Marking Memorial Day, Mayor Adams says NYC faces ‘Pearl Harbor moment’ in COVID

Marking his first Memorial Day as mayor, Eric Adams declared Monday that the city is staring down its own “Pearl Harbor moment” as it strives to bounce back from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Adams drew the parallel to the 1941 attack while delivering remarks onboard the USS Intrepid, which was active as a fighter vessel in World War II.

The Intrepid, which is now a museum docked at Pier 86 on Manhattan’s West Side, was a symbol of American “resiliency” after the Pearl Harbor tragedy left a cloud of “uncertainty” over the country, Adams said.

“We too are that. This is a Pearl Harbor moment,” he said.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul and New York City Eric Adams throw a wreath into the Hudson River during the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum’s annual Memorial Day Commemoration Ceremony on May 31, 2022 in New York City. (ALEXI ROSENFELD/)

Referencing COVID, Adams continued: “We lost loved ones and family members to the uncertainty if they were ever returned from a hospital. Our economy took a devastating dive. Many people lost their homes and businesses. The uncertainty hovered our entire nation, but just as then we are here now: We will survive.”

Joining Adams onboard the Intrepid was Gov. Hochul, who cracked a joke about her and the mayor “making history” by both attending the Memorial Day ceremony — a jab at their predecessors, Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio, who very rarely were seen together in public.

Hochul also lauded the sense of “collaboration” that she said motivates those who go into military service.

“Because when you join the military, you put your ego aside, you put your political persuasions aside, you put your geographic influences aside, and you become one powerful unit where the number one objective is to protect your beloved homeland,” she said. “I believe that all of us as Americans and certainly those in public office have the same capacity in our hearts to learn from the examples of our military.”

US Navy sailors walk in with the colors during the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum’s annual Memorial Day Commemoration Ceremony on May 31, 2022 in New York City. (ALEXI ROSENFELD/)

After their remarks, Adams and Hochul stood silently by as service members unfurled a giant American flag onboard the ship. The annual Intrepid Memorial Day event, which was cancelled the past two years due to COVID-19, also featured a military aircraft flyover. Hundreds of veterans and active services members in town for Fleet Week were in attendance.

“I’ve seen other militaries, and I’m clear every morning there is no place I’d rather be than the United States of America,” Adams told the assembled men and women in uniform.

Later in the day, Adams and Hochul attended Memorial Day parades in Queens and on Staten Island.

Adams’ focus on the pandemic in his Memorial Day address comes as the city remains at a “high” COVID-19 risk-alert level, driven by an uptick in infections and hospitalizations.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams attends the annual Memorial Day Parade in Staten Island, New York on Monday, May 30, 2022. (Spencer Platt/)

The COVID resurgence has unnerved health care workers anxious that the city could return to the dark early days of the pandemic.

Still, Adams has refrained from reinstating any public health precautions, like indoor mask and vaccine mandates, arguing that the city is well positioned to beat back the recent COVID-19 wave thanks to widespread availability of vaccines and antiviral treatments.