NYC Local News: Mamadani Joins Pols in Puerto Rico for 5-Day 'Conference'

Post-Election, Pols Hit Puerto Rico for 5-Day SOMOS Feast 

 

City Hall staffers — many on the taxpayer tab — also traveled to San Juan.

This article originally appeared in The City.

By Katie Honan 

Manhattan Voice 

November 7, 2025

NYC LOCAL NEWS: Mayor Eric Adams is no-showing the SOMOS political conference for a second straight year, but nearly a dozen current City Hall staffers made the taxpayer-funded jaunt to Puerto Rico to hobnob with his successor. 

The list of attendees at the annual gathering includes deputy mayors Camille Joseph Varlack, Ana Almanzar, Suzanne Miles-Gustave and Adolfo Carrion, and Department of Transportation Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez, according to spokesperson Liz Garcia. 

“Nightlife mayor” Jeffrey Garcia, Sheriff Anthony Miranda, Department of Small Business Services Commissioner Dynishal Gross and City Planning Commissioner Dan Garodnick are also traveling to San Juan on the taxpayer tab for the five-day gathering.

The total cost of the staff trips is unknown, and Garodnick’s trip is only paid for partially. But a travel request reviewed by THE CITY for Rodriguez and another DOT staffer totaled more than $6,600, which included $587 for round-trip flights and a $125 per diem for meals. 

All “out-of-city” trips paid for by taxpayers are approved by the Mayor’s Office of Administrative Services, which signed off on expenses for over a dozen city staffers to attend, according to an unofficial count by THE CITY. 

Garcia said the purpose of the trip is “to discuss policies affecting New Yorkers and help foster relationships with Latino communities.” 

“As the mayor has said, the work continues until the end of the admin,” she said in a statement.

A record reviewed by THE CITY showed Transportation Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez and a DOT staffer submitted a travel request totaling more than $6,600, June 12, 2025.

The annual post-Election Day confab, which is hosted by members of the state Legislature to nominally discuss legislative priorities, turns a cluster of hotels in San Juan into a political jamboree.

It runs through Sunday, with a Friday night “Somos Inc. Cultural Celebration” sponsored by Phillip Morris International and a Saturday night beachside blowout featuring Puerto Rican salsa singer Victor Manuelle.  

The stakes are higher this year with a new mayor coming into power in less than 60 days — and current staffers jostling for new jobs or to keep the ones they have.

Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani traveled to Puerto Rico Thursday afternoon, less than 48 hours after his historic win over former governor Andrew Cuomo to become the city’s 111th mayor. 

Mamdani traveled with his city-funded NYPD detail and about 10 staffers who each covered their own costs, according to spokeswoman Dora Pekec. Most elected officials pay for their trips with campaign dollars or with their own money, although the sitting mayor and governor have previously used tax dollars.

Mamdani was scheduled to host a reception at the El Caribe Hilton with New York Attorney General Letitia James and Henry Garrido, the executive director of District Council 37, the city’s largest public employee union. 

Adams made the trip to the Caribbean in 2021, days after he won the general election, to schmooze and relish in his future as the city’s 110th mayor. His trip that year, along with those of the half-dozen aides from his time as Brooklyn borough president, did not come on the taxpayer dime, Adams said at the time. 

But it was later reported that the mayor flew down on a private jet owned by crypto billionaire Brock Pierce.

Pierce — who launched a last-minute, doomed effort to draft Adams back into the mayor’s race — confirmed last month that the trip cost between $5,000 and $7,000.

Adams, he said, paid him back for the trip.