Columnists Goodwin & LeBrun: Cuomo Could Be Next

Two columnists, Michael Goodwin of the NY Post and Fred LeBrun of the Times-Union, weighed in this morning on the possibility of Governor Andrew Cuomo facing criminal charges like his buddies Shelly Silver and Dean Skelos.

First Goodwin looks at Cuomo's shutdown of the Moreland Commission:

As he geared up for re-election, Cuomo put his crime-fighter hat back on and finally convened a Moreland panel in 2013. He recruited an impressive array of law-enforcement officials, gave them a wide berth and promised they would be independent.

“It’s going to be a real follow-the-money investigation,” Cuomo told me then. “We want to see who gives you money, the legislation you introduce.”

When I expressed skepticism about his commitment, given his repeated retreats, he insisted this time was different, saying he was as “serious as a heart attack.”

But he wasn’t. As soon as the Legislature gave him modest ­ethics changes, he pulled the plug on Moreland.

That could be his undoing. The gumshoes he appointed with such flair had taken their assignment seriously and were aggressive, apparently too much so for the governor’s taste. Numerous accounts surfaced that his office intervened when probers focused on his donors and allies.

In response, Cuomo offered a series of defenses that grew ­increasingly bizarre. He started with denials and ended up insisting that the panel was never independent.

“It’s my commission. I can’t ‘interfere’ with it, because it is mine. It is controlled by me,” he told Crain’s magazine.

Fortunately, Bharara had a decidedly different view. He called the decision to prematurely disband the panel “difficult to ­understand” and told Moreland members in writing that it looked as if “investigations potentially significant to the public interest have been bargained away” in a deal among Cuomo, Silver and Skelos.

He seized Moreland’s investigative files in what amounted to a raid on its offices. When reports suggested that Cuomo aides ­solicited statements from panel leaders defending the governor, Bharara warned that such solicitations might “constitute obstruction of justice or tampering with witnesses.”

That, publicly at least, is where the investigation stands. Cuomo is using campaign funds to pay a criminal defense lawyer representing his office, and several of his aides hired their own counsel.

It is possible, of course, that the Silver and Skelos verdicts will be the end of Bharara’s campaign. It is also possible that they were the warm-up and the final act is about to unfold.

LeBrun focuses on Cuomo and his campaign donors:

Federal prosecutor Preet Bharara's outstanding work is a wonder to behold and still has a robust future, in spite of his rhetorical response to the Skelos conviction:

"The swift convictions of Sheldon Silver and Dean Skelos beg an important question: how many prosecutions will it take before Albany gives the people of New York the honest government they deserve?"

Compare that to Governor Andrew Cuomo's response to the same conviction. He, too, expressed confidence in our justice system, which should come as a great relief to Bharara. "However, more must be done and will be pursued as part of my legislative agenda. The convictions ... should be a wake-up call for the legislature and it must stop standing in the way of needed reforms."

Preet points a finger at Albany; Andrew points a finger at the Legislature.

Now, if there is one aspect of the Cuomo personality we can all agree on, it is that he is not clueless. He can try to divert attention to the Legislature, which certainly deserves plenty of the limelight. But he has to be fully aware of the implications of Bharara's reponse.

There is a truism in play that nothing happens of any significance in political Albany without Cuomo's involvement. This is also not wasted on the general public, as poll after poll has showed that the people see Cuomo as part of problem when it comes to corruption.

A question that's begged by the Cuomo response is that despite what he says about the Legislature, what will he do to change his own behavior so as to avoid Bharara's crosshairs? Perhaps we're already seeing clues in the predictable places. We have already seen shifts in the July filing of his campaign war chest which showed $12.7 million, a cesspool of vulnerability for the new standards being carved out by federal prosecutor Bharara. Reportedly, donations from Glenwood Management, lucrative for Cuomo in the past, are way down. Glenwood and its principals were a common denominator, and not in a good way, in both the Skelos and Silver trials.

Where campaign contributions are coming from may be on the move. However, the nearly $35 million plus Cuomo had in his campaign account heading into the last election is probably all a prosecutor might need, if anything was amiss. Last month, in an edifying piece by Chris Smith in New York Magazine, the considerable progress made in tracking corruption among legislators by the now defunct Moreland Commission is revealed. A high-tech security firm used to track money laundered by terrorist groups fittingly adapted software to the cause, so Bharara had a big head start on investigating Skelos and Silver. Presumably, Moreland investigators never looked at Cuomo. They didn't dare, nor was there an internal mandate although there should have been.

Bharara has no such constraints. He has been tactically and strategically brilliant in taking us to the present. With each conviction getting closer and closer to the top, what was once deemed impossible to imagine now has the public holding its breath for the seemingly inevitable.

If Cuomo eventually faces criminal charges, I'm not sure they'll be related to the Moreland shutdown that came in return for the budget deal and modest ethics reform package he got from now-convicted felons Silver and Skelos.

It is known that the executive director of the Moreland Commission, Regina Cacaterra, was feeding Cuomo's office everything that happened within the commission, sometimes in real time via her cell phone, so it's unlikely that Cuomo wouldn't have known that the commission was looking closely at Silver and his outside income.

The evidence that Bharara used against Silver came, in part, from the Moreland investigation, but the Skelos evidence did not (in fact, when it was first leaked that Bharara was investigating Skelos last January, an anonymous source who had served on the Moreland Commission told the Daily News that the commission had been building cases against "a number of" state Senate Republicans but Skelos was not one of them.)

Rather the evidence used against Skelos came from something that was learned as part of the Silver trial.

While there's a pretty good reason to suspect that Cuomo knew exactly what he was doing when he offered to shut down Moreland in return for the budget deal and the modest ethics reforms (i.e., he was saving Shelly Silver from trouble), it seemingly would be hard to prove that.

So the obstruction of justice angle in the Moreland shut down that Goodwin writes about, I have a difficult time seeing Cuomo face charges for that.

No, where I think Cuomo's got problems is with his donors and just what, exactly, they're telling Preet and his prosecutors in the investigations.

The first indication there was something Cuomo didn't want uncovered was when it was reported Larry Schwartz, his secretary at the time of the commission and liaison to all things Moreland, told the commission to "pull back" a subpoena they were preparing to send out to a TV ad company that the New York State Democratic Party and the Cuomo campaign had used.

Schwartz was also said to have interfered with a subpoena that the commission was going to send to REBNY, a real estate group made up in large measure of Cuomo donors, that was meant to get to the bottom of the connections between the group's political donations and a lucrative tax break the real estate industry received (Glenwood Management, the governor's bestest donor in those years, was a member of REBNY, and later was revealed to be tied up in the separate Silver and Skelos cases.)

The NY Times reported Schwartz was said to have told one of the three commission leaders on the phone "There will be no subpoena."

The Times also reported that a planned subpoena to a major retailer that received a tax break in the governor's budget received resistance from Cuomo's shill on the commission, Regina Calcaterra.


The question becomes, when Preet grabbed the Moreland files, did he follow up on the work that the Moreland commissioners were about to do looking into Cuomo's own donors/supporters and, if so, what did he learn?

He likely did follow up on some things, as two of the people who were granted non-prosecution agreements in the Silver and Skelos cases respectively were Cuomo donors (Charles Dorego, the political bagman for Glenwood Management, got an NPA for the Silver case and Skelos cases and Anthony Bonomo, the owner of a medical malpractice insurer that gave Dean Skelos' son Adam a cushy, almost-no show job in return for legislation that benefited his company, got one in the Skelos trial.)

Glenwood has given to Cuomo generously since he took office, either directly or through various LLC's.

Newsday reported no individual received more political donations from Glenwood and its various LLC's than Andrew Cuomo.

In addition, entities linked to and/or allied with Cuomo were recipients of Glenwood largesse. 

The Committee To Save NY, a shadowy PAC that supported the governor's agenda early in his first term before it was shut down when laws changed and it would have had to reveal who was behind it, received $500,000 from Glenwood and the State Democratic Party, an entity that essentially operates as a subsidiary of the Cuomo campaign, received $365,000 from Glenwood.

Anthony Bonomo too was a happy giver to Cuomo and admitted on the stand in the Skelos case that his son had gotten a state job after he donated to Cuomo's campaign.  Bonomo himself got picked to head the NYRA before he was forced to step down after his involvement in the Skelos mess was revealed.

So, we have some smoke already around Cuomo with the Glenwood and the Bonomo connections and Dorego and Bonomo already telling tales in the Silver and Skelos cases - it's not a stretch to think they're telling tales on Cuomo too.

Couple that with the subpoenas that went out in the Buffalo Billion Project probe to at least one of Cuomo's donors and the state entities involved in handling a bidding process that looks suspiciously like it was rigged to be won by Cuomo's donors, and you have a governor who is very, very vulnerable on the campaign donations issues.

I've had readers of the blog say in the past that there will be no explicit quid pro quo between anybody in the Cuomo administration and Cuomo's donors found over any of this, no smoking gun that can be used to arrest some member of the administration or Cuomo himself over the matter.

That's likely true.

Yet after Bharara nailed Shelly Silver with a seven count corruption conviction without proving an explicit quid pro quo between Shelly and his marks, you have to wonder how much the smoking gun matters.

As Tom Precious reported in the Buffalo News today:

The felony convictions of both former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and former Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos within less than two weeks will only further empower the U.S. attorney from the Southern District of Manhattan in his self-stated cause to clean up Albany, according to people in and outside government who have been watching the cases play out.

“I think any time a prosecutor wins a conviction in an important case, his credibility goes up,” said Salvatore Martoche, a former U.S. Attorney of the Western District of New York and former state appellate court judge.

“He’s got to feel that this is a mandate, and the public is going to give him every benefit of the doubt,” Martoche added.

Certainly juries are giving him the benefit of the doubt. 

While the Skelos case, with the wiretaps exposing explicit criminal activity getting played to the jury day after day, was seemingly going to end with a guilty verdict, the Silver case was much more subtle - one of the prosecution's witnesses even admitted there was no explicit quid pro quo agreement between himself and Shelly Silver in Silver's asbestos case referral scheme.

The defense argued that there was no crime there, this was just a "friends doing favors for friends" kind of thing, business as usual in Albany and really, nothing to concerned about.

Yet the jury didn't see it that way and Bharara got the conviction on all seven counts.

Interestingly enough, Cuomo used a Silveresque defense of his own when it came to talking about political donations and state contracts related to the Buffalo Billion Project:

Asked recently whether it's a problem that people getting state grants and contracts are contributing to his campaign fund, Cuomo noted that's not new.

"It hasn't been a problem for the past 100 years, so I don't know why it would be today," he said.

Will that defense work if Bharara decides to bring a case against Cuomo over his campaign donations and the state contracts his administration was handing out as part of the $1 billion dollar Buffalo Billion Project or the largesse the real estate industry showered upon him in return for tax breaks and other political gifts?

Hard to know, but a similar argument in the Silver trial - this stuff is just business as usual - didn't work with that jury.

Had Silver walked in his trial or gotten a mistrial (which seemed possible at one point with a juror complaining she wasn't getting along with other jurors), Bharara would have suffered a setback for whatever other cases he was pursuing.

But as the Precious article points out, the Silver slam dunk, along with the Skelos convictions, empowers Bharara to bring whatever other cases he might have in the pipeline - including one against a sitting governor with an awful lot of smoke around him and his donors, two of whom had NPA's in the Silver and Skelos cases.

Whether Bharara goes that far, it's certainly impossible to know.

But as LeBrun wrote in his column, what once was deemed impossible is starting to feel like the inevitable.

The Precious piece points out that the clock is ticking on Bharara, with a presidential election coming next year, so whatever cases he plans to bring, he's going to have to bring them soon.

I guess for now we'll just have to take Bharara's own advice and stay tuned.

But what a show it is.

Cuomo's Flip-Flop On The Moreland Commission

When it comes to how stunningly full of shit Andrew Cuomo is on corruption, this William Rashbaum tweet puts it all in perspective:

Day after Silver conviction, @NYGovCuomo recollection of Moreland mandate contradicts earlier view #AlbanyOnTiral pic.twitter.com/6C5rkdK6kA

— William K. Rashbaum (@WRashbaum) December 1, 2015

With Shelly Silver convicted on all seven corruption counts and Dean Skelos all but assured of being convicted in his corruption trial, no wonder Cuomo wants to rewrite the history and make believe like the Moreland Commission on Public Corruption wasn't actually supposed to investigate or prosecute anything or anybody.

It's worth revisiting the NY Times piece by Craig, Rashbaum and Kaplan on how Cuomo "hobbled" the Moreland Commission that ran on July 23, 2014 because it gives much insight into why Cuomo would want to have the public forget the truth about the commission.

In the piece, we learn that Cuomo tried to exert control over the Moreland Commission on Public Corruption through its executive director, Regina Calcaterra, who fed everything that was happening there back to Cuomo's office, sometimes literally in real time via her phone .

We know that whatever the commission knew Cuomo likely knew too because Calcaterra was feeding it back to his office.

So Cuomo's office likely knew that Silver and Skelos were both under investigation, yet he made the deal with the two then-legislative leaders to shut down the Moreland Commission in return for a budget deal that contained a lukewarm ethics reform package in it.

There sure is a funkiness to that budget deal that resulted from the Moreland shutdown that ought to be looked at now that Silver's convicted and Skelos is soon-to-be convicted.

In addition, we know that when the commission got too close to Cuomo's own donors in the real estate industry with a subpoena, Cuomo's man Larry Schwarz, told them to "pull it back."

We continue to learn more and more about all the money that was going from real estate interests to Cuomo's coffers - including how the real estate developer at the center of the Silver and Skelos trials who gave Cuomo over $1 million in donations last election cycle either individually or through connected entities also gave $500K to Cuomo's allies at the Committee To Save New York PAC back in 2011:

If you're tallying it all up at home, here's the total from Glenwood and/or Litwin to Cuomo or Cuomo-controlled entities and/or allies:

Glenwood and Litwin gave Cuomo’s committee $1 million during the last election cycle, more than any other donor. They also gave his 2014 running mate, Lt. Gov. Kathy Hochul, $19,700 and the New York State Democratic Committee $450,000.

The $500,000 given to the Committee to Save New York thus brings the total from the developer that went to support the governor during his first term to $1.97 million — about 32 times the campaign contribution limit imposed on donations from most individuals.

Cuomo attempted to cover up his connections to Glenwood, claiming that even though they were donating this dough to him, he wasn't meeting with them - but that statement turned out not to be true and Cuomo had to retract it:

ALBANY—Governor Andrew Cuomo appeared to misspeak on Wednesday when he said he had "never" discussed rental control with executives of Glenwood Management, the real estate company whose alleged efforts to influence legislation in Albany were at the center of a criminal complaint against Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos that was released this week.

Glenwood Management has not been accused of any illegal activity, but it has been widely identified as “Developer-1” in criminal complaints against Skelos and former Assembly speaker Sheldon Silver.
...

On Wednesday, Capital asked Cuomo if Glenwood had ever brought up rent control with the governor or any members of his administration.

“No, never,” he said.

But a review of Cuomo’s public schedules indicates he met with executives from Glenwood three times in 2011 to discuss "rent regulations," according to the schedules. The meetings took place in the months before rent control laws were set to expire.

“The Governor did not remember off the top of his head three meetings from five years ago, two of which also included many other industry advocates,” said Rich Azzopardi, a spokesman for Cuomo. “What is clear to everyone is that we emerged that year with the strongest rent regulation laws in decades, which included the creation of a tenant protection unit that has returned more than 37,000 unlawfully deregulated apartments to rent regulation."

The Moreland Commission could have uncovered some of this stuff had they been allow to investigate Cuomo's donors at REBNY but Cuomo made sure the investigation into his donors didn't pick up speed and then shut down the commission not long afterward.

You can see why he'd now want to rewrite the history and make believe that what he said about the commission having investigatory and prosecutorial powers wasn't actually said.

Because there sure is a lot of smoke around Cuomo, his donors and the Moreland Commission shutdown and you know he doesn't want anybody to remember that.

How Three Men In A Room Operate In New York State

Here's one of the wiretaps from the Dean and Adam Skelos corruption trial, courtesy of the Daily News:


There's one of the vaunted "three men in a room" in Albany discussing with his son how sad he is that the governor has banned fracking - something he himself says has little support - because his son stood to gain financially from the procedure: 

The recordings were admitted into evidence during the testimony of Senator Avella, who gave the jury a primer on the Senate. A prosecutor in the case, Jason A. Masimore, then questioned him about legislation that the government has alleged was part of three schemes under which Senator Skelos used his position to obtain more than $300,000 in payments for his son.

Mr. Masimore, using emails and other documents along with the tapes, walked Mr. Avella through some of the evidence that prosecutors say shows how the schemes worked. He asked the senator if he would have voted the way he did on certain bills if he had known that Senator Skelos supported them, and that his son had in some ways secretly benefited from them.

In one instance, he showed Mr. Avella a draft agreement under which Adam Skelos would have received $1 per barrel of fracking waste water treated by a company, AbTech Industries, that paid him as a consultant. Mr. Avella said each fracking well produced tens of thousands of gallons of contaminated water a day.

The prosecutor then asked if Mr. Avella, a leading opponent of fracking, had known that Senator Skelos had asked his staff to set up a meeting on the subject between AbTech and state officials. He said he had not, and when asked if that would have mattered to him as a state senator he said, “Without question.”

“Given the fact that this is one of the most significant environmental considerations that the State of New York has probably had to decide in a hundred years, that influences being made on behalf of a family member is inappropriate and, in my opinion, absolutely disgraceful,” he said.

The wiretap also makes clear how Skelos and Senate Republicans used the turncoat Dems of the IDC to maintain control of the state Senate and how he had worked with Cuomo in the past but after the fracking decision, would no longer be "buddy-buddy" with the governor:

The son used an anatomical term to refer to Mr. Cuomo, and asked, “How do we beat him, Dad?”

“We will,” the senator replied. “I’m going to run against him.”

“I wish you would, Dad,” the son said, his mood seeming to lift, adding with coarse language that he “would be so proud” if the senator soundly defeated Mr. Cuomo.

“You watch what I’m going to do in the next couple of years with him, especially starting this year,” the senator said. “No more, you know, buddy-buddy and all that stuff,” he continued, and then referred to the governor with an expletive.

Today Glenwood bagman Charlie Dorego is expected to continue his testimony and explain how Glenwood doled out millions in campaign cash to politicians through LLC's:

Mr. Dorego, as part of his testimony, gave jurors a brief primer on limited liability companies, or LLCs, explaining that each of Glenwood’s 20-plus buildings was owned by such an entity, and that each of those was in turn owned by the Litwin Family Trust. Prosecutors are expected to show during the trial that Glenwood used the LLCs to shower millions of dollars in campaign contributions on political candidates, including Senator Skelos.

Dorego, btw, just got finished testifying in the Shelly Silver corruption trial - how's that for synchronicity? - and Governor Cuomo's biggest donor was Glenwood, so the other two "men in a room" in Albany are coming up in this trial too.

Speaking of Silver, the prosecution rested their case yesterday and Silver's defense is not expected to call any witnesses, just introduce documents to the jury that will try and bolster their argument that Silver's financial dealings were not quid pro quo crimes but simply business as usual in Albany.

Quite a show we've got going on right now and with the feds investigating Cuomo's Buffalo Billion Project and campaign donors, the show may get even better before it's all said and done.

Something tells me that much hinges upon on the Silver case.

Given the evidence in the Skelos case, it's difficult to see the prosecution not getting convictions in the trial.

But the Silver case is much more complex and Silver could walk.

If that happens, the feds may be a little more circumspect in how they work through the Buffalo Billion Project investigation and the remaining Moreland cases (including looking into Cuomo's shutdown of the commission in return for a budget deal.)

But if they get Silver, well, if I were Sheriff Andy, I'd be worried about them going for the trifecta.

Andrew Cuomo Makes Shelly Silver's Witness List

John Riley in Newsday:

Defense lawyers for former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver have listed a virtual who's who of Albany politics, including Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, as potential witnesses or subjects of testimony at Silver's upcoming federal corruption trial.

Also included on a list of 62 names to ask prospective jurors if they knew are indicted Sen. Dean Skelos, Court of Appeals Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman, lobbyists Pat Lynch and Brian Meara, and high-profile real estate figures such as Larry Silverstein, Leonard Litwin, Steve Spinola and Jack Rudin.

Silver is due to go to trial next month on charges that he did legislative favors for developers and a doctor to generate $4 million in referral fees from two law firms he was affiliated with.

...

The defense list, however, provided a taste of how deeply testimony at the trial is likely to delve into some of the inner workings of the Capitol and its power structure.

In addition to big-name lobbyists and real estate moguls, it included current and former Assembly members, suchas Vito Lopez of Brooklyn, Herman "Denny" Farrell and Keith Wright of Manhattan, and Audrey Pheffer of Queens.

Chris Bragg at the Times Union has been sleuthing out the names - you can see a partial list below.

Jonathan Taub: Robert Taub’s son, whom Silver allegedly helped find a job at a Brooklyn social services group.

Arthur Luxenberg: Partner at Weitz & Luxenberg, where Silver served as “of counsel.”

Perry Weitz: Partner at Weitz & Luxenberg.

“Lenny Litwin”: Head of Glenwood Management, which allegedly hired a small law firm, Goldberg & Iryami, from which Silver then got fees. The first time we’ve seen his name rendered as “Lenny.”

Brian Meara: Top Albany lobbyist close to Silver who is said to have cooperated with federal authorities.

Charlie Dorego: Top Glenwood Management official, cooperating witness in case against ex-Senate Majority Leader Sheldon Silver.

Dean Fuleihan: New York City budget director, former longtime top aide to Silver.

Dean Skelos: Long Island senator, federally indicted Republican former Senate Majority Leader.

Herman (Denny) Farrell: Manhattan assemblyman and chariman of the Ways & Means Committee.

Jack Rudin: may be the chairman Rudin Management Company, a major New York City developer.

Jonathan Lippman: Chief Judge of New York Court of Appeals, childhood friend of Silver. Retiring from bench at end of the year.

Joseph Strasberg: president, Rent Stabilization Association.

Judy Rapfogel: longtime top Silver aide, wife of William Rapfogel.

Keith Wright: Manhattan Assemblyman, chair of housing committee, candidate for Congress.

Larry Silverstein: Owner of major development firm Silverstein Properties.

Solly Assa: A person of this name is a New York City real estate developer.

Steven Spinola: The recently retired president of the Real Estate Board of New York.

Victor Franco: A person of this name has been deputy Budget Director for the Assembly.

Vito Lopez: Formerly powerful Brooklyn assemblyman. Silver faced criticism for a secret settlement regarding sexual harassment claims against Lopez.

Rubin (Ruby) Schron: New York City real estate investor and landlord.

Pat Lynch: Top Albany lobbyist known to be close to Silver.

A commenter at Newsday writes the following:

Any testimony by Jonathan Lippman could get nuclear as it would expose the Cuomo-Silver-Schwartz scammery in open court. It also could show Bharara knows the deal about how Cuomo was operating until just very recently.
 
I wonder what the average Joe is going to think of Albany democrat progressives now when they see who turned the entire state of NY into Detroit and why. I also wonder what the average scuz NY politician will think when they realize the new technology brought to bear on the Three Men in a Room and how clearly it shows the connections.
 
Expect sunlight.

We'll see if we indeed get sunlight.

Make no mistake, given the names on the list, it looks like Silver plans to put the whole system on trial, to say, "Hey, if I'm guilty of crimes, so is the whole system and everybody in it."

Should be fun if Shelly actually goes to trial.

Update On The Cuomo Buffalo Billion Corruption Story

Yesterday was quite a day, with leaks coming throughout that US Attorney Preet Bharara was expanding his corruption probe of Albany politics to Governor Cuomo's Buffalo Billion Program and various entities and individuals connected to it.

First the NY Post reported that Bharara had launched an investigation into Cuomo's Buffalo Billion project, looking at the bidding process and the awarding of contracts.

Then the NY Daily News reported that SUNY Polytechnic Institute had been the recipient of subpoenas relating to the Buffalo Billion Project and had hired a criminal defense attorney to deal with the matter.

Last night the Buffalo News reported that the same contractor/Cuomo donor, Louis Ciminelli, who seemed to be the recipient of a rigged contract in the Buffalo Billion project, is also the contractor for the Buffalo Schools Construction Project, a $1.3 billion dollar renovation program that has tens of millions of funds missing.

Documents related to the Buffalo Schools Construction Project have also been subpoenaed by the US attorney's office.

The NY Times reports this morning that Cuomo appoints the majority of SUNY board members and is known for his "hands-on" management style when it comes to governance, especially around large-scale programs like the Buffalo Billion project.

Indeed, even as the leaks kept coming throughout the day about the Bharara probe into Cuomo's Buffalo Billion project, Cuomo was touting it before business leaders at a business conference in Lake George:

Governor Cuomo, in an address before the state’s business leaders,  promoted his economic development plans, including the Buffalo Billion initiative, and fended off questions on reports that some of the projects are under investigation by US Attorney Preet Bharara.

Cuomo, who was well received by business leaders meeting at the Sagamore resort on Lake George, gave a power point presentation focusing on his successes in building up the upstate economy, including the Buffalo Billion project, which has received praise and credit for helping turn around the state’s second largest city.

“Buffalo was the most pessimistic community about their economic future five years ago,” said Cuomo. “Today, Buffalo is the most optimistic, tied with Manhattan.”

Last night, WGRZ led their coverage of the Buffalo Billion investigation story with the headline "Is Governor Cuomo Under Investigation?" and gave a great round-up of the day's events, including analysis from Investigative Post's Jim Heaney, who may have kicked off the whole federal investigation with his reporting on the lack of transparency around the Buffalo Billion project bidding and contract award process.

Heaney says the investigation may center on Governor Cuomo's go-to economic development guy, SUNY Poly CEO Alain Kaloyeros, who has led the development of the nanotech industry in Albany as well as the spread of high-tech initiatives to Buffalo, Utica, Rochester and Syracuse.

Heaney was updating Investigative Post throughout the day as more leaks and reports came in - you can see those updates here.

Yesterday was a pretty extraordinary day in New York State.

What we learned yesterday is that a US attorney from Manhattan is rooting around in business dealings and contracts in Buffalo even as it's unknown whether the US attorney for Western New York - Bill Hochul - has recused himself from the investigation or just been passed over by Bharara's office because Hochul is the husband of Governor Cuomo's Lieutenant Governor, Kathy Hochul.

This appears to be part of a larger investigation into state contracts and business dealings with at least part of the focus on one of the state's highest paid employees, SUNY Polytech CEO Alain Kaloyeros, who also happens to have close ties to Governor Cuomo and former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver.

At least one Cuomo donor, Louis Ciminelli, has received subpoenas from the US attorney's office related to the Buffalo Billion project and what appears to be a rigged contract award as well as the Buffalo Schools Construction Project and what is said to be tens of millions of missing funds.

At the center of the Buffalo Billion project is a solar panel company chaired by Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla Motors - SolarCity.

The state is putting $750 million into the building of a manufacturing plant for SolarCity in Buffalo - but Jim Heaney reports that SolarCity lost $375 million last year and has lost over $300 million in the first half of this year.

Heaney also reports that SolarCity is the target of a federal investigation related to federal stimulus funds.

Something smells wrong about the state investing $750 million in a development project for a company that has lost over $675 million in the last year and a half alone, and yet that's what's happening here.

No wonder Governor Cuomo's administration did everything it could to quash FOIL requests for documents related to the project.

Unlike the reports that Preet Bharara was investigating Governor Cuomo's actions regarding the shutdown of the Moreland Commission, which were a little hazy with detail, the reports around the investigation of the Buffalo Billion are detailed, including who has received subpoenas in the case and who has lawyered up.

The pattern with Bharara and these corruption investigations has been leak, indictment, leak, indictment...

That's what happened in the Shelly Silver case and the Dean Skelos case.

These leaks yesterday - at least three separate ones to three different news organizations if I'm counting correctly - suggest Bharara intends to continue the pattern.

Governor Cuomo downplayed the stories yesterday, saying there's no "there" there in this story.

But he's fooling himself if he really believes that.

At the very least, the feds have one of his donors on the other end of a subpoena and one of the state's highest paid employees, the PolyTech CEO, who is leading Cuomo's development efforts for high tech industries in Buffalo, Rochester, Utica and Syracuse is the focus of, if not the target of, a criminal investigation.

Given the previous pattern with Bharara and leaks, you can be sure criminal charges will come and somebody will make a plea deal here to turn evidence over to the feds.

That's what happened in the Silver case and in the Skelos case - and I would bet that's what happens here too.

Will Cuomo's donor, Louis Ciminelli, get the squeeze and turn on Kaloyeros?

Will Kaloyeros get the squeeze and turn on someone else?

I'm speculating here, but given how Bharara worked in both the Silver case (where he got REBNY bagman Charlie Dorego to cooperate) and the Skelos case (where he got Cuomo donor and former NYRA chair Anthony Bonomo to cooperate along with using evidence from Dorego against Skelos and son), this is not idle speculation.

Cuomo's got serious problems here, whether the criminal investigation reaches him or not.

He has made the Buffalo Billion the centerpiece of his upstate economic agenda, spreading it to Rochester, Utica, and Syracuse, and now it appears that centerpiece is rotten to the core.

That's a political problem for sure.

Whats worse for Cuomo is, if Bharara's rooting around in this mess, what else is he rooting around in?

Just last week, Gotham Gazette reported that Cuomo had his mojo back, that he was strutting his stuff again after dispatching NYC mayor Bill de Blasio in a feud.

De Blasio was an easy opponent for Cuomo to beat - Preet Bharara, on the other hand, does not look like he will be so easy for Cuomo to dispatch.

Leonard Litwin "Thanks" Andrew Cuomo For His Support

From the Observer:

The Alliance for Tenant Power, a left-leaning pro-tenant group, is circulating a meme and quote parodying Mr. Cuomo’s ties to scandal-scarred Glenwood Management. The meme portrays Glenwood’s 100-year-old founder, Leonard Litwin, raising a martini glass and smiling like Leonardo DiCaprio in the 2013 film The Great Gatsby.

Mr. Litwin is “thanking” Mr. Cuomo for calling for the straight renewal of a controversial real estate tax break known as 421a. Many progressives, including Mayor Bill de Blasio, want 421a reformed or scrapped altogether.

“The world’s upper class can sigh in relief. A straight extender on 421-a is exactly what we paid for. We know that billionaires want a 50’ lap pool and their tax break as well. Thanks to the Governor we will deliver nothing less,” reads the parody quote from Mr. Litwin. Alliance for Tenant Power noted the quote was delivered “from the stone whirlpool spa in his main penthouse.”

The meme arrived in the form of a press release from a fake gmail account for Charles Dorego, CharlesDoregoNY@gmail.com. Mr. Dorego is Glenwood’s senior vice president.

Dorego is "cooperating witness-1" in the corruption case against former state Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and his son Adam.

This is a parody, but like all good jokes, it's got truth at the center of it.

Cuomo's making as if the deadline for getting 421-a reforms snuck up on him, but the truth is, he and the legislature knew this was coming and chose not to do anything about it.

So now Sheriff Andy says a straight extender of the tax giveaway is the best way to go - and of course that benefits Leonard Litwin and all of Cuomo's real estate donors and buddies.

You bet Litwin and Company will be happy if they get a straight extender to the 421-a program with no changes - and they'll "thank" Governor Cuomo and the legislators who give them that straight extender.

Cuomo Puts Blame Onto Preet Bharara If Rent Regulations, 421-a Expire

No, really:

ALBANY—State lawmakers are now seriously contemplating the loss of two major housing programs, and suggested that federal prosecutors hamstrung their ability to cut a deal.

With two scheduled session days remaining before the programs expire Monday, Governor Andrew Cuomo and other legislators began speaking more openly about how the cloud of scandal—including the indictment of both legislative leaders—has made it more difficult to get things done.

“If there was a different time and a different climate, I might just put everyone in a room and try to negotiate this myself. But with this climate in Albany, it's not conducive to that,” Cuomo told reporters after a rally. 

Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney for the southern district of Manhattan, brought charges against both Assemblyman Sheldon Silver and State Senator Dean Skelos that prompted their replacement as members of the infamous “three men in a room.” The charges against both former leaders stemmed, in part, from their interactions with executives at Glenwood Management, a real estate development firm and major political donor that is heavily interested in rent regulations and the 421-a property tax subsidy program. Both expire June 15.

As Capital had reported, Cuomo confirmed on Wednesday that he is now seeking a short-term, straight extension of the 421-a program. The governor told reporters after a rally that it was “under a microscope” and that any potential changes would “benefit some political interest” and “generate snarky news pieces.”

Sorry Andy, it's not Preet's fault you've taken boatloads of cash from Glenwood in return for sweetheart deals in the past and now worry that you're next for arrest.

Nor is it Preet's fault you lied, er, forgot, about those meetings you had with Glenwood's bagman (now known as "Cooperating Witness-1" in the Skelos case) the last time these housing programs were set to expire.

If rent regulations expire and "mayhem" ensues (as you said would happen yesterday), that's your fault, not Preet's.

Preet's Working His Way Up The Food Chain

For the skeptics out there who remain dubious that US Attorney Preet Bharara is working his way up the chain to Governor Cuomo comes this theorizing from The Albany Project:

I think that it becomes clearer everyday that Preet Bharara neither Sheldon Silver or Dean Skelos are his ultimate target and that he is methodically arresting and indicting his way through Albany with a certain bigger fish in his sights. And he’s picked up some prime cooperating witnesses along the way while leaning hard on those he’s already nabbed to flip. 

Look at was happened in just the last few months. Bharara turned up the heat on Sheldon Silver after his arrest and indictment by then indicting his son-in-law for allegedly running a $7 million Ponzi scheme through a firm co-owned with Silver’s daughter who also serves as the firms CPA. A week later, he added some fresh charges to the former speaker’s indictment just to make sure Silver got the message.

Then Bharara’s office leaked that not only was Dean Skelos under investigation, but that Bharara was presenting a criminal case to a federal grand jury that targeted not only Skelos, but also his son. He then arrests them both on federal corruption charges. Then, to turn the screws on Skelos further, tosses in this new charge, one that wasn’t mentioned at all in the initial criminal complaint against Skelos and son, about the no-show job from the firm run by a guy with significant ties to Cuomo.

Along the way, Bharara flipped the bagman for the state’s largest political donor, a man responsible for spreading millions in campaign cash all over the state to politicians in both parties, and let it be known that he now had god-only-knows how many new wiretap targets thanks to Sheldon Silver. That sent shockwaves through Albany and has lawmakers all over town freaking right the hell out. Bharara is so far in their heads that they are too scared to even do typical end of session horse trading for fear that Bharara will nail them for it.

This is all reminiscent of how prosecutors run mafia cases, working their way up the food chain by arresting and pressuring the hell out of the underlings to make a case against the boss. Bharara is doing exactly that. He’s getting closer and closer to the top of the pyramid. He’s putting enormous pressure on both Silver and Skelos to cut a deal, and in New York, there’s only one chair above them on the org chart.  

... 

It’s becoming increasingly obvious that Preet Bharara is not conducting a number of separate, unrelated investigations into corrupt Albany pols. He is conducting one massive investigation, one that is moving ever closer to the guy at the top.

Cuomo appointed the latest federal cooperating witness, Anthony Bonomo, to run the New York Racing Association in April.

Bonomo and family have donated $400K to Cuomo over the last four years.

Bonomo gave Dean Skelos' son, Adam, a no-show job worth a hundred grand.

Bonomo is cooperating with the feds in the case against the Skelos men.

I suppose you can make the case that Bharara is just taking a scattershot approach to corruption in New York, but the Albany Project theory makes a lot more sense.

He's working his way up the food chain.

One of the critiques on Bharara is that he's Wall Street's boy, that he's never gone after systemic corruption on the Street but instead has targeted insider trading cases and Madoff.

The critique goes that Preet, out of the Schumer shop, is being very careful not to antagonize the big boys so that if he does run for higher office some day, he doesn't have to worry about them trying to "Spitzer" him.

As a side note to this theory, it's said by some that Bharara won't take down Cuomo because he's Wall Street's puppet.

But I don't think that's necessarily so - the part about taking out Cuomo, I mean.

Kathy Hochul, the former bank lobbyist, would become governor if anything ever happened to Cuomo, so it's not like Wall Street's interests won't be taken care of if Cuomo goes down.

I would add that Cuomo's become a bit of a liability of late, what with all the Cuomo donors becoming cooperating witnesses and such, so you can make the argument that maybe, just maybe, Wall Street wouldn't be so sad to see Cuomo taken out and replaced with the equally amenable but much less troublesome Hochul.

We'll just have to see what happens.

Regardless, you can bet with all these Cuomo donors cooperating and with some other Cuomo cronies getting squeezed, Sheriff Andy isn't happy and doesn't really know what to do about it.

Today he argued that he has passed the "most dramatic" ethics reforms in history so you know, everything's cool.

I dunno, I'm no lawyer, but I'm going to guess that Bharara doesn't see it that way - not with the case he seems to be building against Sheriff Andy.

Is The De Blasio Public Slam Of Cuomo A Sign That Cuomo Is Soon To Hit The Skids?

The always-perceptive Michael Fiorillo on what de Blasio's pointed public criticism of Cuomo may mean:

De Blasio has been very careful and calculated in his dealings with our Reptilian Governor, and this is in that vein, suggesting that the Mayor has decided that Cuomo is sufficiently wounded and undermined that he can be openly criticized or defied.

Perhaps another sign that The Reptilian One is soon to hit the skids.

One big-time donor to Cuomo is cooperating with the feds (Anthony Bonomo), a lobbyist (Charles Dorego) to Cuomo's biggest donor (Glenwood Management) is cooperating with the feds, Cuomo's point man in Buffalo just had his condo raided last week G. Steven Pigeon) and some in Albany think Dean Skelos is looking for a plea deal in exchange for leniency in sentencing for himself and his son, Adam. That plea deal would most liekly only come in exchange for information on Cuomo.

On top of all of this, Cuomo is at his lowest level in job approval in both the Marist and Siena polls and his favorability has been falling over the past year.

He's taking a steady barrage of attacks for his war on teachers and public schools.

Scheiderman just publicly embarrassed him by pushing for ethics reforms that Cuomo claims he's for but just never gets around to putting any muscle behind.

I wouldn't be ready to write Cuomo off yet, but the Good Ship Cuomo is certainly taking on a lot of water and listing to port.

De Blasio's coming out in public with his criticism of Cuomo does seem to be another sign that Cuomo's ship is sinking.

“If There’s Something To Be Known About The Governor, His Office Or Anyone Else In Albany, They Know It.”

Ken Lovett in today's Daily News:

Albany is again on edge with reports last week that several prominent players with access to Gov. Cuomo and other major state government figures are either cooperating with the feds or under investigation.

Anthony Bonomo, a big time donor to Gov. Cuomo and other state politicians in both parties and who was recently named by the governor as chairman of the New York Racing Association, last week was referenced (not by name) in the indictment against now former Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Suffolk County) for allegedly giving the senator’s son a $100,000 no-show job. 

And Steve Pigeon, a registered lobbyist and longtime Democratic operative from western New York who has done work for Cuomo, had his home raided by state and federal investigators as part of a probe into his fundraising activities.

Meanwhile, Charles Dorego, a top executive at Glenwood Management, has been cooperating with the feds in separate cases against Skelos and now former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. Influential lobbyist Brian Meara, who has close ties to Silver, has also been cooperating in the probe against the Manhattan Democrat.

“These are not just nobodys,” one insider said. “If there’s something to be known about the governor, his office or anyone else in Albany, they know it.”

There are many Perdido Street School blog readers skeptical that Preet will go after Cuomo.

I totally get that skepticism and share in some of it

But having watched the feds line up Dorego and now Bonomo as cooperating witnesses, with Pigeon about to be squeezed, and (perhaps) Skelos set to deal, I have to say, there's an awful lot of people who have dirt on Cuomo in the feds' clutches.

Not saying that means Preet's going after Cuomo.

But it appears he's going after somebody, doesn't it?

And these are all Cuomo cronies in one way or another.

Interesting times we live in.

Preet Bharara Moves Ever Closer To Cuomo

Fred Dicker in the NY Post:

Attorney Preet Bharara moved “a giant step closer” to Gov. Cuomo late last week with an indictment that alleges insurance exec Anthony Bonomo, a top Cuomo contributor whom the governor made chairman of the New York Racing Association, gave a lucrative no-show job to state Sen. Dean Skelos’ son, sources have told The Post.

“Bonomo is Cuomo’s guy, and he wouldn’t offer anything to Skelos’ kid without first making sure it was OK with the governor or his people,’’ said a senior state Democrat.

“The fact that Bonomo, like Dorego, is cooperating with Bharara brings the whole investigation a giant step closer to Cuomo,’’ the Democrat added, referring to Charles Dorego, a top official at Cuomo megacontributor Leonard Litwin’s Glenwood Management.

Glenwood, a real-estate development firm, has been linked to the Skelos indictment and the indictment of Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. Dorego is cooperating with Bharara’s probe.

Others at the Capitol agreed Bharara appeared to be moving closer to charging Cuomo and/or one or more of his top aides in his investigation of corruption in state government, which originated with Cuomo’s abrupt closure last year of his Moreland Act Commission as it was closing in on evidence of wrongdoing.

“This is a drip by drip that’s getting closer and closer to Cuomo, with Bonomo and Dorego providing prosecutors with an inside look at how the corrupt Albany system works,’’ explained a second senior state political figure.

...

The indictment said a state-regulated insurance company — identified as the Bonomo-run Physicians Reciprocal Insurers (PRI) — gave Adam Skelos a no-show job worth more than $100,000 at a time when it was lobbying Sen. Skelos on legislative matters.

A spokesman for the Roslyn, LI-based insurer said Friday that Bonomo — who with family members contributed nearly $250,000 to Cuomo’s campaign committee — and others at the company “are fully cooperating with the US Attorney’s Office.”

Several sources at the Capitol said Bonomo’s alleged willingness to provide a no-show job to Adam Skelos was further proof of Cuomo’s close political ties to Sen. Skelos.

“If you needed any further proof of Skelos’ ties to Cuomo and his people, this job from Bonomo’s company for Skelos’ kid should provide it,” said a top GOP official.

 Bonomo cooperating with the feds is bad enough for Cuomo.

But then there's this:

Some in Albany think Skelos will eventually plead - here's NT2 blog from a few weeks ago:

Not everyone can hack the hard core world that is state politics and government today.

Silver can. Deposed, he won’t quit. He sits in the back of the chamber and seethes. He lives for the day when he can testify and tell people how crazy it is to think that a grant for cancer research could be a bribe to get a client referral nine years later.

So can Libous. They investigated him for seven years and the best they could come up with was a charge that he lied when he said he didn’t remember how his son got a job. Then they went after the son and charged him with nine counts of which two counts stuck. It’s a tax offense for which an ordinary person would have to re-file and pay a penalty, but the son is going to jail for it. Libous struggles with both cases and with cancer and complications from back surgery, but still he won’t give in.

And then there’s Skelos. He’s not steely like Silver and Libous. He’s a mess. He can’t think clearly. Over the weekend, he dissembled to the point of telling colleagues that if they forced him out, he’d quit and they’d lose their majority. Only after everyone reassured him that they’d stand by him did he relent, but this isn’t a situation in which anybody thinks he’ll have the stomach to continue the fight. He’ll make a deal with the Feds. He’ll do anything to make it easier on himself and his son.

Something similar happened with Brian Meera. He’d had it good for a long time and was approaching retirement. Even though he didn’t think he’d done anything wrong, he wasn’t going to take a chance. He made a deal to protect himself.

If Skelos looks to plead, Preet's going to want some information on somebody big.

I would bet Skelos has some dope on Cuomo the feds would find interesting.

Couple that with the Bonomo and Dorego cooperation, and you interesting times in Albany.

Andrew Cuomo And Cooperating Witness #1

In the NY Times profile of Glenwood real estate exectuive Charles Dorego, "CW-1" in the Dean Skelos criminal case and a "representative of Developer-1" in the Silver case, is this:

Today, nine Glenwood buildings get 421-a tax benefits, according to New York City records. In exchange for the tax breaks, Glenwood set aside 459 units, a relatively low 15 percent, of the 2,987 apartments for low- and moderate-income households, according to city records and an analysis by the Association for Neighborhood Housing Development.

“Glenwood takes an absurd amount of benefit from the taxpayer’s pocket to boost its bottom line,” said Benjamin Dulchin, executive director of the housing group, which has called for reforming the housing program. “No wonder they use every bit of influence at their disposal.”

Days after Glenwood contributed $1,000 to Mr. Cuomo’s re-election campaign, Mr. Dorego and a lobbyist met in April 2011 with the governor to discuss rent regulation, according to state records.

A short while later, after Glenwood contributed $25,000 to the Senate Republican Campaign Committee, Mr. Dorego met with Mr. Skelos to discuss real estate regulations and legislation affecting Glenwood, the complaint says.

As the legislative session heated up, Mr. Cuomo met one day in June with representatives from two real estate groups, Mr. Dorego and Mr. Jacob, another top Glenwood executive, as well as Mr. Silver and Mr. Skelos.

Two weeks later, Mr. Cuomo had another meeting on rent regulations that included Mr. Dorego and the trade groups.

Though it is common for the groups to meet with top officials in Albany, it was unusual, according to several Real Estate Board members, for Mr. Dorego to attend.

In the end, real estate executives said, Mr. Dorego and the Real Estate Board were successful in lobbying lawmakers to renew the 421-a program.

Dorego agreed to begin cooperating with the feds in April and received a non-prosecution agreement in return.

Dorego's cooperation has a lot of people worried:

What's prompting concern at the Capitol is that Dorego, as well as Glenwood founder Leonard Litwin, are close to everyone.

“If Dorego is involved,” said one lobbyist, speaking on background, “then you can bet more trees are going to fall.”

In the past four years, Glenwood passed out at least $3.6 million to state politicians and the political committees that support them through a roster of two dozen limited liability companies. Records show it has ties to a dark money group that spent another $1 million attacking Democrats in 2012. It's hard to state definitively, because only some of the L.L.C.s can be readily associated, by address, with their parent company.

The contributions flowed across party lines through both chambers of the Legislature, pooling around the men with the most power, regardless of their stated affiliations or ideologies.

Governor Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, has benefited the most, taking in $1.45 million for his campaign committee and the soft money account he controls at the Democratic State Committee. Glenwood is also the largest donor to Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and Tom DiNapoli, both Democrats.

What did Cuomo do for the $1.45 million from from Litwin and Glenwood?

I bet Dorego, who met with Cuomo three times, knows.

Cuomo initially said he had nothing to do with Glenwood executives or lobbyists other than they were donors of his:

Cuomo was asked to describe his political and governmental interactions with Glenwood, its executives and its lobbyists since taking office.

“They are a donor of mine. They are a donor of many elected officials across the state, and that's basically the interaction,” Cuomo said. “I've had nothing to do, except they've been political supporters of mine.”

The governor said they “never” brought up rent control or 421-a with him or any members of his administration, “and I have no family members who worked with them or I asked to work them.”

That "never" turned to this after Jimmy Vielkind reported the three meetings between Cuomo and Charlie Dorego:

“The Governor did not remember off the top of his head three meetings from five years ago, two of which also included many other industry advocates,” said Rich Azzopardi, a spokesman for Cuomo. “What is clear to everyone is that we emerged that year with the strongest rent regulation laws in decades, which included the creation of a tenant protection unit that has returned more than 37,000 unlawfully deregulated apartments to rent regulation.”

Again, I bet Dorego knows what Cuomo got in return for 421-a support back in 2011.

Is he talking to US Attorney Preet Bharara and the feds about it?

What else is he talking to the feds about?