{"id":197811,"date":"2026-04-15T09:20:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T09:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/197811\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T09:20:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T09:20:12","slug":"hear-eric-adams-speak-yiddish-on-ai-voice-recordings-nbc-new-york","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/197811\/","title":{"rendered":"Hear Eric Adams speak Yiddish on AI voice recordings \u2013 NBC New York"},"content":{"rendered":"

For two and a half years, the NBC New York I-Team has been asking City Hall for controversial audio files that depict Eric Adams communicating in foreign languages.\u00a0Back in 2023, the former mayor used AI voice cloning software to produce robocalls targeting New York City enclaves where English is less common.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At the time, Adams was criticized for not disclosing, within the robocalls, that the voice heard by his constituents had been altered by AI.\u00a0After questions from reporters, the former mayor did release one Spanish-language robocall, but the others remained under wraps \u2013 month after month. Until now.<\/p>\n

Under the Mamdani administration, the audio files, once withheld, were made public this week. After initially delaying the release in March<\/a>, Mamdani handed them over this month. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of the newly released recordings depicts Adams speaking Haitian Creole.\u00a0Another audio file is an attempt to make Adams sound like he\u2019s speaking Yiddish.\u00a0Several of the recordings are Spanish versions of the former mayor\u2019s voice speaking at different cadences.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s never been clear why Mayor Adams declined to release all the audio files.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the type of information that the journalists, the public should be able to get quickly,\u201d said Rachael Fauss, Senior Policy Advisor at the good government watchdog, Reinvent Albany.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for Adams did not respond to the I-Team\u2019s questions about why the former mayor withheld the files during his time in office.\u00a0 However, in a series of automated \u201cextension\u201d notices, delivered during the two years after the I-Team requested the records, City Hall blamed \u201cthe volume of [records] requests\u201d for a delay in producing the recordings.<\/p>\n

Last year, Fauss authored a report documenting New York City\u2019s failure to produce more than 50 thousands of government records sought by members of the public over the prior six years.\u00a0 She found the Mayor\u2019s Office, under Adams, was among the slowest to close requests for public records, taking an average of 283 days to fully respond to citizen\u2019s requests under the state\u2019s Freedom of Information Law.<\/p>\n

Prior to taking over City Hall, in both his campaign and transition, Mamdani pledged a \u201cnew era\u201d of transparency in government.\u00a0 After the I-Team requested Mamdani make public the audio files of his predecessor\u2019s AI-altered voice, Jenna Lyle, a spokesperson for the new mayor, said he was committed to following through on his transparency pledge.<\/p>\n

\u201cMayor Mamdani has been clear,\u201d Lyle wrote, \u201ctransparency and accountability are prerequisites to a city government that truly delivers for New Yorkers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fauss applauded Mayor Mamdani\u2019s decision to release the AI audio files to the I-Team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it is a good sign that this request was responded to quickly after you elevated it,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cHopefully that\u2019s going to translate to all the requests that are in the backlog from the Adams Administration.\u00a0 There are a number of people \u2013 thousands – waiting for records.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For two and a half years, the NBC New York I-Team has been asking City Hall for controversial…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":197812,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[81,4484,9,11,10,87],"class_list":{"0":"post-197811","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-eric-adams","9":"tag-i-team","10":"tag-new-york","11":"tag-new-york-headlines","12":"tag-new-york-news","13":"tag-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197811"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197811\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}