Meet the New York City Hall community liaison whose house was raided by the FBI

NEW YORK — She reports directly to Mayor Eric Adams. Some City Hall aides are hazy on her exact duties. And she's now on leave, following FBI raids of her homes.

For Adams, Winnie Greco fills a critical role — a government liaison to the Chinese diaspora, one of the many ethnic voting blocs in New York City's multicultural electorate that the mayor has made inroads with.

Now Greco is under fire, following news that federal agents descended on a pair of her single-family homes in the Bronx Thursday, making her the second community fixer in the Adams administration caught up in a sprawling federal probe.

“She has been empowered in City Hall in a way that goes far beyond what her government experience justifies, and that’s where you can get into trouble,” said one former City Hall official, who was granted anonymity to discuss the mechanics of local government. “These types of roles come with the imprimatur of the mayor’s office and the mayor’s personal power over the city, and if each and every person in that building is not careful, it is very easy to cross the line.”

The FBI raid echoed one just four months earlier, when federal agents reportedly investigating Turkish influence in the New York City government turned up at the home of Rana Abbasova, Adams’ connection to Turkish and Azerbaijani communities.

While roles like Greco’s and Abbasova’s are ingrained in the operations of any New York politician with a diverse constituency, Adams’ unique drive to cultivate support from various demographic enclaves throughout the city has empowered them even further.

Greco is among a select group of city officials who report directly to Adams, according to a City Hall spokesperson, putting her in the company of the first deputy mayor, the schools chancellor and the police commissioner. Most community liaisons do not report straight to the mayor. Greco has traveled with Adams on multiple occasions and stood by his side at key citywide events — underscoring a close relationship dating back to his time as Brooklyn borough president.

While an FBI spokesperson confirmed the location of the raid, federal officials have otherwise been mum on what prompted agents to toss Greco’s two homes along with a third location in a Queens mall where she worked during Adams' 2021 mayoral campaign.

Neither she nor anyone in the Adams administration has been accused of a crime, though the New York Post reported Friday that federal officials suspect Greco of potentially orchestrating straw donors who gave to the mayor’s campaign.

Mayoral administrations take community outreach seriously, so much so that they have an entire division, the Community Affairs Unit, dedicated to fielding concerns and shoring up political support in neighborhoods around the diverse city. The unit has long had a liaison to the Chinese community. But Greco stands apart for her high station in the administration.

“She is not just Eric’s Chinese liaison, she has direct access to the mayor,” a Democratic strategist familiar with their relationship said in an interview.

“She is a power player,” the person added, likening her to Adams’ top aide and longtime ally, Ingrid Lewis-Martin.

When Adams was sworn in as mayor in Times Square on New Year’s Eve, Greco was among those on the dais. She joined him again to watch the ball drop two years later in 2024.

At events and meetings around the city, she is a constant presence at the side of Lewis-Martin, the mayor’s closest confidante. And unlike others in the community affairs division, she holds the dual role of special advisor to the mayor. In fact, Greco was given a coveted seat in the City Hall bullpen, an open-office configuration where top officials manage the daily challenges of city government, according to a former government official with knowledge of the arrangement.

“She’s got deep ties. She’s very, very well connected in the Asian community,” said a person who worked closely with Adams and Greco. “And I think that because Eric knows that … she has his ear.”

Yet beyond maintaining those ties to the Chinese community, the former government official who spoke with POLITICO said it was unclear what other job duties Greco performed to justify her elevated title and salary, which city records show to be $100,000 annually. She works with the Community Affairs Unit as well as other teams, the City Hall spokesperson said.

Greco has a history of attracting unwanted attention to Adams.

Just weeks after he assumed the largely ceremonial role of Brooklyn borough president in 2014, Adams announced her as the first of Borough Hall’s cultural ambassadors. In May of that year, Greco brought Adams to China for 11 days on behalf of a nonprofit she ran called the Sino America New York Brooklyn Archway Association Corp. The organization paid Adams’ way, spending nearly $7,000, while the Chinese government paid $800, the Post reported at the time.

Adams returned to China with Greco again in 2017, one of seven total trips to China he took as borough president, the Post reported.

Asked Friday how many times he’s been to China, Adams told POLITICO, “I’ve lost count.”

Greco’s group supported Adams, funding Chinese cultural events when he was borough president, news outlet THE CITY reported. And Adams boosted Greco’s goal of building a “friendship arch” in the heavily Chinese neighborhood of Brooklyn’s Sunset Park, signing an agreement with a county government in Beijing and dedicating $2 million of his office’s capital dollars to the endeavor. However, the Chinese government pulled out of the project in 2020 and the arch has yet to be built.

As a volunteer for Borough Hall and an unpaid director at an affiliated nonprofit that Adams used to bolster his profile ahead of his mayoral run, Greco grew close to the outspoken Democrat. She was deeply involved in his campaign as a volunteer, primarily fundraising in the city’s Chinese American communities. And once he moved into Gracie Mansion, Adams brought her onto the payroll.

A former Adams campaign volunteer said Greco made him do unpaid work renovating her home in return for help getting a government job, and then made him do personal favors after he got hired, THE CITY reported. A business leader also told the outlet Greco tried to solicit a $10,000 donation to her nonprofit in return for access to a free government event at the mayor’s residence. Following the story, the city’s Department of Investigation opened an investigation — on City Hall’s referral.

Additionally, Greco was named in a story from THE CITY and Documented uncovering questionable contributions to the Adams campaign by employees who worked at the New World Mall in Flushing, Queens. She was also named in another report from THE CITY, Documented and The Guardian that included claims that donors to Adams’ reelection campaign were reimbursed, which would be illegal.

“The campaign has always and will always follow the law,” Adams campaign counsel Vito Pitta said in a statement to POLITICO following the raid. “It would be inappropriate to comment on an ongoing investigation at this time.”

Furthermore, Greco’s connections to an investment group that won a potentially lucrative city lease to operate a mall — first reported by Documented — have raised eyebrows.

Greco, whose Chinese name is Zheng Qirong, worked in the food export business, as well as business development between the U.S. and China.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York, which is reportedly leading the investigation involving Greco, last year charged two men with running an illegal Chinese government police station in Manhattan. One of the men, Harry Lu, joined Greco and Adams ally Jesse Hamilton on a 2019 trip to China on Adams’ behalf, the National Review reported.

On Friday, a day after the FBI raid, Adams told a television interviewer he had full confidence in his longtime ally while insisting he would cooperate with any investigation.

“Whenever there’s an inquiry, the review must be done, and that’s the process. My job is to stay focused on running the city. I’m not going to remove trash off the street and keep the city safe from violence if I’m distracted,” he said, noting that he was not contacted by the FBI in conjunction with the raid.

Greco is currently on sick leave after a medical incident coinciding with the raid and will be placed on unpaid leave thereafter.

Like Greco, Abbasova had worked with Adams since he was borough president. For years, she focused on relationships with the Brooklyn diasporas of Middle East and Central Asian countries like Turkey and Azerbaijan. She was also brought into City Hall once Adams became mayor, taking a post in his International Affairs office. And she, too, was placed on unpaid leave in the wake of the Nov. 2 FBI raid, which was also looking at potential straw donors.

On Friday, Adams was asked if he should have screened some of his staffers more closely.

“We did a great job of vetting,” he said, maintaining that his campaign followed all of the applicable laws when it came to donations. “I had a compliance attorney that looked over every contribution that took place.”