NEW YORK (AP) — A federal judge on Friday canceled the corruption trial for New York City Mayor Eric Adams and appointed counsel to advise him on how to handle the Justice Department’s controversial request to drop charges against the Democrat.

Judge Dale E. Ho’s written order means he won’t decide before mid-March whether to grant the dismissal of the case against the embattled mayor of the nation’s largest city.

At a hearing Wednesday, Acting Deputy U.S. Attorney General Emil Bove defended his request to drop the charges on the grounds that they were too close to Adam’s reelection campaign and would distract from the mayor’s efforts to assist in the Trump administration’s law-and-order priorities.

Adams confirmed at the hearing that he accepted that charges could later be reinstated — a feature of the request that has led some legal experts to speculate that the mayor can only escape trial if he helps Trump’s plans to round up New Yorkers who are in the country illegally.

Adams was indicted in September on charges alleging he accepted over $100,000 in illegal campaign contributions and travel perks from a Turkish official and others seeking to buy influence while he was Brooklyn borough president. He faces multiple challengers in June’s Democratic primary. He has pleaded not guilty and insisted he’s innocent.

On Friday, Ho appointed Paul Clement, a former U.S. solicitor general under President George W. Bush, to present arguments on the government’s case-drop request.

Ho said he wanted all parties and Clement to address the legal standard for dismissing charges, whether a court may consider materials beyond the motion itself and under what circumstances additional procedural steps and further inquiry was necessary.

He also said he wants to know when dismissal without the ability to reinstate charges is appropriate. He set a briefs deadline for March 7 with possible oral arguments on March 14.

In his order Friday, Ho said one of Clement’s tasks would be to review a 1977 case in which a judge rejected the government’s demand to dismiss a case.

Before she resigned last week, Interim U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon cited the case in a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi. In it, a Manhattan federal court judge said it was “not in the public interest” to go along with the Justice Department’s request for dismissal against a chemical company executive in a price-fixing case.

University of Richmond law professor Carl Tobias said Clement was a relatively conservative lawyer recognized as one of the nation’s most distinguished attorneys and was a sensible choice to be a neutral adviser for a recently appointed judge whose previous experience was primarily civil matters.

Late Thursday, three former U.S. attorneys — from New York, Connecticut and New Jersey — submitted a letter urging Ho to “hear from parties other than the government and the defendant in deciding about the appropriate next steps.”

In court on Wednesday, Adams’ lawyer, Alex Spiro, said no appeals court has ever sided with a judge who rejected an unopposed motion to dismiss a criminal case. Until about 80 years ago, such requests were granted automatically, without a judge weighing in.

In a letter to Ho on Friday, Spiro cited Bondi’s Thursday night remarks at the Conservative Political Action Conference that the indictment against Adams was “incredibly weak” and needed to be dismissed to end the “weaponization of the government” in arguing for Ho to dismiss the charges for reasons based on “the evidence and on the law.”

He did not respond to a message seeking comment on Ho’s order. The Justice Department also didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Adams will not be required to attend future hearings, the judge said.

That could help mitigate some political damage for Adams as he could avoid being hauled back to court for hearings while he tries to convince the public that the case isn’t distracting him from running the city.

Adams has sought to project calm as questions over his independence have sparked a political crisis in his administration.

This week, four of his top deputies resigned and Gov. Kathy Hochul announced that she had for now decided against removing Adams from office but would instead propose legislation to enhance state oversight of City Hall as a way to reestablish trust with New Yorkers

Bove’s initial request last week to Sassoon to drop charges against Adams was rejected and she resigned, accusing Bove of dangling a quid pro quo that would ensure help from Adams in the immigration fight in return for dismissal of his criminal case.

Another prosecutor, Hagan Scotten, told Bove in a resignation letter that it would take a “fool” or a “coward” to meet Bove’s demand, “but it was never going to be me.”

In all, seven prosecutors, including five high-ranking prosecutors at the Justice Department in Washington, had resigned last week before Bove made the dismissal request himself, along with two other prosecutors from Washington.

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Associated Press reporters Jennifer Peltz, Alanna Durkin Richer in Washington and Anthony Izaguirre in Albany, New York, contributed to this story.