The Legal Aid Society is condemning Emergency Executive Orders issued by Mayor Eric Adams over the weekend, which will suspend parts of a new law intended to ban solitary confinement in local jails a day before it was to take effect.

“This manufactured ‘emergency’ is an overreach by Mayor Adams. It is irrational to claim that the prospect of implementing a law enacted months ago has caused a state of emergency,” reads a statement from Legal Aid. “These executive orders set a dangerous precedent where the Mayor can avoid implementing laws that he disagrees with simply by claiming they would adversely affect public safety.”

Related: LAS Sues to End Solitary Confinement of New Yorkers with Disabilities

“Instead of issuing emergency orders a day before the ban was scheduled to go into effect, Mayor Adams should be doing everything possible to end the inhumane isolation of incarcerated New Yorkers, stop the rampant brutality in the jails, and reduce the jail population.”

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