Randy Mastro, who withdrew his bid to be the city’s corporation counsel in September after an uproar from the City Council, will now be the city’s first deputy mayor.
Mayor Eric Adams announced the hiring to round out a new slate of aides following the departure of high-level staffers earlier this month.
“Randy is a storied and impressive New Yorker with a track record of success in the face of some of the city and nation’s most challenging times,” the mayor said in a statement.
Mastro is a lawyer who served as deputy mayor for operations and chief of staff to former Mayor Rudy Giuliani in the mid-1990s.
He also worked as an assistant U.S. attorney and deputy chief for the civil division in the Southern District in the 1980s, specializing in organized crime, according to the mayor’s office. Until recently, he also served as chair of Citizens Union, a non-partisan group focused on good government.
“Like so many New Yorkers, I love this city and want it to succeed,” Mastro said in a statement.
Last year, Adams announced he would put Mastro forward for the city’s next corporation counsel, replacing Sylvia Hinds-Radix.
The appointment required approval from the City Council, who throughout a more than eight-hour hearing grilled Mastro about his past work, including representing landlords and anti-congestion pricing groups. During the pandemic, he drew ire for representing opponents to a controversial homeless shelter on the Upper West Side.
When he withdrew his nomination weeks later, Mastro criticized the hearing as “anything but fair” and said in a letter “I do not know what possessed the City Council to conduct this confirmation hearing as it did.”
He’ll replace Camille Joseph-Varlack, who served as interim first deputy mayor for less than a week following the departure of Maria Torres-Springer.
Torres-Springer, along with Meera Joshi, Anne Williams-Isom, and Chauncey Parker, announced their resignations last month over the mayor’s apparent cooperation with the Trump administration as the Department of Justice took the highly unusual move of seeking to drop the mayor’s federal corruption charges.
The role of first deputy mayor is a major job that oversees the city’s budget office, the Department of Finance, the Department of Citywide Administrative Services and other offices, and works with other agencies on city goals.
John Avlon, the chairman of Citizens Union, celebrated Mastro’s hire in a statement — while also criticizing the mayor. The organization has previously called for the mayor to resign.
“New York City will be safer and stronger with my friend and former Citizens Union board chair, Randy Mastro, serving as first deputy mayor,” he said.“Despite the Mayor’s self-inflicted distractions, ethical transgressions and compromised leadership — which led to Citizens Union to call for his resignation — New Yorkers should have faith that their city will be run well and fairly with Randy Mastro in the role of first deputy mayor.”
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