Same Old Same Old: Cuomo Rakes In Charter School Supporter Cash

Bill Mahoney at Politico NY:

ALBANY – In the first year of the 2018 gubernatorial election cycle, the list of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s largest donors is dominated by hedge funders and real estate developers.

...

This list is topped by hedge fund manager Stanley Druckenmiller, who has written two $500,000 checks to the party that has spent a huge share of its money supporting Cuomo in recent years. In 2013, the state Democrats’ housekeeping account spent millions buying advertisements that boosted the governor’s agenda, the next year, 86 percent of its independent expenditures were on Cuomo’s behalf.

Druckenmiller has been a major supporter of charter schools. So has Paul Tudor Jones, the second largest donor to committees controlled by the governor ($10,000 to Cuomo and $500,000 to the Democrats). Tudor Jones was a supporter of a pro-charter Super PAC that helped Republicans retain control of the Senate in 2014.


Hedge fund Renaissance Technologies founder James Simons, whose $1.65 million to the Democrats’ campaign committees was enough to earn a spot as their top donor in the last election cycle, continued to financially support Cuomo. Simons, who made a $150 million gift to SUNY Stony Brook in 2011 that was contingent on tuition hikes, gave the party $300,000 and the governor $45,000 in 2015, placing him third for the year.

Other large hedge fund donors included Joel and Julia Greenblatt, who gave Cuomo $60,000 apiece, and Daniel and Margaret Loeb ($88,000 total), who hosted a July fundraiser for the governor.

Greenblatt, Tudor Jones, Druckenmiller, Loeb - all charter school supporters and education "reformers."

But there are some new reformer names to the Cuomo donation list too:

Cuomo’s new donors also include the founders of collaborative office renter WeWork, Miguel McKelvey ($50,000) and Adam Neumann ($25,000; Neumann’s wife gave an additional $25,000). Wal-Mart heiress Alice Walton gave Cuomo $60,800 in November, and Jackie Bezos, the mother of Amazon’s founder, gave $15,000 in July.  

Walton is of course a charter school supporter and education reformer backer.

So is Jeff Bezos.

That Bezos' mother gave money to Andrew Cuomo - well, that is interesting, isn't it?

Not much has changed post-Silver/post-Skelos for Cuomo.

He continues to rake in the big bucks from hedge fundies and real estate developers, much of it through LLC's that allow donors to skirt individual limits.

The only change is Glenwood Management - once Cuomo's biggest donor, but since the firm and it's top political bagman wound up at the center of the Silver and Skelos corruption cases, they have given nothing to Cuomo.

Cuomo Plans A Merry Christmas For Himself: No Closing Of The LLC Loophole

Michael Gormley in Newsday:

ALBANY — In the wake of the corruption convictions of two of the State Legislature’s top former leaders, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said Monday he will push a new package of ethics in the coming legislative session.

But Cuomo said he believes that a top reform priority of good-government groups — closing the so-called LLC loophole — would be ineffective, even if passed by the legislature, because of a federal court ruling.

An element of state campaign finance law allows companies to exceed their $5,000 corporate limit by creating limited liability corporations. Through the LLCs, often with names that mask the parent company’s identity, corporations can contribute in total more than $100,000 to candidates and their political parties.

One of the companies that uses this loophole the most — the Manhattan real estate firm Glenwood Management — contributed to former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) and former Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Rockville Centre). Silver and Skelos were convicted this month on corruption charges. The company and its founder were mentioned in each trial, although they were not accused of wrongdoing.

Glenwood is also one of Cuomo’s biggest donors, providing his campaign with more than $1 million. Cuomo said that he’s never been influenced by donors and that he’s unsure if any legislators were influenced.

How much has Cuomo taken through the LLC loophole?

The NY Times reported that Cuomo received about $1.4 million in donations through LLC's from January 2015 to June 2015 - which, extrapolating out, is a nice chunk of change every year.

Pro Publica reported in July 2014 that Cuomo had raised 6.2 million dollars from LLC's for the first three and a half years of his administration - this, despite claiming more than once that he planned to close the loophole through a push for reform.

One of his flying attack monkeys explained the contradiction between taking millions through the loophole yet claiming to be against it this way:

In a statement, Cuomo spokesman Matthew Wing offered this to explain the apparent contradiction: "The Cuomo campaign is following existing campaign finance laws, while the Governor is leading the charge to reform them, including closing the loophole for LLCs."

This is the same game Cuomo's playing now, claiming to be against the loophole and moving to close it while undercutting those claims with his every action.

Pro Publica reported that the Moreland Commission had been investigating LLC donations until Cuomo closed down the commission in return for a lukewarm ethics reform package and budget deal agreement with then-Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and then-Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos - now both convicted on corruption charges.

Closing the LLC loophole was of course not part of that lukewarm ethics reform deal Cuomo got in return for closing down the Moreland Commission.

As noted in Gormley's Newsday piece, crooked real estate outfit Glenwood Management was the governor's biggest donor, giving money directly to Cuomo as well as steering it to Cuomo-linked entities like the State Democratic Party and his friends at the shadowy PAC the Committee To Save New York - but Glenwood wasn't the only real estate company to utilize the LLC loophole:

Another real estate developer, the Extell Development Co., has also given extensively to Cuomo through LLCs, including two donations last year that were flagged by the Moreland Commission.

Two LLCs affiliated with Extell gave the governor a total of $100,000 on Jan. 28, 2013—two days before Cuomo signed legislation that granted a tax break to Extell's One57 skyscraper in Manhattan, as well as properties owned by four other developers. Two other LLCs with ties to Extell gave Cuomo another $100,000 six months later. (The contributions were first reported last year by The Daily News.)

Other companies besides the real estate interests have utilized the LLC loophole with the govenror as well:

Since the governor took office, Time Warner Cable has contributed more than $60,000 to him through its LLC; LLCs affiliated with Cablevision have given $110,000. Two liquor distributors, Empire Merchants LLC and Empire Merchants North LLC, have given over $120,000. And two LLCs affiliated with the Ultimate Fighting Championship have contributed $115,000 to Cuomo, plus tens of thousands of dollars more to state legislators and political committees.

Cuomo has not proposed any legislation to legalize professional mixed martial arts events in New York, the only state that bans them. But almost a year after he received a $50,000 check from one of the LLCs, Cuomo seemed to come out in favor of overturning the ban.

"I think we need economic activity, especially in upstate New York," he said in a radio interview in 2013. "I think this is a major endeavor that is televised, that is happening all over the country at this point. You're not going to stop it from happening. And I'm interested in the potential economic potential for the state."

No wonder Cuomo plays this sham with LLC loophole closure - he's sucking up an awful lot of money via the LLC loophole that he wouldn't be able to get otherwise.

It's not like Cuomo, an unpopular governor with a job approval rating below 40%, is raking in millions from little people looking to support a politician.

He's raking in the big bucks from powerful interests looking for influence in Albany and since they can only give so much directly, the rest has got to be steered to him through various LLC's that hide who is giving the money and where it's coming from.

No wonder his actions belie his statements on the LLC loophole - there's just too much money to be made here for the governor to want to truly close the LLC loophole.

Dunno if Preetmas is coming this year, next year or ever, but given how criminal and corrupt this governor is, how he plays this sham game of claiming to be a "reformer" on the one hand while taking all these corrupt and/or hypocritical actions on the other, we surely need it to clear away this last man in the room.

Cuomo's facing criminal charges on corruption might not clean up the cesspool that is Albany, but it surely will clean up the part right at the center, where Cuomo himself stands.

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.

Cuomo Having Some Fundraising Trouble?

State of Politics:

Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s re-election campaign on Friday sent out another appeal to donors for buying tickets to a fundraiser that will include a viewing of the hit Broadway musical “Hamilton.”

The Cuomo campaign has been selling tickets to the Oct. 14 event since August, with donations ranging from $125 to $25,000.

But in a sign the campaign has struggled to sell tickets to the event — which will include the governor in attendance — those who have never donated to Cuomo have received letters urging them to buy tickets.

In the email sent Friday afternoon the Cuomo campaign gives three reasons for attending:

“If your inbox is anything like mine, you’re getting flooded with crazy End Of Quarter emails. So I figured I’d give you something easy.
Here’s the story:
1. Hamilton is an absolutely incredible show.
2. Tickets are hard to find (the show is basically sold out through 2016).
3. We would love you to come see the show with us on October 14th.
That’s really about it. You get to come see the show, and support Governor Cuomo at the same time.”

Cuomo has indicated he will run for a third term in 2018.

With the US attorney rooting around in the Buffalo Billion project, probing Cuomo donors who received contracts worth hundreds of millions from the state, Cuomo can't exactly do the old "Quid Pro Cuomo" right now and have some donors pay him back for favors by sending in eight checks from four LLC's linked to the same guy.

No, he's got to rely on the more standard form of fund-raising and if the repeated emails about the Hamilton show are an indication, looks like he may be having trouble reeling fish in.

Looks Like Cuomo's Working The Phone Again, Lashing Out At Enemies

State Senator Marc Panepinto publicly backed Mayor Bill de Blasio in his battle with Governor Andrew Cuomo earlier this month, saying “I have a great deal of respect for the governor, but he wants to rule the Democratic Party with an iron fist.”

Today the Daily News' Glenn Blain reports the following about Panepinto:

ALBANY — A state senator from Buffalo pressed state Workers Compensation Board officials to take action favored by his multi-million-dollar law firm, the Daily News has learned.

Sen. Marc Panepinto, a Democrat, lobbied Workers Compensation officials to abandon plans to alter — and in some instances reduce — the reimbursement rates paid to doctors and other medical service providers shortly after taking office in January.

Panepinto's opposition mirrored that of his law firm, Dolce Panepinto, which, according to its website, specializes in Workers Compensation cases and recovered more than $8.5 million for injured workers in just the first few months of 2015. The senator personally earned more than $1 million from his work as a partner in the firm in 2014, according to records.

The firm trumpeted Panepinto's efforts to roll back the proposed rate changes in its most recent quarterly report, boasting that the senator was part of a coalition that "banded together to successfully defeat this regulatory barrier to quality health care for injured workers."

Workers Compensation Board spokeswoman Rachel McEneny confirmed that Panepinto "discussed a variety of issues" with board executives during a Feb. 11 telephone call but declined to provide further details. She stressed that the board was still considering the rate changes.

Panepinto's response:

A spokeswoman for the senator defended Panepinto's efforts.

"Senator Panepinto received no compensation for his efforts fighting the ill-conceived Workers Compensation Board proposal and his law firm had no financial stake in stopping this reckless policy change," the spokeswoman said.

She said the proposed regulatory fee change was “a bad plan that would have harmed millions of hardworking New Yorkers and it would have created additional costs to taxpayers.”

The spokeswoman did not respond to requests for further information about Panepinto's activities or say whether he sought approval from the Legislative Ethics Commission.

And then there's this at the end of the article:

Insiders familiar with the Workers Compensation System suggested the changes, if implemented, would not drastically alter the financial recoveries earned by Panepinto's firm, but the firm's efforts likely endeared it to unions and doctors that refer cases.

"There's always something to be gained by doing something indirectly for the hand that feeds you," said one insider.

Panepinto, who pleaded guilty in 2001 to misdemeanor election fraud charges for collecting false signatures on nominating petitions, was elected to the Senate in November with heavy backing from labor unions, including the state's powerful teachers union.

Cuomo used the Daily News to dish dirt anonymously on de Blasio last month before de Blasio returned fire on Cuomo publicly.

It's not a stretch to think that Cuomo's using the Daily News again to strike out at enemies - including Panepinto, but not limited to him.

There's also a Ken Lovett Daily News expose on Eric Schneiderman today that reports the attorney general has "raked in hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations over the past six months — through a loophole he has said should be closed."

Schneiderman, seen as a potential candidate for governor in 2018, is another enemy of Cuomo, having criticized the governor and the legislature for not closing the LLC loophole.

Lovet does report that $1.4 million of the $5.2 million raised in the last six months by Andrew Cuomo has come through the LLC loophole too.

But overall, the Lovett piece is aimed at Schneiderman, not at Cuomo.

And frankly, the story's kinda bullshit.

Scheiderman raised a combined $267,850 from more than 40 different limited-liability companies.

Seems like a lot until you put that into context.

Hell, last week alone Cuomo got eight checks amounting to $250,000 from four different LLC's with connections to the land development guy in the village of Kiryas Joel after Cuomo vetoed legislation that might have out the kibosh on Kiryas Joel's ability to annex 500+ acres of land next to the village.

Cuomo taking a quarter of a million from four LLC's with connections to the land development guy in Kiryas Joel just days after he helps Kiryas Joel with a veto - kinda puts the Scheiderman LLC donations into a bit of perspective, doesn't it?

How come Kiryas Joel/Cuomo story didn't make it into the Lovett column today?

Unless I missed it, I haven't seen the DN cover the Kiryas Joel/Cuomo $250K story at all.

The NY Post had it.

Two Daily News pieces attacking two Cuomo enemies today - Panepinto and Schneiderman - I dunno, seems odd, especially since Cuomo's used the Daily News in the recent past as a weapon of choice to lash out anonymously at enemies.

I'm no "insider" in the ways of Albany or anything and maybe I'm just being naive here, but my bullshit meter goes up when I see this sort of thing. 

Feels like Cuomo's working the phones again, using the press to plant stories and lash out at his enemies.

Cuomo Gets Beaten Up Over Ethics, Hypocrisy

What a day for Governor Cuomo.

First the Independent Business Times reported this:

Cuomo has so far raked in more than $188,000 from HarperCollins, a News Corporation subsidiary. That is part of a book deal that could ultimately net him more than $700,000. With Albany’s transactional politics now the subject of a federal probe, the context of that April 2013 book deal is particularly significant: An International Business Times review of New York state documents reveals that News Corporation gave Cuomo a book contract after Cuomo’s administration backed a series of state initiatives that benefited the media giant.

One of the initiatives was a bill that created a special sales tax break for online-only publications that charge for subscriptions. News Corporation, which was one of the two companies that lobbied for the bill, was at the time investing tens of millions of dollars in such a publication. Another initiative was a special tax exemption that Cuomo’s administration created for electronic books, which are sold by, among others, HarperCollins. State records list News Corporation as lobbying Cuomo’s tax department in the months before the exemption was announced. And, while News Corporation lobbied the governor’s office in 2012, Cuomo championed an expansion of controversial film and television tax credits that have benefited News Corporation’s films, and that News Corporation had lobbied for in the past.

News Corporation did not respond to IBTimes’ request for comment. Cuomo’s office -- his calls for transparency notwithstanding -- declined IBTimes’ request to release the text of the contract for the book, which has reportedly sold just 3,000 copies. The governor’s office also declined to comment about the legislation he signed and the administrative tax change his officials enacted. The governor has previously rejected the notion that his book deal had anything to do with state business, saying book income is “an exception” because “I'm not allowed to represent anyone or any business matter." He has also scoffed at the idea of applying outside income restrictions on statewide elected officials like himself, challenging anyone to identify how those paying his book contract benefited from his policies.

Then, after a cabinet meeting, Cuomo had the following Q and A with the Albany press corps (transcript from Jimmy Vielkind at Capital NY):

Q: Governor, why didn't your ethics plan close the LLC loophole, which allows LLCs to be treated as individuals under the law? [Cuomo has raised $1 million from Leonard Litwin, a landlord, under this provision. Lawmakers from both parties are also regular beneficiaries.]

CUOMO: You know, there are a lot of things that you could include—this was about ethics, this was about responding to a particular point in time and focusing all our energy on making a difference on that issue. You make it too broad, then, first of all, you almost defy success, right? … I wanted to keep it sharp, tight, and frankly, indefensible that you could be opposed to these five points. How can you be opposed to disclosure? How can you be opposed to pension forfeiture? How can you be opposed to a fair per diem policy? I believe these items are almost inarguable, hence saying the budget should be conditioned on their acceptance.

If you inject an issue that you know is combative, like LLCs, well, I don't know that you're then arguing in good faith that this is an inarguable premise when you know LLCs have been argued for years and years and years.

What is the argument you've heard for not doing it?

It's the same argument you've heard. Why hasn't it happened?

The only argument I've heard is it allows rich people to multiply their political giving.

That's their argument. And that's why it hasn't happened for years and years.

Bharara says “stay tuned,” and the Capitol went for a loop when Silver was arrested. Should New Yorkers be concerned about you or senior members of your administration? Is there a legal risk that you feel regarding this ongoing probe, and what can you tell us to address those concerns?

I don't think there should be a concern. Has there been a series of 'scandals' in Albany? Yes. The shortness of memory surprises me. ... Paul Grondahl had a story that starts with an opening quote of these scandals in Albany and it's ongoing and every few months there's a scandal in Albany and every few months somebody gets arrested and on and on and on and it sounds like it was written contemporaneously. Then it says, 'So said Teddy Roosevelt.'

The scandals in government are not new. The question is, keep refining the system so that you do everything you can to prevent it, and if it happens then find it and punish it, and that is my point on the ethics disclosure. Five points, very strong, and by the way focusing on the issues arising from the case: pension forfeiture, outside income. …
I remember with my father, this was the constant drumbeat. You talk about the speaker: This was the third speaker who has been indicted. This is nothing new. I remember Mel Miller. And if you look at the genesis of most of the cases, it is because you have a part-time Legislature, and the part-time legislator can also have an outside business. … Many of them are lawyers, they can represent the private client, and you don't know who the private client is. … The case that keeps moving over and over is there was a conflict between a legislator who represented privately versus the public interest. That was the Joe Bruno case. That is inherent conflict.

[They say] 'Well, we want to have a part-time Legislature. We don't want to have a full-time Legislature. That's the constitutional framework.' Fine. So disclose the private clients. 'Well, that violates my right as a lawyer and my clients' rights.' No, it doesn't. That is just a red herring argument.The [New York City] Bar Association has said, unequivocally, you can release the client's name. 'Well, some clients will be embarrassed. Criminal case, divorce case.' Fine: exempt them. …
But clients that pose a potential conflict when they may be retaining you for your public capacity rather than your private capacity have to be disclosed. … Why does tort reform never get passed by the Legislature? There are little secrets that never sit right.

I understand that, but there is also concern about the executive branch.

There shouldn't be.

Could you elaborate a little on that, and can you describe if there's been any internal review that you've undertaken at the same time as the federal probe? You were elected in 2010, and again in 2014, talking about ethics, talking about changing the tenor of state government. I hear lots of concerns from people that there's going to be some kind of action that could involve the administration.

Yeah, I hear a lot of things from a lot of people. You should be more discriminating in who you're talking to, what you take to heart.

We have said … we worked very hard to clean up the culture of Albany, and we have. There is no doubt that there is more disclosure today than ever before—there is more disclosure in terms of clients, there is more disclosure in terms of income than ever before, there is more disclosure about who's going before state agencies, who has an interest in legislation. We have proceeded in leaps and bounds.

[They say] 'Well, it's not enough.' That may be true, it's not enough. But it's also true that we've made tremendous progress. That gets left out of the story, and, by the way, I don't know that it's ever going to be enough unless you make a structural change to who can represent outside clients, et cetera. ...
Do I feel we've done what we said we would do? Yes. Also, we've proposed a lot of ethics legislation that the Legislature has refused to pass. Right? It's a very difficult situation because the body that would be regulated is the body that needs to approve the regulations. …
What do you do? You say, I'm going to give you a very tight, narrow package and say, 'If you don't accomplish this, I'm not going to sign the budget.' You cannot say or do any more than I did.

Why don't your proposals capture the executive branch? Yourself?

Structurally, you don't have the conflicts with the executive because you don't have the opportunity for conflict. None of the people around the state, statewides, have outside income from clients. An elected official can do it.

Well, New Jersey bans all kind of speaking fees, book fees, all outside income. Other governors have taken speaking fees.

If there was a governor who you thought was abusive, then that would be fine.

But governor, the question isn't whether or not it's abusive, it goes to whether there's a potential conflict. You have not yet released the full details of your book deal with HarperCollins, which keeps everyone guessing as to just how much income you're going to derive from it.

I have released the income I've gotten from the book. [It's at least $700,000.]

On a year-to-year basis as required by law. But you haven't taken the extra step.

Hang around. Next year you'll see the other payment.

But does that go to the level of transparency that you're trying to create?

It's News Corp. You know that company. You know who owns it, and it is a book deal. You come up with some theory of how there's a conflict, writing a book, and we'll talk about it at that point. I understand the potential conflicts with speaker fees. I was here when we went through that—who engaged you, was there a conflict … I have not done speaking fees.

Well, there's an International Business Times report out today detailing how News Corp. had business before the state and it lobbied your administration, both as A.G. and as governor.

Who has?

News Corp., on issues that you ended up either signing or putting the budget. Tax breaks for online publications.

Tax breaks for online publications. I have no idea that they lobbied for it. I don't even know what it is, by the way. Also: The ethics laws that we proposed do apply to the executive, right … but the executive does not have many of the liberties that the Legislature does.

All of that came after Cuomo was aked if he or any member of his administration had been subpoenaed in a criminal investigation or talked to the feds:

Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he hasn’t had any conversations with federal prosecutors investigating his office’s role in the activities and disbandment of his Moreland Commission, but declined to say whether his staff has.

“Not myself. You’d have to ask people individually,” Cuomo said when asked by reporters following a Capitol cabinet meeting.

When asked how he would not know if his staff has talked to the U.S. Attorney’s Office or has been subpoenaed, he responded: “Not necessarily. I wouldn’t know if you were. It’s nobody else’s business besides the individual.”

He added, “You’d have to ask individuals. None to me.”

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara has been investigating Cuomo’s decision to end the panel’s work last March and whether there was any meddling by Cuomo’s office into the Moreland Commission, which the governor vowed was independent.

Bharara hasn’t disclosed the status of his investigations into the Moreland Commission or state legislators, but last month offered the ominous message: “Stay tuned.”

Yesterday a usually Cuomo-friendly venue, NT2 blog, described the Cuomo administration as "teetering" in the frantic actions and fights Cuomo's been engaging in since the start of the second term.

Things got even worse for Sheriff Andy today.

Cuomo's trying to dictate to the Legislature in his "Sheriff Andy" style over ethics reform but it's hard to take him seriously when he's jiving over reforms that would affect him (like the LLC loophole) and refuses full transparency over the News Corp deal.

With the pounding he took over various issues today, I think we can officially say that Andrew Cuomo's lost control of the narrative in Albany.