New York City-based non-profit news organization The City reported Wednesday that a longtime close associate of Mayor Eric Adams handed one of its reporters a wad of cash stuffed inside an opened bag of Herr’s Sour Cream & Onion ripple potato chips, immediately following an Adams campaign event. The associate, an already notorious advisor named Winnie Greco, summoned the reporter to a nearby Whole Foods, thrust the bag of chips into their hands, and then refused its return. Inside the bag, the reporter soon discovered a small red envelope containing "at least one $100 bill and several $20 bills" in folded money. The City referred to this exchange in its reporting as a "failed payoff," and turned the cash over to an investigator from the Brooklyn U.S. attorney's office.
It's not clear what precisely Greco was attempting to purchase with this payoff. The City has reported extensively on the various misdeeds of the Adams administration, but this exchange seems to have happened somewhat randomly, and without the care and discretion a reader of hard-boiled political thrillers might prefer to see from transactions of the sort. Katie Honan, the upstanding reporter, was summoned across the street by a text from Greco, and then handed what at first appeared to be a leftover portion of potato chips. For reasons possibly having to do with ethics but also possibly having to do with having a higher standard for midday snacks, Honan attempted to decline the gift, not realizing at first that the crinkly bag also contained not nearly enough money to buy a single ticket to tonight's showing of John Proctor Is the Villain, at Broadway's Booth Theater.
Speaking as a fellow journalist, I am proud today of Honan, whose loyalty could not be purchased with a moderate handful of reasonably fresh ripple potato chips, to say nothing of almost enough money to pay a third of the price for a solo omakase dinner at New York's Masa restaurant, minus beverage, taxes, and tip. And I must also say—still speaking as a fellow journalist—that I am disgusted and affronted by the actions of Greco, which are an insult to my noble profession.
When Harry Karafin, reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer, went "on the take" for Broadway Maintenance Co., back in 1961, he was compensated to the tune of a $15,000 salary. Broadway Maintenance had been accused by Philadelphia City Controller Alexander Hemphill of rigging bids for public maintenance contracts and then doing hack repairs, and Karafin, an award-winning investigative journalist, was assigned by the Inquirer to dig into Broadway's shit. Instead, he went on the payroll, and added what the Inquirer later described as "about 50 percent more" than his newspaper salary. Karafin, who died in prison in 1973, also took $7,000 from a sham public relations firm to publish pseudonymous columns attacking Mayor James Tate. In one of his most egregious and brazen grafts, Karafin worked back channels to direct a $15,000 city grant to the Combs College of Music, for a summer music program, and then, via an attorney, attempted to extort a full half of that amount from the school's director, later settling for a $2,500 check.
That was more than six decades ago. According to this one online calculator I found and totally trust, $15,000 in 1961 works out to more than $150,000 today. Greco, who as recently as last October was employed by the city as a senior advisor to Adams, attempted to establish a relationship with an investigative reporter with an amount of money that could be fit into a pocket envelope, and then into a snack bag. And not even one of the good snacks—not Andy Capp's Hot Fries, or those kettle-cooked Chesapeake Crab chips, or even a nice pocket-warmed bag of Haribo gummy bears. Have we fallen so far? A Cold War-era local reporter could demand bribes hefty enough to require a by-God briefcase, but today a reporter is supposed to abandon their ethics for far less than the average price of a roundtrip Acela ticket? Today's media environment is truly warped and rotted if favorable coverage for an absolute dead-end loser of a mayoral candidate isn't even worth a party-sized bag of peanut M&Ms.
It's somehow worse if you accept Greco's explanation of her actions. Speaking first in a series of panicked phone calls and later via an attorney, Greco insists that this was all a perfectly innocent misunderstanding. "Can we forget about this," Greco pleaded with editors from The City, per their reporting. "I try to be a good person. Please. Please. Please don’t do in the news nothing about me. I just wanted to be her friend. I just wanted to have one good friend." Greco's attorney, a man named Steven Brill, said that Greco, who has lived in New York City for decades and has been involved in local politics for at least the last 11 years, and whose home was raided by the FBI in 2024 as part of a corruption probe, is still working to grasp the finer points of American culture. "In the Chinese culture," explained Brill, super credibly, "money is often given to others in a gesture of friendship and gratitude. Winnie is apologetic and embarrassed by any negative impression or confusion this may have caused."
Can friendship be had so cheaply, I ask you! Certainly, Greco's has not: The City reported in November 2023 that she allegedly solicited a whopping $10,000 payment from an associate, made to her own nonprofit, just to get that person onto the guest list of an event at Gracie Manor. If that is the going rate for acts of friendship, how are we to take an offer of a mere 45th of that amount for the "good friendship" of a working reporter? And to not even sock that gift inside one of those huge plastic tubs of chocolate peanut butter pretzels! A nice hefty bribe socked inside a huge barrel of Fiddle Faddle is at least not openly rude to an entire profession. Several hundred dollars nestled among the dust and detritus at the bottom of a Costco-level bag of barbecue-flavored pork rinds might—IN THEORY—be received as the genuine basis for an honest friendship. Folded-up cab fare jammed inside a greasy half-eaten bag of potato chips is the payoff equivalent of tipping your server a roll of pennies. Duels have been fought to the death over lesser insults.
This embarrassing episode may finally bring to a close Greco's career in political influence-peddling. An Adams spokesperson told The City that Greco has been suspended from the campaign, and condemned her behavior as inconsistent with the values of the Adams administration, basically every member of which is either being investigated for corruption or has already been imprisoned for corruption. "Mayor Adams had no prior knowledge of this matter," claimed the spokesperson. "He has always demanded the highest ethical and legal standards, and his sole focus remains on serving the people of New York City with integrity."
[The City]
