Feds subpoena NYC Mayor Eric Adams’ head of asylum seeker services Molly Schaeffer

Federal authorities subpoenaed New York City’s head of asylum seeker services Friday — looking for records on migrant contracting as part of a probe into one of Mayor Eric Adams’ top aides, The Post has learned.

Molly Schaeffer, the low-profile director of the city’s Office of Asylum Seeker Operations, was hit with the information-sharing request by the feds at her Brooklyn home, according to law enforcement sources.

Sources said the subpoena is connected to an investigation into Timothy Pearson, a retired NYPD inspector who advises Adams on public safety – and one of a raft of top City Hall officials and mayoral allies who were raided by the feds Sept. 4.

It’s only the latest in a widening net of federal scrutiny circling Adams’ administration. No officials have been charged or accused of wrongdoing.

Schaeffer was asked to cough up her communications with Pearson and is not under investigation by the feds for wrongdoing, sources said.

Investigators are looking into whether Pearson, who oversees security deals for migrant shelters, may have allegedly interfered with picking contractors in exchange for illegal kickbacks, sources have said. It’s not known which specific contracts the feds might be eyeing.

Pearson’s schedules, obtained by The Post, show he had a daily “quick check in” with Schaeffer on asylum seekers since May 2023. 

He also met with Schaeffer on migrants four different times in April of that year, according to the schedules.

The Post tried several times to contact Pearson, only to get a prompt that he couldn’t accept calls. His attorney didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The feds grilled a number of cops in Pearson’s obscure city unit, the Municipal Services Assessment, earlier this year about city contracting, according to sources.

Similar allegations emerged in an April lawsuit that quoted Pearson telling people in the MSA that he was looking for a cut of the city deals. 

“Do you know how these contracts work?” Pearson allegedly asked some of the employees of the unit in October 2022, according to the lawsuit, filed by a staffer in the unit. “People are doing very well on these contracts. I have to get mine. Where are my crumbs?”

Pearson had his phones taken by the feds two weeks ago during a large-scale sweep of city officials’ devices. 

Reached by phone Friday, Schaeffer told The Post there was no raid, but did not deny the feds had visited her home.

She referred further questions to the City Hall press office before hanging up abruptly.

Calls to the Southern District of New York were not returned. 

“We have repeatedly said, we expect all team members to fully comply with any ongoing inquiry,” Deputy Mayor of Communication Fabien Levy said in a statement when asked about the subpoena.

“Molly Schaeffer is an integral part of our team and works hard every day to deliver for New Yorkers,” he said. 

Schaeffer was hired by City Hall back under then-Mayor Bill de Blasio in 2019 after spending the prior five years in city government, according to her LinkedIn.

She was appointed by Adams in February 2022 as a deputy chief of staff and senior emergency adviser focused on COVID-19 and public safety.

But Schaeffer’s role changed as tens of thousands of migrants began flowing into New York City in the spring of 2022. She moved to the city’s Office of Asylum Seeker Operations in mid-2023, taking on a portfolio that included a “resettlement” effort aiming to ship migrants from the Big Apple.

Schaeffer often attended community meetings with Adams, but seldom spoke, transcripts show.

The investigation into Pearson and another top aide, Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Phil Banks, “for contract steering and kickbacks compels Mayor Adams to conduct an internal review of the contracts they’ve touched,” said political operative Ken Frydman. 

“There’s too much drip drip here,” said Councilman Robert Holden (D-Queens). 

“I’ve been suspicious for over a year about how contracts like DocGo and MoCaFi are tied to the migrant crisis,” he added, referring to the controversial no-bid emergency contracts signed by the Adams administration since 2022.

DocGo, a controversial COVID testing-turned-migrant shelter firm, has netted around $432 million in no-bid city contracts. Tech finance company Mobility Capital Finance (MoCaFi) snagged a $53 million deal to provide migrants with prepaid credit cards earlier this year.

The two deals have been held up as reasons to pull the Adams administration’s emergency contract powers — but The Post has no reporting to suggest they are part of the probe.

“The migrant crisis has cost this city far too much, and it’s a crisis of City Hall’s own making. It’s extremely concerning that the subpoenas keep coming,” Holden said.

Finance Chair and Brooklyn Councilman Justin Brannan added: “When the fog of an emergency lifts, our rules and laws remain. And when it comes to hardworking taxpayer dollars, every goddamn penny must be accounted for. This isn’t Monopoly money.”

Adams has repeatedly defended Pearson, a longtime friend and confidante, against growing calls for his ouster. He said Tuesday that Pearson’s value to the city could be measured in mountains of money saved in migrant contracts.

“We asked him to go in and look in and we saved hundreds of millions of dollars by bringing down the costs, everything from security contracts to other contracts,” Hizzoner said.

Loyalty to his longtime ally lost the mayor his top legal counsel over the weekend. 

The shocking resignation of Lisa Zornberg came late Saturday after Adams refused to push Pearson out the door, sources said.

Zornberg also called for two other top officials ensnared in federal probes to go, Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Phil Banks and the city’s director of Asian Affairs Winnie Greco.The fresh subpoenas come just a day after the feds dropped another set of court orders for information on the mayor’s former chief of staff, Frank Carone, and Brooklyn Monsignor Jamie Gigantiello, according to sources.