New York Attorney General Letitia James announced that she's running for governor in 2022, offering a primary challenge to current Gov...
New York Attorney General Letitia James announced that she's running for governor in 2022, offering a primary challenge to current Governor Kathy Hochul, who took office after Andrew Cuomo was forced out thanks to an investigation by James herself.
James, 62, who served under Cuomo for three years, becomes the first challenger to Hochul in the Democratic primary, which will take place June 28, 2022.
The announcement follows a statement from Cuomo's top spokesperson on Friday accusing James of using her office for political gain, a day after a misdemeanor sex offense complaint was filed against Cuomo.
'Law and politics are totally separate and this is a toxic intersection of the two,' Rich Azzopardi, the spokesman, said in a statement that Cuomo tweeted on Friday. 'Tish James used her office to attack the Governor for her own political benefit and she violated the law in the process.'
A criminal complaint charging Cuomo with a misdemeanor sex offense for forcible touching was filed on Thursday in a court in Albany, the state capital, the first prosecution stemming from a misconduct scandal that led to his resignation.
New York Attorney General Letitia James announced that she's running for governor in 2022
James becomes the first challenger to current Governor Kathy Hochul in the Democratic primary, which will take place June 28, 2022
James providing a shocking report that led to the resignation of former Governor Andrew Cuomo, Hochul's running mate
James made the announcement in a statement on Thursday. She had spent the morning at a Brooklyn political breakfast that she only arrived at after Hochul had departed.
It is unclear if she deliberately avoided her rival for the gubernatorial race, which will culminate in a November 2022 election.
'As I've traveled all around New York state, I have witnessed too many working families struggling to make ends meet, and it's clear that the status quo just won't do,' said James.
'New Yorkers need a governor who isn't afraid to stand up to powerful interests on behalf of the vulnerable. Throughout my career, I've taken on big forces and New Yorkers know I will never back down when it comes to fighting for them. Today, I am proud to announce my candidacy for governor of New York so we can bring transformational change that uplifts all New Yorkers.'
James did not reference Hochul or Cuomo by name in her statement.
Her announcement was immediately followed by an endorsement from the president of the Transport Workers Union, John Samuelsson.
'In Tish James, workers will have a Governor who goes to bat for us every single day,' he said in a statement.
Samuelsson was the first major union leader to end his support of Cuomo back in July, before James had delivered the results of her investigation.
James has been a longtime servant in New York politics. She got her start working in the Brooklyn regional office of Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.
She enters what is likely going to be a crowded field in June's Democratic primary. James' successor as public advocate, Jumaane Williams, is exploring a run and expected to make an announcement 'very soon,' a spokesman told DailyMail.com Thursday. Williams unsuccessfully challenged Hochul in the race for Lieutenant Governor in 2018.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio has also hinted at running.
On the Republican side, Long Island Congressman Lee Zeldin and Andrew Giuliani, attorney and son of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, are the highest profile candidates to declare so far in the heavily blue state. New York has not elected a Republican to statewide office since 2002.
Requests for comment were sent to representatives for Hochul and Williams.
James made the announcement in a campaign video that didn't make mention of Hochul or Cuomo by name
New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams is also exploring a run for governor
Hochul has served as governor since August 24
Long Island Congressman Lee Zeldin is running in the Republican primary for governor
Andrew Giuliani, attorney, Newsmax TV contributor and son of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, is running for the Republican nomination
She spent a decade in New York City Council after first winning election to her Brooklyn district in 2003. That was followed with five years serving as New York City Public Advocate.
James won 62 percent of the vote in 2018 to become New York's first woman attorney general and first woman of color to hold statewide elected office.
During that time, she's become a recognizable figure for investigations into both former President Donald Trump and, more recently, now disgraced Governor Andrew Cuomo.
James issued a damning 168-page report on August 3, 2021, detailing Cuomo's abusive behavior with the 11 women who made sexual assault allegations against the former governor.
The report 'extraordinarily prejudiced the governor, ousted him from office, overturned an election and disenfranchised the votes of 3.6 million New Yorkers,' Cuomo's lawyer Rita Glavin said in a news conference livestreamed on Cuomo's campaign website.
In James's 168-page shock report, she claimed that the embattled then-governor was a sex pest behind a concerted campaign of unwanted comments and touching that spanned from 2013 to 2020.
It concluded that Cuomo sexually harassed 11 women and was more scathing and damaging than his top aides - including his most loyal Melissa DeRosa - who Cuomo even dubbed a 'mean girl'.
James also revealed that DeRosa, who resigned weeks before Cuomo stepped down as governor, did so because she didn't believe her former boss had a future in office following the allegations.
She was also reportedly no longer willing to stand up for him in public.
Charges were filed against Cuomo on Thursday in Albany City Court. They relate to the allegation of Brittany Commisso, a former aide who claimed Cuomo groped her breast in the office of the Executive Mansion in Albany in December 2020, when he was at the height of his pandemic popularity.
Cuomo has always denied it.
Commisso's claim was the most serious of all of the allegations listed in James' report, which Cuomo has always maintained was a hit-job by James to get him out of her way. She is running for governor in November 2022.
'From the moment my office received the referral to investigate allegations that former Governor Andrew Cuomo sexually harassed multiple women, we proceeded without fear or favor,' James' office said in a statement.
'The criminal charges brought today against Mr. Cuomo for forcible touching further validate the findings in our report.'
Cuomo is pictured with Brittany Commisso, the former aide who claims he groped her breast in the Executive Mansion in November 2020. The picture was taken in 2019 and she says he'd touched her behind shortly before it was taken
Commisso claimed that she felt violated and that Cuomo wouldn't 'touch his mother' the way he did her. He has always denied her claims
The complaint, which was signed by an investigator from the Albany County Sheriff's Office, alleges that the former governor 'intentionally, and for no legitimate purpose, forcibly place his hand under the blouse shirt of the victim and onto her intimate body part'
If convicted, Cuomo - who has not yet commented - could face up to one year in prison.
The complaint, which was signed by an investigator from the Albany County Sheriff's Office, alleges that the former governor 'intentionally, and for no legitimate purpose, forcibly place his hand under the blouse shirt of the victim and onto her intimate body part.'
Cuomo is alleged to have touched Commisso's left breast 'for the purposes of degrading and gratifying his sexual desires, all contrary to the provisions of the statute.'
The incident is alleged to have taken place on the second floor of the governor's Executive Mansion in Albany on December 7, 2020, sometime between 3:51pm and 4:07pm.
The complaint was signed by an investigator on Monday.
Cuomo attorney Rita Glavin has said that Commisso's 'story changed over time.'
The complaint filed by the sheriff's department investigator said evidence in the case included police BlackBerry messages, cell phone records, building security records and a text message from Cuomo's mobile phone.
District attorneys in Oswego, Manhattan, suburban Westchester and Nassau counties also had said they asked for investigative materials from the attorney general's inquiry to see if any of the allegations could result in criminal charges.
The announcement of the charge was chaotic on Thursday; the criminal summons was filed hastily, before sheriff's deputies had received the permission of Commisso.
It was then leaked to a local reporter in Albany, who tweeted about it and published a brief report on New York Focus.
Spokespeople for the Albany County Sheriff's Department then refused to confirm or deny whether or not their office had filed charges.
Eventually Lucien Chalfen, a spokesman for the court system, confirmed it to The Washington Post.
'A Misdemeanor Complaint against former Governor Andrew Cuomo has been filed in Albany City Court.
'As this is a sex crime, a redacted complaint will be available shortly,' he said.
The Times Union - another local Albany paper - reports that the charges had been filed too early in a clerical error.
Albany's top prosecutor released a statement on Thursday indicating that he was 'surprised' by the court filing.
'Like the rest of the public, we were surprised to learn today that a criminal complaint was filed in Albany City Court by the Albany County Sheriff's Office against Andrew Cuomo,' read a statement from the office of Albany County District Attorney P. David Soares.
'The Office of Court Administration has since made that filing public.
'Our office will not be coming further on this case.'
Commisso was one of multiple women who gave evidence against Cuomo as part of the AG's investigation.
She also spoke on TV about the alleged incident in November 2020.
'I said, 'Governor, you're going to get us in trouble.' Then I thought to myself, that probably wasn't the best thing to say.
'That's when he put his hand up my blouse and cupped my breast over my bra.
'I remember seeing his hand, which is a large hand, and thinking 'oh my God, this is happening.'
'He didn't say anything,' she said.
Cuomo has been laying low since his resignation, occasionally sharing photos on Instagram of himself fishing with his dog, Captain
Andrew Cuomo told the doctor who carried out his COVID-19 test last spring that she 'made the gown look good'. AG James said that amounted to sexual harassment, and she included it in the report
The majority of the allegations that James said amounted to serial sexual harassment were non-physical.
One of them applied to a nurse who gave the governor his first on-camera COVID-19 test.
He told her she made the 'gown look good', which James considered sexual harassment.
Others said Cuomo asked them about their boyfriends - which he admits - and that he 'clearly' insinuated wanting to sleep with them, but never did.
Cuomo fight the claims, resisting an Albany impeachment proceeding and pushing on with the COVID governance he was revered for at the start of the year, before eventually bowing out.
Since resigning, he has made few public statements aside from to bash James and her report, which he says is all politically motivated.
The allegations of sexual misconduct peppered the final year of his ten year governorship.
He got the job after his predecessor, Elliot Spitzer, resigned in shame having been caught patronizing a prostitution service.
Cuomo always denied that he was a sex pest and said at worst, he made inappropriate comments and jokes as an affectionate Italian man, like his father was.
The sexual misconduct allegations came at the same time as claims of gross negligence stemming from Cuomo's order to send thousands of COVID-19 positive elderly people back into New York nursing homes, a decision which many say proved fatal.
Not only did those infected patients infect others and lead to more deaths, critics say Cuomo's administration also tried to cover it up by deliberately skewing COVID deaths numbers.
For months, his administration reported the deaths of people who contracted COVID in nursing homes as 'hospital deaths' because they had died in hospitals.
He was only reporting nursing home deaths for people who contracted COVID in the nursing home and died in the nursing home.
His administration says it was an innocent error in numbers reporting.
Cuomo's political enemies seized on that scandal and the sexual misconduct claims, both of which were made even more irresistible when he released a smug memoir last October in the height of the second wave, titled Lessons in Leadership.
Cuomo was panned for writing the self-congratulatory book at a time when dozens of people were still dying every day in the state.
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