongoing inquiry. Molly Schaeffer is an integral part of our team and works hard every day to deliver for New Yorkers.”
In her post, Schaeffer has played a prominent role in overseeing city contracts for migrant services like shelter, food, security and case management.
In that capacity, Schaeffer has worked closely with Tim Pearson, a senior adviser to the mayor tasked by him with coming up with ways to save money on migrant contracts, sources familiar with her role said. Pearson was among a half dozen top advisers to the mayor who got their homes raided and electronics seized by the feds earlier this month.
The federal probe that resulted in Pearson’s devices being seized is looking into potential unregistered lobbying and kickbacks on city contracts, sources have confirmed. Terence Banks, a government consultant and the younger brother of Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Phil Banks and Schools Chancellor David Banks, is a focus in that probe and has represented multiple companies with city business interests.
A spokesman for the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment.
With Graham Rayman
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