Mayor Eric Adams and the New York Times have gone to war over claims he lied about carrying a weathered photo of his friend and fallen NYPD comrade in his wallet for decades.

The dramatic spectacle erupted Thursday when the outlet alleged that a portrait of Officer Robert Venable that Adams says he has long carried with him isn’t legit — and is instead just a printed-off Google image that was doctored to make it appear old.

The mayor’s office immediately went on the defensive, furiously accusing the outlet of waging a “false attack” against him — even going as far as lining up several members of the slain officer’s family to publicly rebuke the claims.

“It is disgusting that The New York Times has chosen to have Robert Venable’s friends and family relive the tragic murder of a loved one for nothing more than feeding its obsession with dissecting every single moment of Mayor Adams’ life as the paper continues its unsuccessful campaign to paint the mayor as a liar,” his spokesman, Fabien Levy, said in a statement.

The crux of the Times’ story, based on a person familiar with the so-called ordeal, is that staffers inside the Mayor’s office were allegedly pressured into manipulating the photo of Venable in January last year — just days after Adams first publicly revealed he carried the tiny portrait.

The employees had found an image of the slain cop on Google, printed it off in black and white and then splashed coffee on it to make it look old, the source alleged.

Adams’ office, however, has denied the photo-tampering allegation and insists the outlet had initially contacted him Wednesday making claims that the mayor and the slain officer were never actually friends.

“While yesterday’s initial inquiry mentioned a photo, the crux of this request and all initial questions in writing focused on the Times’ claim that there was no real relationship between the two former officers,” a statement from the Mayor’s office said.

His office admitted it “wasted an inordinate amount of time” proving the Times wrong by tracking down Venable’s loved ones, as well as half dozen ex-cops who could corroborate that Adams and the fallen officer were “close friends.”

Despite the allegations of a doctored photo, the mayor’s spokesman insisted Adams had made a photocopy of Venable’s photo more than 30 years ago after the transit officer was killed in the line of duty by drug dealers in East New York in 1987.

“Over 30 years ago, after Officer Venable’s murder, then-Officer Adams made a copy of a photo published of Officer Venable from an NYPD Transit News Bulletin — a document he still has to this day,” Levy said.

“For decades, Mayor Adams has carried a picture of his friend who died in the line of duty, and the Times’ efforts to attack the mayor here would be laughable if it were not so utterly offensive.”

For his part, Hizzoner, a former NYPD captain, has repeatedly spoken publicly since taking office about how he carries the wallet-sized image of his late friend.

“I still think about Robert,” Adams said at a press conference in January last year. “I keep a picture of Robert in my wallet.”

The Mayor made the revelation as he was addressing the recent murder of two NYPD officers — Wilbert Mora and Jason Rivera — who were gunned down on Jan. 21, 2022 while responding to a domestic call in an East Harlem apartment.

The Times source alleges the mocked-up photo was created soon after Adams made those remarks.

The outlet added that the mayor had posed for a photo for them back in February 2022 after they had requested to see the old image.

In an interview with the outlet at the time, Adams said the portrait had been in his wallet until it “got too bulky” — and that he’d since taken to keeping it in a money clip instead.

Adams brought up the photo again in two TV appearances in April 2022 and then showed it while delivering remarks at a Police Academy ceremony in June last year.

“I understand the pain,” Adams told News 12 at the time. “I carry around a picture of Robert Venable, my close friend, that was shot several years ago during my early days of police, and I always have Robert’s picture. The pain never dissipates.”