{"id":265454,"date":"2026-06-13T12:41:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T12:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/265454\/"},"modified":"2026-06-13T12:41:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T12:41:10","slug":"sharks-circling-around-samuels-after-disastrous-city-council-hearings-dead-man-walking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/265454\/","title":{"rendered":"Sharks circling around Samuels after disastrous City Council hearings: ‘Dead man walking’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sharks in City Hall are circling around NYC Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels, insiders told The Post this week, as the first elected official has publicly called for his head.<\/p>\n

Samuels had a disastrous week after he was grilled at a City Council budget hearing<\/a> Monday over The Post\u2019s bombshell <\/a>exclusive that he inked a $180,000 no-bid contract with a non-Department of Education-approved vendor Sean Kreyling in 2023, while he was superintendent of the Upper West Side\u2019s District 3.<\/p>\n

\"DOEThe first public official has called for Samuels to resign. Stephen Yang for NY Post<\/p>\n

He also split payments<\/a> between Kreyling\u2019s two companies so they wouldn\u2019t exceed a $25,000 threshold that would have triggered city financial oversight, emails obtained by The Post show. <\/p>\n

\u201cChancellor Kamar Samuels has lost the confidence of public school parents, educators, and school administrators. He should step down,\u201d New York City Councilman Phil Wong (D-Queens) told The Post. <\/p>\n

A City Hall insider told The Post the DOE is already expecting Samuels to get the axe, and the agency is bracing itself for the loss of its fourth chancellor in five years.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a dead man walking,\u201d the source said. <\/p>\n

\u201cPeople don\u2019t really like him anyway \u2014 people believe he is in way over his head,\u201d a well-placed DOE source told The Post.<\/p>\n

Before DOE General Counsel Liz Vladeck shut down further questions, Samuels testified Monday that he regrets \u201cthe lapses in policy and procedures that took place while I was the superintendent, and the actions in question were all meant to [be] in the pursuit of educational opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"PhilNYC City Councilman Phil Wong said Samuels lost the confidence of parents and educators. James Messerschmidt for the NY Post<\/p>\n

Samuels\u2019 week only got worse after Kreyling was suddenly called in to testify at a hearing Wednesday, and pointed the finger squarely at Samuels and also accused the SCI \u2014 the independent DOE investigative body \u2014 of engaging in a rigged investigation<\/a> to cover for him.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt had a narrative that it wanted to carry out from start to finish, protecting certain individuals, and ultimately it allowed me and my organization to be the scapegoats for the very poor decisions of Kamar Samuels,\u201d he testified at the hearing. <\/p>\n

The June 2025 SCI report pinned the blame on Kreyling and Samuels\u2019 former Deputy Superintendent, Mariela Graham \u2014 who signed a near-identical contract with Kreyling in 2024 \u2014 and made no mention of Samuels\u2019 role in the scheme.<\/p>\n

City Councilman Frank Morano (R\u2013Staten Island) demanded accountability after Kreyling\u2019s testimony.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat troubles me isn\u2019t just the allegation itself. It\u2019s the possibility that there may be one set of rules for rank-and-file employees and another set of rules for senior leadership,\u201d Morano said. <\/p>\n

The DOE and Samuels did not respond to The Post\u2019s request for comment. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sharks in City Hall are circling around NYC Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels, insiders told The Post this week,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":265455,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[4337,41579,57,9,56,63,65,64,10693,58],"class_list":["post-265454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-department-of-education","tag-kamar-samuels","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-scams","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265454","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=265454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/265455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=265454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=265454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=265454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}