New York Mayor Eric Adams (D) is in a bind.
But his latest move reeks of desperation and is likely to be self-defeating.
And Eric Adams shot himself in the foot after going to war with social media.
He’s nothing if not creative, and given recent policy blunders he may not have much choice.
With over one hundred thousand illegal immigrants having arrived in his city over the past couple of years, there’s been a tremendous strain on city services – and the city’s budget.
According to City Councilwoman Vicki Paladino, the city is now “spending more taxpayer money to care for foreign nationals than we are on the annual budgets of the NYPD, FDNY, and Department of Sanitation, combined.”
Now Adams and city officials are looking for some way, anyway, to offset that spending.
To that end, the Adams administration has filed a lawsuit against social media companies for fueling a mental health crisis among the youth.
Included in the suit are Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, in addition to Alphabet’s YouTube, Snap’s Snapchat, and ByteDance’s TikTok.
The suit alleges that the tech companies designed their platforms to “purposefully manipulate and addict children and teens to social media applications.”
Adams: Tech companies are “fueling our national youth mental health crisis”
In a statement, Adams said, “Over the past decade, we have seen just how addictive and overwhelming the online world can be, exposing our children to a non-stop stream of harmful content and fueling our national youth mental health crisis.”
Adams claimed that the social media sites have cost the city $100 million because of mental health issues related to their “addictive” content.
It’s really just a shakedown for cash to make up for bad policy
But what essentially amounts to Adams’ Big Apple shakedown of these tech companies has the very real potential of causing further headaches for him and his city down the road.
All of the social media sites included in the lawsuit except Snapchat are owned by companies that have Manhattan real-estate holdings that pay enormous property taxes and other real-estate-related taxes.
All of those tax dollars go directly to funding city services.
The social media companies are hardly blameless when it comes to contributing to detrimental effects on America’s youth but a lawsuit filed by the city of New York isn’t going to solve that problem in a way that congressional legislation possibly could.
The city has far bigger concerns, particularly when it comes to combating “out-of-control” crime and ensuring that criminals are prosecuted for serious offenses instead of the current practice where many receive a slap on the wrist and are back on the streets in almost no time at all.
Using buildings intended for public education to instead house illegal immigrants and forcing students into distance learning has proven to be a disaster that only hurts legal, law-abiding citizens as well.
In the end, risking the loss of companies that provide tens of thousands of high-paying jobs and help fund city services through ill-conceived lawsuits is bad for New Yorkers.
There are better and far more effective ways to close the budget gap.
If Adams and leaders of other deep-blue “sanctuary cities” joined Republicans in demanding that the Biden Administration enforce existing immigration laws, that would be a great start.
Stay tuned to Blue State Blues for any updates to this ongoing story.
