Trump Housing Official Trapped In Elevator While Touring NYCHA

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — A Trump Administration housing official got trapped in an elevator at an Upper West Side public housing building while touring the complex with reporters and local officials before she moved in for the week.

Lynne Patton and a host of reporters got stuck in the elevator of a Frederick Douglass Houses building on Tuesday, according to firsthand reports and New York City Housing Authority officials. The group was freed from the elevator before noon by the FDNY, a NYCHA spokesperson confirmed on social media.

PIX11 reporter Monica Morales uploaded a selfie of the trapped group to Twitter. State Senator Brian Benjamin was also present in the trapped elevator, according to the photo.

Reporters stationed outside the elevator doors got an up-close look at the rescue effort:

City Hall Spokesman Eric Phillips pinned the elevator breakdown on suspected overcrowding, according to a statement posted on social media.

"No mechanical issues have been found, and the elevator was recently inspected," Phillips said on Twitter.

A NYCHA spokeswoman later clarified that building staff confirmed the elevator's alarm was accidentally triggered, causing the machine to stop.

Patton, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's regional administrator for New York and New Jersey, was touring the Frederick Douglass Houses ahead of a week-long stay at the building with a host family. Patton moved into the complex late Monday night to live with Tenant Association President Carmen Quiñones and plans to hold a town hall Friday night in Harlem to meet with more NYCHA residents.

The HUD official harshly summed up a previous five-day stay at the Bronx's Patterson Houses: "We went to a ton of s---hole apartments, as my boss would say," Patton said last week. "We went to a ton of them. They are horrible."

Patton, a former event planner who worked for the Trump family, is spending five days apiece in four New York City Housing Authority developments to better understand tenants' experiences, according to federal officials. She said she will bring her findings to HUD Secretary Ben Carson and the monitor whom federal officials will appoint as part of a recent deal to address NYCHA's myriad issues.

Patton planned to begin her tenancy earlier but said she had to put off the plans because of the five-week partial government shutdown.

Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images News/Getty Images