Gov. Cuomo in 2013 (photo: The Governor's Office)
As part of the #MeToo movement, a group of women who experienced sexual harassment or abuse while working in New York state government have for months been advocating for public hearings on the culture that enables that misconduct in government, especially the state capital, and in the private sector. Their calls have intensified -- and been echoed by prominent women running for state elected offices this year -- after Governor Andrew Cuomo and state legislative leaders passed new anti-harassment laws without any public hearings and without going far enough, according to the women.
Those calls have fallen on deaf ears from the men who control state government, however, with Cuomo touting the new laws as the “strongest in the nation” as he seeks a third term and leaders of the Assembly and Senate, including one accused of forcibly kissing an aide, largely remaining silent.
The Sexual Harassment Working Group, seven women who launched the #HarassmentFreeAlbany movement, have criticized the Democratic governor and bi-partisan Legislature for passing an inadequate package of anti-sexual harassment legislation in this year’s budget, agreed upon in late March. The policies were negotiated by Cuomo, Democratic Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, Republican Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan, and Senator Jeff Klein, then-leader of the Independent Democratic Conference that has since rejoined the mainline Democrats.
The criticism that the “four men in a room” had for years epitomized the opacity of state budget negotiations was made all the more stark by the fact that they decided how to tackle sexual harassment without hearings, without significant consultation with female legislators -- including the lone woman to lead a legislative conference, Democratic Senate Minority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, who had been promised a seat at the table -- and without those who had been subject to harassment or abuse, as well as the glaring inclusion of Klein, who was accused earlier this year of forcibly kissing a staffer in 2015 outside an Albany bar. Klein’s accuser, Erica Vladimer is among the members of The Sexual Harassment Working Group.
In consultation with experts, the group has issued a set of recommendations for enacting stronger anti-harassment protections and have been joined in their cause by the likes of Fordham Law professor Zephyr Teachout, who is running for the Democratic nomination for attorney general, and actor and activist Cynthia Nixon, who is challenging Cuomo in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, along with rank-and-file state legislators and other advocates.
At a news conference in Manhattan on Wednesday, August 1, Vladimer, other members of the group, and Zenaida Mendez, former President of NOW New York, appeared with Nixon, urging Cuomo to take action.
“It’s time to stop putting politics over human rights,” Vladimer said, “and the first way we can do that is with public hearings...where workers from every industry -- government, retail, food service, hospitality -- can be heard by those we elect to legislatie on our behalf and those who are appointed to enforce those protections.”
Nixon, running to be the first woman elected governor of New York, issued scathing remarks against Cuomo. “New Yorkers deserve better than a governor who ignores victims and chooses instead to protect and sometimes even promote those accused of harassment and worse,” she said. The first-time candidate recently released a video ad that cut back-and-forth between footage of Cuomo and President Donald Trump using similar rhetoric that smacks of ‘toxic masculinity.’
In an editorial for the Albany Times Union on Friday, two members of the group, Leah Hebert and Rita Pasarell, who were subjected to harassment by former Assemblymember Vito Lopez when they worked in his office, criticized Cuomo for his “strongest in the nation” claim about New York’s new anti-sexual harassment laws.
“[E]ven after accounting for rhetorical hyperbole in an election year, the new measures fall far short of what's needed,” Hebert and Pasarell wrote. “They lack teeth for enforcement. They fail to address many obstacles that prevent victims from seeking redress in court. They do nothing to fix the pervasive abuse in Albany, highlighted by more than 100 current and former state employees in an open letter. These new measures were passed in the same way gender-based harassment and discrimination often happen: behind closed doors.”
They noted how the New York City Council recently passed its own set of bills on sexual harassment after holding hearings to solicit testimony from those affected by it and from experts. The Stop Sexual Harassment in NYC Act included almost a dozen bills that were crafted after multiple hours-long hearings of the Council’s Committee on Women and the Committee on Civil and Human Rights. The bills, signed into law by the mayor, mandated, among other things, anti-sexual harassment trainings at city agencies and in private businesses, increased transparency from agencies on harassment complaints, stronger protections under the city’s human rights law, and added reporting requirements for city contractors.
Besides the open and very public process compared with how the new state policies were created, the city laws appear to be somewhat more expansive. The state policies require state contractors to provide anti-harassment training to all employees, prohibit mandatory arbitration for sexual harassment complaints, ban non-disclosure agreements unless a victim demands one, and extend harassment protections to non-traditional employees such as freelanders, contractors, and vendors. A broader model policy is still due from the state Division of Human Rights, which is meant to apply across the public and private sectors.
Cuomo, Heastie, and Flanagan, on the other hand, have shown no indication that they are listening. Spokespeople for all three officials did not respond to, or even acknowledge, requests for comment from Gotham Gazette about why there have been no public hearings, whether they are open to the idea, or if they had reviewed the recommendations put out by the Sexual Harassment Working Group. A Cuomo spokesperson told Gotham Gazette in late June that the administrations did “look forward to reviewing these recommendations,” but there’s no indication that has happened.
Dutchess County Executive Marc Molinaro, the Republican nominee for governor, also backed the call for public hearings on Thursday. “I pledge to insist on such hearings in Albany next year, should I be honored to be elected governor in November,” he said. “Albany’s culture will change. The coverups we have seen under Andrew Cuomo’s tenure are inexcusable and wrong.”
Molinaro, Nixon, and other Cuomo opponents and critics have also been seizing on recent revelations reported by the Albany Times Union around how victims of sexual harassment have been treated within the broader executive branch.
In the attorney general race, Teachout has been vocal about using the office’s power, if she is elected, to investigate sexual harassment, even in the private sector if it happens under her jurisdiction. Teachout also joined the Sexual Harassment Working Group when they were in Albany last month pressing their demands.
“The idea that New York State — in the middle of a national #TimesUp movement, after the Harvey Weinstein scandal, after all these scandals — that New York has not fixed its own problem is a total shame and disaster and suggests that our old boys club isn’t only covering up corruption but also covering up sexual misconduct,” Teachout said at the news conference, Politico New York reported. She urged her three Democratic primary opponents to join the calls for hearings and improved laws.
Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, also running for attorney general, has called for a “full-scale investigation” into harassment in state government. Leecia Eve, a former Cuomo and Hillary Clinton aide now running for attorney general, also supports holding hearings, according to a campaign spokesperson.
Delaney Kempner, a campaign spokesperson for Public Advocate Letitia James, who is the State Democratic Party’s preferred candidate for attorney general and has cross-endorsed with Cuomo, sent a statement to Gotham Gazette that touted work James has done co-sponsoring legislation on mandatory sexual harassment training and reporting, and advocating against forced arbitration clauses in employment contracts.
But the statement did not indicate whether James supports the call for hearings on sexual harassment in state government and beyond or believes that the new state laws passed are sufficient. “It is clear that our laws have not protected women in the workforce from harassment and abuse, both in Albany and across the state…,” Kempner said. “We must improve our laws and change our culture. As Attorney General, Tish will continue to stand up for the women of New York and investigate anyone who seeks to abuse or harass us. That is how we make lasting change.”
[Read: Pointing to Deficiencies, Victims Call for Changes to State’s New Sexual Harassment Policies]
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by Samar Khurshid, senior reporter, Gotham Gazette
@samarkhurshid @GothamGazette
Gov. Cuomo at a broadband event (photo: The Governor's Office)
The revocation of Charter Communications’ ability to do business in New York State may be seen by many as a win for consumers and for striking workers, but several key questions remain unanswered, including what cable operator will replace it, and if the company will really be forced to relinquish its assets in the first place.
Charter is the largest cable operator in the state, with its umbrella including most of New York City (the Bronx and parts of Brooklyn are dominated by Cablevision) and large swaths of upstate New York. Cable companies are sometimes described as “cartels,” divvying up territory where each can be the only operator, enabling higher prices and poorer customer service. Some have accused cable companies of explicit collusion.
When Charter acquired Time Warner Cable, New York City’s previous main cable operator, in 2016, the state’s Public Service Commission (PSC) approved the merger on the condition that Charter provide statewide broadband at 100 megabits per second (mbps) by the end of 2018 and 300 mbps by the end of 2019, and to provide broadband access to 145,000 unserved or underserved households in rural parts of the state.
The state says that Charter failed to live up to its promises and attempted to deceive the public into thinking that it had fulfilled them, via advertising campaigns. As such, the state revoked its approval of the Charter-TWC merger on July 27 in a hastily called meeting without one of its most vocal members, and banned Charter from operating in the state.
The PSC ordered Charter to “file within 60 days a plan with the Commission to ensure an orderly transition to a successor provider(s).” Charter can appeal or sue to block the decision, but as of yet has not done so.
As it was for Charter, approval from the PSC of a franchise agreement for the replacement provider is potentially extremely lucrative. It is not clear which company will become the successor, though the list of potential suitors includes large donors to Governor Andrew Cuomo’s campaigns.
Cablevision, the regional behemoth that operates in the Bronx and upstate, has donated $617,500 to Cuomo’s gubernatorial campaigns since 2008, with $92,500 coming since July of 2017. The donations have come from various LLCs affiliated with local affiliates (e.g. Cablevision of New Jersey, Cablevision of Rockland/Ramapo, etc.) as well as from a corporate PAC, though all donations list the address of its headquarters in Bethpage on Long Island.
Cablevision is now a subsidiary of European telecom giant Altice, which is not listed as having ever donated to Cuomo under its name.
Comcast, which has a limited presence in New York State, has given Cuomo $164,700 since 2009, with $55,180 coming on November 27 of last year. With Charter being evicted from the state, Comcast, the largest cable provider in the United States despite being routinely criticized for poor customer service and anticompetitive business practices, may attempt to gain a foothold in the Empire State and the single largest media market in the country.
AT&T and Verizon, both of which compete with cable companies with fiber optic offerings, have donated $137,900 and $72,815.89, respectively, to Cuomo’s gubernatorial campaigns. AT&T donated $20,100 on May 28. Cuomo received $187,800 from Time Warner, whose parent company his administration banned from the state.
Asked whether the campaign contributions could influence the process to replace Charter, Cuomo spokesperson Tyrone Stevens called any such notion "baseless" and noted that the replacement process is controlled by PSC without interference from the governor.
“The Governor believes the PSC should not back down to a media giant that has failed to live up to its promises and violated its obligation to build out our broadband system," Stevens said. "The PSC stepped up and took aggressive action to enforce the law, and the Governor stands with New York consumers who deserve the broadband service Charter-Spectrum promised, but has failed to provide."
The PSC, which regulates public utilities in the state such as gas, electricity, water, and telecommunications, is made up of five commissioners, each appointed by the governor. The PSC fined Charter $2 million in June for failing to adequately expand its network.
Charter has 60 days to present to the PSC a six-month transition plan to another cable operator. Charter is entitled to make its preference known as to which company it wants to replace it, but any new operator must prove to the PSC that it intends to serve the public interest in order to be approved to conduct business, and the actual broadband contracts are with localities, not the state.
“The properties that are owned by Charter/Time Warner in New York State are very profitable, and they’re essentially a known entity,” said Richard Berkley, the executive director of the Public Utility Law Project, a non-profit representing low-income and rural consumers seeking better service and consumer protection by public utilities, in an interview with Gotham Gazette. “So I think you’d see a lot of private entities interested in that.”
Charter can seek a “temporary restraining order” from a court, which Berkley had expected the company to do, but as of Monday afternoon, August 6, Charter does not appear to have filed any motions for a restraining order, or filed an appeal or lawsuit.
“In the same way that the state had a role in deciding whether or not Charter could buy Time Warner, or for that matter Comcast could buy Time Warner, whoever is proposed by the company will have to go through that same process,” Berkley said of PSC approval.
A large and profitable network of infrastructure suddenly being up-for-grabs may lead to intense lobbying of the PSC for the franchise.
“I would assume to the extent that they’re interested in stepping into the shoes of Charter that they have probably started checking in with the department or the state,” Berkley said.
“It’s a very profitable enterprise, and there are any number of large telecom firms that would want to step forward and try to buy it. The thing which is gonna make it more difficult still is that they have to be responsible. They have to be able to run the operation.”
A spokesperson for Altice declined to comment. Spokespeople for AT&T and Verizon did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for Comcast told Gotham Gazette, “at this time we aren’t commenting on this issue.”
A spokesperson for the PSC told Gotham Gazette, “The final decision as to who succeeds Charter is up to the PSC.” The spokesperson did not respond when asked whether telecom companies had been lobbying the PSC, or whether they were expected to. Cuomo told reporters Auburn on July 27 that the PSC is “talking to a number of companies.”
Cuomo has repeatedly publicly criticized Charter in the wake of its failure to live up to the terms of the merger deal. On July 31 in Queens, in response to a question about the Crystal Run straw donor scandal by NY1 reporter Zack Fink, Cuomo said that Charter/Spectrum had been “defrauding” the state. NY1’s future in a Spectrum-less New York is uncertain.
“You are defrauding the people of this state,” Cuomo told Fink. “That’s a fraud.”
A Cuomo spokesperson has insisted the governor was discussing Spectrum and has no ill-will toward Fink, a veteran reporter who has covered Cuomo for several years. Still, many noted Cuomo's response to legitimate questions about a campaign finance scandal that is being investigated by federal authorities.
In Auburn, where Cuomo was announcing a $10 million economic development initiative, the governor said that he asked the Attorney General to investigate advertisements making potentially false claims about Charter’s adherence to the conditions.
“They have breached their franchise agreement by being behind schedule in their build-out, even though their ads state the exact opposite, and they have not been forthright with the consumers in this state,” Cuomo said. “If you watch Spectrum-Charter, this issue has been going on for months. They haven’t even reported on it. Meanwhile, they’re running advertising that says the exact opposite. So, that’s why the PSC took that action today, and I support it.” Last Thursday, Charter halted its ad campaign touting its expanded broadband network, described by Cuomo and the PSC as misleading, a month after being ordered by the PSC to do so.
Berkley is skeptical that the donations to Cuomo’s campaigns by cable companies would significantly influence the PSC’s decision. “In the end, the Public Service Commission is an independent entity,” he said, despite the fact that Cuomo has a history of interfering in purportedly independent entities. “The governor doesn’t sit on the board. Yes, he gets to pick the people who come before the Senate to be vetted and confirmed. But, you know, the Senate has the ability to say ‘no’ to people.”
Berkley said that, rather than looking at large donations to Cuomo’s campaign coffers, the greater political influence lies in how much money companies have invested in state and local economic development initiatives. The cable infrastructure is privately owned and constructed, but built on public land, which is what makes it a public utility. Time Warner had, as a public utility, invested in local economic development initiatives such as the governor’s now-tarnished Buffalo Billion, announcing in 2013 that it would build a new call center in Buffalo. The larger Buffalo Billion program was at the center of a major public corruption trial earlier this year, which resulted in the conviction of a top Cuomo economic development official as well as Cuomo donors.
Berkley is not optimistic about the chances for municipal broadband to take hold in New York over private companies. Democratic State Senate candidate Ross Barkan has higher hopes: he thinks that the state should create a publicly owned internet company to compete with private cable companies and “break these monopolies once and for all.”
“Many New Yorkers are stuck with expensive, slow internet, and can't even shop among companies,” Barkan said in a direct message. “A public option for the internet would force private companies to provide better service, lower their prices, and would guarantee everyone in this city and state has a right to access the internet.”
Barkan, who is running in a competitive Brooklyn primary to try to unseat Republican Senator Marty Golden, said that if the proposal could be done through the legislative, rather than executive, process, he would be on the front lines for it.
“Either way, we need it. If it came down to introducing and passing a bill, I would do it,” he said.
In contrast to Cuomo and the PSC, who blame Charter, the Empire Center, a think tank, has laid blame for the situation on the cozy relationship between Cuomo and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 3, which represents Spectrum workers who have been striking for over a year. Just one day before the PSC announced Charter’s banishment, New York City launched its own probe into whether Spectrum was fulfilling the conditions of its franchise with the city, namely whether their “cable techs” were local union workers; the IBEW told the Daily News that Spectrum had begun utilizing out-of-state staffers. And on July 31, 23 New York City Council Members called for Charter to not be considered for any future contracts in New York City.
Ken Girardin, a policy analyst at the Empire Center, cited a speech by Cuomo at a rally for striking IBEW workers, where he questioned how Charter could “improve customer service without the workforce that knows how to provide customer service” in the wake of the merger and its attached conditions.
“Cuomo’s rhetoric makes it impossible to separate the PSC’s actions from the Charter-IBEW dispute,” Girardin said. He doubted that Charter would even be kicked out of the state at all, asserting instead that the PSC would revise the merger’s conditional deadlines if Charter acquiesced to the demands of the striking workers. Charter can seek a restraining order and settlement to block the state’s actions, but has not filed motions to do so at this time.
A spokesperson for IBEW did not respond to a request for comment from Gotham Gazette. The union and its affiliates have also donated generously to Cuomo’s campaign accounts.
In an interview, Girardin described the PSC as a “kangaroo commission,” an institution that is operating on Cuomo’s behalf unchecked by the state Legislature, and said that if the Charter decision stands it would allow the governor to extort favorable outcomes out of companies lest they be kicked out of the state, too.
“The governor makes no illusion about the control he exercises over the PSC,” Girardin said. “The PSC has done mental and legal backflips to implement policy on the governor’s behalf. And that ranges from inventing a way to subsidize nuclear power plants to creating a basis for expelling Charter out of the state. The PSC’s core mission is to ensure the reliability of utilities and to regulate the rates that they charge. Governors going back to Pataki have exploited the PSC’s statutory authority.”
Girardin is also more suspicious of the cable companies’ donations to Cuomo’s campaign.
“I can't speak to how contributions influence decision-making,” he told Gotham Gazette in an email, “but if the governor were to let the PSC operate as intended -- as an independent panel of experts focused on rates and reliability -- there would be less incentive for regulated utilities to contribute to his campaign.”
Cuomo has been a regular target of pay-to-play allegations given the state’s porous campaign finance laws, his acceptance of campaign contributions from entities with or seeking state business, and policy decisions that have favored donors. Cuomo’s office has consistently said that government decisions are based on the merits, not influenced by campaign donations of any size.
Nevertheless, Girardin said that, despite some seemingly political decisions such as the seizure of the Fitzpatrick Power Plant when the operator wished to close it, and bailouts for nuclear plants lacking in transparency, the banishment of Charter would be without precedent in the state.
“Nothing that the PSC has done in the past rises to this level,” Girardin said. Girardin said that the PSC, in normal circumstances, would simply levy a fine and lay out an enforcement plan against Charter, and that it should attempt to foster competition in the market instead of simply choosing a replacement for Charter’s franchise.
Republican gubernatorial nominee Marc Molinaro also claimed that the revocation of Charter’s franchise was politically motivated, in order to punish NY1, which is owned by Charter/Spectrum.
Molinaro called on the state’s Inspector General to look into the decision to revoke Charter’s franchise, to determine if the Cuomo administration had “orchestrated” the action for political purposes.
“I’ll come right out and say it: It looks to me like Andrew Cuomo is trying to send a chilling message to the news media—’don’t mess with me’—and I hope the Inspector General can prove me wrong,” Molinaro said.
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by Ben Brachfeld, Gotham Gazette
@GothamGazette
Note: this story has been updated to reflect additional comments from the governor's office.
Gov. Cuomo at God's Battalion Church in Brooklyn (both photos via Governor's Office)
On a recent morning at Sylvia's, the historic soul food restaurant in Harlem, caterer Lindsey Williams was weighing his upcoming vote in New York's gubernatorial primary election.
"I listened to Cynthia Nixon, and I liked what she was saying," said Williams, the 52 year-old grandson of Sylvia's founder Sylvia Woods.
Ultimately, however, Governor Andrew Cuomo had his vote, Williams said, citing his admiration for the governor's father, late Governor Mario Cuomo, and the younger Cuomo's years of experience.
"I commend [Nixon] for running," he said, "but I trust Cuomo."
That wariness towards the first-time candidate for elected office reflects a hurdle for the actor-turned-insurgent: winning over black voters, a bloc that has helped buoy New York Democrats from Mayor Bill de Blasio to Hillary Clinton and now, according to polls, strongly supports Cuomo, who is seeking a third term as governor.
In a July survey from Siena College, 75% of black likely Democratic primary voters polled said they would vote Cuomo over Nixon. Nineteen percent went with Nixon, and 6% were undecided. Of the total polled, 60% went with Cuomo to Nixon's 29%.
In a July Quinnipiac University poll, 61% of non-white voters approved of Cuomo, compared to 42% approval among white people.
Cuomo's favorability rating with black likely voters hit 79% in both June and July Siena polls. That number is more than double Nixon's -- and it bests Siena favorability ratings with the same demographic this year for de Blasio and U.S. Senators from New York Kirsten Gillibrand and Charles Schumer.
Cuomo's favorability rating with black voters in the polls is also higher than the 65% favorability rating with the same demographic for Public Advocate Letitia James, a Brooklyn native who would become the state's first black attorney general if she wins her race this year but is not nearly as well-known as Cuomo among voters across the state.
James and Cuomo have allied throughout their races and cross-endorsed, a partnership that may bolster the standing of both among black voters.
"We work with people who have worked with us," said Keith Wright, a Cuomo backer and former state legislator representing Harlem, the neighborhood that has long been a center of black power in New York. "Black people don't throw their votes away."
As for Nixon, Wright said: "I don't know the woman."
Longevity, Trust
In interviews, black Democratic party leaders, religious officials, and voters cited the Cuomo family's longevity in politics and the governor's reliability visiting their communities and pushing issues from gun-control to an outside monitor overseeing the New York City Housing Authority.
"People are familiar with him," said Brooklyn Assemblymember Rodneyse Bichotte, the first Haitian-American woman elected to the state Legislature. "It takes a lot of time to penetrate these communities and get name-recognition."
Ms. Bichotte endorsed Nixon's de facto running-mate -- Lieutenant Governor candidate Jumaane Williams -- but declined to endorse in the governor's race even as she is frequently critical of Cuomo.
"He's a charismatic man with a lot of experience," she said of the governor. "New Yorkers want to feel secure."
Wright expressed similar sentiments.
"He has been working on issues important to the black community for years, and his father before him," he said. "There's a track record, and a level of trust."
Nixon Camp Questions Polls
Nixon has sought to address issues of race head-on with a campaign video where she decries "an unjust system that criminalizes communities of color."
At the top of her campaign agenda is ending cash bail and legalizing marijuana, which she says would create a fairer criminal justice system. Her campaign has been centered on the notion that on criminal justice reform and many other issues, Cuomo has pushed through half-measures, if anything at all, to address racial, social, and economic inequality.
A spokeswoman said the Nixon campaign has knocked on doors in predominantly black and Latino communities, "and 70% of the people we talk to support Cynthia and Jumaane."
L. Joy Williams, a senior advisor to the Nixon campaign and president of the NAACP's Brooklyn chapter, said the polls are not capturing people Nixon is eying, who may be newly engaged in state politics and not regular voters.
"The community I am a part of in central Brooklyn is very dissatisfied in terms of affordability, access to services, the criminal-justice system," she said in an interview. "I know a number of people of color feel the same way. The question is whether they have been provided an alternate candidate to address these issues before."
But there isn't "some special thing you do for black voters," she added. "Sometimes campaigns make the mistake of thinking it's criminal justice and that's it. Going into communities, asking them questions, and then engaging people on the issues that matter to them is the key to success no matter the ethnicity."
Cuomo’s Inroads
Some two decades ago Cuomo's support among black voters was shakier. He ran a heated gubernatorial primary against then-Comptroller Carl McCall, who would have become the state's first black governor.
That race ended in Cuomo's defeat, while McCall went on to lose to incumbent Republican Governor George Pataki.
People familiar with the governor's thinking said Cuomo has been self-conscious about his standing among black voters ever since.
"Since [the McCall race] there has been a realignment," said Reverend Alfred Cockfield II, the executive pastor at God's Battalion of Prayer in Brooklyn, a predominantly Caribbean African-American Church where Cuomo spoke in March. "Those hard feelings are washed away."
Mr. Cockfield and other black supporters of the governor's cited a range of policy issues, from large initiatives like removing most minors from adult criminal proceedings for nonviolent crimes and appointing the attorney general to investigate police-related deaths, to smaller-scale ones like efforts to get more state contracts for minority-owned businesses.
Geoffrey Davis, a Democratic district leader in Brooklyn whose brother, a City Council member, was shot to death in 2003, cited Cuomo's gun control work.
"If someone is campaigning of course they'll say what they're going to do," he said. "We want you to say what you have done."
"This is serious business," he added. "Now we're going from 'Sex & the City' to reform. It sounds good, but we know what Governor Cuomo is doing, and we're satisfied."
‘A Subtle Disrespect’
When it comes to issues where Nixon has hit Cuomo hardest -- managing the city's ailing subways, and rooting out corruption in a state government where criminal convictions are common -- Cuomo supporters expressed skepticism she could offer improvements.
"It's a subtle disrespect," said Rev. Cockfield II. "Like they don't think we're wise enough to know she has not come to these communities before."
A minor debacle over Nixon's campaign kickoff location also made some black clergy leaders uneasy, they said.
She began her campaign at Bethesda Healing Center, a church in Brownsville, Brooklyn, but a religious leader there said church leaders thought the meeting would be private and were caught off-guard by the widely-publicized campaign event.
Organizers of the campaign kickoff apologized to church leaders for the misunderstanding, people familiar with the matter said.
A few weeks later, Cuomo invited a number of church leaders from Brooklyn, including an official at Bethesda Healing Center, to his office to highlight efforts like his "Vital Brooklyn" initiative, a multi-faceted state spending program in Brooklyn.
One attendee came away feeling that the governor is "an astute politician," this person said.
Support for Nixon
For some black leaders, the support for Cuomo is frustrating.
"With a $168 billion state budget there should be zero poverty in our community, " said Assemblymember Charles Barron, a Brooklyn Democrat and former member of the Black Panther Party. "It sickens me and saddens me that black leaders will give these two politicians a pass," he said, referring to Cuomo and de Blasio.
He chalked up their support to ambitious politicians who can be "easily bought off by a chairmanship," and voters too easily wooed by policies he said don't help enough.
Education activist Zakiyah Ansari disputed criticisms that Nixon has only come lately to issues affecting people of color, pointing to her years of pushing for more state support for public education.
"Through the advocacy work she was doing with her children, she thought about what it looks like for black and brown communities, who were getting even less," Ansari said.
Ansari, who introduced Nixon at her campaign kickoff and vouched then for her work in communities of color, described legislators darting away when they saw activists at the state Capitol until Nixon walked with them and "elevated our voices."
When Ansari walked 150 miles from New York City to Albany to push for more school spending, on the other hand, Cuomo's office called it a publicity stunt.
"That was the response we got."
Undecided in Harlem
At a recent 56th anniversary breakfast for Sylvia's, a voter registration drive was on hand and patrons encouraged each other to go to the polls this year.
Voters there said they were leaning towards Cuomo in the September 13 primary, but several attendees weren't sure.
Mike Nelson, a 60 year-old respiratory therapist registering voters outside the restaurant, said Nixon "hasn't knocked on my door," but he hasn't yet settled on Cuomo. "My vote is not easy to come by," he said.
Another Sylvia's diner, 67 year-old James Wynn, said he is undecided. His union, 32BJ, endorsed Cuomo, he said, "but I'd give Cynthia a chance."
[Read: In Wide Open Lieutenant Governor Primary, Hochul Targets Votes in Williams’ Backyard]
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Mike Vilensky is a freelance journalist and student at Brooklyn Law School.
@GothamGazette
Ben Max, left, of Gotham Gazette, and Jarrett Murphy, right, of City Limits
August 1, 2018 - Max & Murphy Podcast: The Epicenter of the Fight Over the IDC, with guests State Senator Marisol Alcántara and challenger Robert Jackson
Marisol Alcántara won a close, competitive four-way Democratic primary in 2016 to take her seat in the state Senate, and promptly joined the controversial Independent Democratic Conference (the rogue Democrats who formed a coalition with the majority Senate Republicans), which had supported her in her narrow primary victory, including with hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding. Alcántara says she did not keep Democrats from the Senate majority and that she has accomplished a great deal in her first term.
But Robert Jackson, who narrowly lost to Alcántara in 2016, is challenging her, and this time it's head to head and amid a major backlash against the IDC members, who returned to the mainline Democratic conference in April, in an apparent effort to quell primary challenges that have continued.
Alcántara then Jackson joined Max & Murphy for this week's podcast, originally aired on WBAI radio, where each also took listener calls. The podcast includes the full Max & Murphy hour on WBAI, including the two interviews, listener calls, and other discussion. Alcántara is on starting about five minutes in and Jackson is on starting at about 30 minutes into the hour.
Listen to the full conversation and let us know what you think -- we're on Twitter @TweetBenMax and @JarrettMurphy. You can listen to the show through the embedded audio below or download the episode wherever you get your podcasts, under "Max & Murphy," and listen to the show on Wednesdays at 5 p.m. on WBAI radio, 99.5FM or wbai.org
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by Ben Max, Gotham Gazette
@tweetBenMax @GothamGazette
Lt. Gov. Hochul, center, in Brooklyn (photo: @KathyHochul)
Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul, in campaign mode, has appeared in the Bronx and Brooklyn several times over the past few weeks. The Democratic lieutenant governor, facing a challenge from Brooklyn City Council Member Jumaane Williams as she seeks a second term, has been spending more time in New York City as primary day gets closer.
Hochul’s focus on the city, and its communities of color in particular, are indicative of the importance of voters from the five boroughs, especially voters of color, in statewide Democratic primaries, and of her potential vulnerability to Williams, who has been an elected official in Brooklyn since 2010 and is black. A Siena Research poll released Tuesday -- just over six weeks until the September 13 statewide primary vote -- shows Hochul with a 30-21 percent lead among likely Democratic primary voters, with nearly half undecided. In other words, a wide open race.
Hochul seems to know it. The lieutenant governor spent Saturday July 28 at a “Brooklyn Women for Cuomo” event, July 22 in the Bronx with Assemblymember Nathalia Fernandez and City Council Member Vanessa Gibson, July 18 giving remarks at the Bronx Democratic Party’s Annual Gala, and July 14 in Brooklyn with State Senator Roxanne Persaud, attending a block party and the opening of Public Advocate Letitia James’ attorney general campaign office in Prospect Heights.
These events, among others both campaign and governmental -- in her role as lieutenant governor, she made an announcement at the Brooklyn Public Library main branch on Tuesday afternoon and appeared at a June gun control rally in the Bronx, for example -- have had Hochul appearing with black and Latino elected officials and posting photos with them to her social media feeds, and highlighting state investments in the boroughs with the highest proportions of people of color.
“Beautiful Saturday with my sisters in #Brooklyn – thank you for coming out to support @AndrewCuomo and I as we run for re-election,” Hochul tweeted on Saturday, with two photos attached, one of herself with four African-American women including Senator Persaud and Assemblymember Latrice Walker.
At the same time, Hochul has begun to zero in on Williams, returning some of his criticism of her as little more than a booster of Governor Andrew Cuomo, unwilling to be independent or speak up about corruption in state government. Hochul, who is from Erie County, where she was county clerk and a one-term member of Congress, has a conservative record on gun control and immigration that Williams has criticized and she has since distanced herself from, expressing more liberal views.
Hochul’s counterattacks have homed in on Williams’ own more conservative stances on abortion and marriage equality, and she has also taken him to task around his late and faulty campaign finance disclosures and unwillingness to release his past tax returns.
Last Tuesday, Hochul released a statement chastising Williams for failing to release his tax returns despite having introduced a resolution in the City Council calling for presidential candidates do so. “It's time for Councilman Williams to live up to his calls for transparency,” Hochul tweeted recently. “Stop trying to deflect and delay. Release your tax returns to the people of New York.”
She has also criticized Williams for issues with filing his campaign finance disclosure and for having to return $50,000 in illegal corporate donations. He has fired back saying that she has talked more about his campaign finance disclosures than about corruption in the state economic development programs that are key to her portfolio as lieutenant governor and have centered in Buffalo, which she represented in Congress.
In some ways, Hochul has appeared to embrace the challenge from Williams -- she calls herself a fighter and has said that while she thinks Democratic infighting hurts the party’s chances to flip Republican seats in Congress and the state Senate, she is happy to defend her record and Cuomo’s -- she enthusiastically supports the governor and explains her role as helping to get administration programs over the finish line and then to promote them around the state. While Cuomo has declined thus far to debate Cynthia Nixon in the gubernatorial primary, Hochul recently took to a Westchester stage with Williams for a forum, with only a moderator between them.
Any Democrat running for statewide office will have to spend a significant amount of time in New York City, with 55 percent of registered Democrats statewide residing within the five boroughs according to an April report from the State Board of Elections. But Williams may pose a different challenge to Hochul than did Tim Wu, Hochul’s 2014 Democratic challenger who ran alongside Zephyr Teachout, who took on Cuomo that year, as he was seeking a second term (Robert Duffy was Cuomo’s first-term lieutenant governor).
People of color, and particularly African-Americans, in the city play an outsize role in statewide Democratic primaries, the “base” of the party that is the most strongly identifies as Democratic.
“We can look at the record, just across the entire United States of America: black women are strong voters and strong leaders in our communities,” Brooklyn City Council Member Alicka Ampry-Samuel told Gotham Gazette on Monday. “Elected or not elected. And we usually are the ones that come out and help folks to get elected. Look at Alabama, right? And so, [Hochul] knows that, campaigns know that, and so it’s the same way you see Jumaane Williams now having conversations with women.”
In seeking to draw a wedge between the two candidates that will resonate with Democratic primary voters, Williams has pointed to Hochul’s votes in Congress for “concealed carry reciprocity,” allowing concealed carry gun permits to be valid in states without concealed carry (it did not pass the Senate), and for Hochul’s opposition to former Governor Eliot Spitzer’s plan to allow undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses.
“The lieutenant governor has no real record to speak of in 25 years,” Williams told Gotham Gazette near City Hall on Tuesday, after receiving the endorsement of the City Council’s Progressive Caucus Alliance. “There’s a lot of conversation of what their hands have been in, but my record is rich, in the past nine years, whether it’s communities of more color, whether it’s the LGBT community, whether it’s reproductive rights.”
Hochul has distanced herself from her more conservative past, criticizing the Trump administration’s child separation policy and unsuccessfully campaigning with Cuomo to get the state Senate to pass a “red flag” gun bill, while trumpeting Cuomo’s prior gun control victories. She has also expressed regret about, when Erie County Clerk, threatening to turn in to law enforcement any undocumented immigrants who may seek a driver’s license from her office. And she’s repeatedly pointed to Williams’ conservative personal views on abortion and marriage equality, which he has modified in recent years while touting his legislative record on the subjects as separate from his personal beliefs.
Not everyone is convinced that Williams is a threat to Hochul. Political scientist and Democratic strategist Bruce Gyory, of Manatt, Phelps, and Phillips and SUNY Albany, believes that Williams may not have the political capital among African-Americans necessary to mount a statewide challenge against Hochul.
“Does Jumaane Williams start out with overwhelming black support?” Gyory said in an interview with Gotham Gazette. “He didn’t back Bill Thompson [in the 2013 mayoral race], he backed de Blasio that time. He never endorsed Ken Thompson [for Brooklyn District Attorney] in the seminal reform race for black progressives in Brooklyn. He undercut black unity by not stepping out of the race for City Council [speaker] and backing [Robert] Cornegy, who had more support. And if you look at blacks in the Council, they were kinda begging him to do that, I’m sure they’re not thrilled that right after losing that race, he runs here for this.”
Gyory also noted that Williams has not endorsed Tish James, a fellow Brooklynite who would become the first black woman to hold statewide office, for Attorney General. Williams has endorsed Cynthia Nixon for governor and the two are both backed by The Working Families Party. He has also campaigned with Teachout, who is now running for attorney general, and the two seem set up to endorse each other.
Cuomo remains highly popular among black voters, and he, Hochul, and James have all endorsed each other. It’s not immediately clear that support from Cuomo and James will help Hochul among black voters, but it is exceedingly unlikely to hurt. The race may hinge in part on money, and there Williams appears at a significant disadvantage -- not only has Hochul raised more, but she has Cuomo’s immense largesse behind her as well, while Williams has never been a prolific fund-raiser.
"The Lieutenant Governor is very happy with where she stands in this race and the support that she is receiving statewide,” reads a statement from the Hochul campaign. “The poll clearly shows that the people of New York are happy with the record of accomplishments the Governor and Lieutenant Governor have achieved over the past four years. The Lieutenant Governor always campaigns hard and will be spending the next six weeks all over the state talking about that record."
Williams was also optimistic about the poll.
“The biggest poll for me is on election day,” he told Gotham Gazette. “So, don’t get too high or low on the polls in general. We’ve seen polls be completely wrong, so it’s hard. But I will say, it’s encouraging.” He noted that the high numbers of undecided voters in the poll -- roughly 50 percent of respondents -- as a good sign for his campaign.
Hochul’s campaign acknowledged that New York is a difficult state to become well known in, but expressed confidence that it will have the resources to continue to build her name recognition.
Gyory said that the swingiest demographic in statewide Democratic primaries is upper middle class, educated Catholic white women from the suburban counties; he said that Williams’ past personal opposition to abortion rights and LGBT rights would hurt him among that demographic.
He believes that Hochul is being tactically wise to target city voters and voters of color, explaining the recent spate of appearances in the city. While there are just over 300,000 registered Democratic voters in Hochul’s home county of Erie, which includes the state’s second-largest city of Buffalo, there are more than 3.4 million registered Democrats in New York City, including 1,096,765 in Williams’ home borough of Brooklyn.
“It would be hard to argue that she’s not being smart, that it’s not a good use of her time, to make him work as hard as he can for those votes in New York City,” Gyory said. “Because if she pins him down there, it’s tough to see him doing what he needs to do outside of New York City. So I think that’s a smart approach.”
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by Ben Brachfeld, Gotham Gazette
@GothamGazette
Letitia James at City Hall (photo: Gotham Gazette)
In the four-way contest for the Democratic nomination for attorney general, Public Advocate Letitia James is leading the pack but more than 40 percent of likely primary voters have yet to decide who they will support, according to the latest Siena College poll released Tuesday.
The poll, conducted from July 22 to 26, sampled hundreds of Democrats across the state that are likely to vote in the September 13 primary. James, who is the State Democratic Party’s chosen designee for attorney general, received 25 percent of the vote from those polled, ahead of U.S. Representative Sean Patrick Maloney, who polled at 16 percent; Fordham Law professor Zephyr Teachout, who received 13 percent; and Leecia Eve, a former aide to Governor Andrew Cuomo and Hillary Clinton, who polled at 4 percent. But 42 percent of those polled said they were undecided, and it is not clear that it, or any other poll, is accurately measuring who will come out to vote in September.
“It’s not surprising that the race is wide open since none of the candidates are particularly well known to voters,” said Siena College pollster Steven Greenberg, in a statement accompanying the poll’s release.
The numbers seemed to buoy the hopes of each candidate, though they all showed a lack of name recognition with voters. James seems to be the most popular of all the four, with 36 percent of voters holding a favorable opinion of her. Teachout and Maloney’s favorability rating was 27 percent and 21 percent, respectively, while Eve only had 9 percent of voters that felt the same. Mostly, voters said they didn’t know enough about the candidates to have an opinion.
New York City voters, who make up a large portion of the Democratic primary electorate, overwhelmingly chose James, with 41 percent of the vote, and she performed particularly well with African-American and Latino voters, among whom she received 56 percent and 35 percent of the vote respectively. After having become the first woman of color to win a citywide office in 2013, James, if victorious, would become the first woman of color elected to a statewide position if she wins the primary and general election for attorney general.
“Tish James’ record as Public Advocate, a City Council Member, and as an Assistant Attorney General has engendered grassroots support from New Yorkers of all backgrounds - the truest testament to the strength of her candidacy,” said Delaney Kempner, a James campaign spokesperson, in a statement. “She is solely focused on addressing the real issues that New Yorkers are facing.”
The poll showed that James has nothing to take for granted, despite the fact that she has the powerful backing of Governor Andrew Cuomo, who has helped her raise money and build her profile among voters, and is likely to do more of both ahead of primary day.
“Over the next six weeks, all of these candidates have a lot of work to do to become known to Democratic primary voters and then get them to the polls in what is likely to be – sadly – a low turnout election,” Greenberg said. “Although James has the early lead, there’s a long way to go in this race before we know which Democrat will take on Republican Keith Wofford to succeed Barbara Underwood in an election with no incumbent.”
Among suburban voters, Maloney was the more popular choice, with 25 percent supporting his campaign, compared with 15 percent for James and 9 percent for Teachout. In upstate New York, Maloney again led with 21 percent of the vote, while Teachout had 17 percent and James got only 5 percent. Maloney and Teachout had almost the same level of support among white voters, while James was behind the two.
Eve, the least known candidate, says she is undeterred. “We are energized by the strong, grassroots support we are receiving from people across New York who know that Leecia has what it takes to be a fearless and effective champion for all New Yorkers,” said Maggie McKeon, a campaign spokesperson.
Maloney’s favorability hovered between 19 and 26 percent across all categories of voters. “This race is wide open,” the Hudson Valley member of Congress said in a statement. “New Yorkers are still waiting to see which candidate can show that they are passionate enough to take the fight to Trump and experienced enough to win - and right now I am the only one who can do that."
Teachout’s campaign made a similar argument, while also stressing that the polling was flawed and did not account for the energized progressive base that has turned out for candidates such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who beat ten-term Democratic Representative Joe Crowley in the June congressional primary. “[W]e've seen that the polls aren't really great at understanding insurgent candidates, as we saw with Dana Balter," said Cristina Gonzalez, a Teachout campaign spokesperson, in a statement, with reference to the congressional candidacy of another upstart, unexpected female primary winner.
The youngest category of voters, those between the ages of 18-34, mostly supported James, giving her 43 percent of the vote, compared with 8 percent for Teachout, 9 percent for Maloney, and 6 percent for Eve. The younger demographic is one that Teachout expects to do well with given she is running her campaign furthest to the left and with the most anti-establishment fervor (James also led among voters aged 35-54 and older).
Teachout has received the backing of a number of progressive groups, elected officials, and activists, but James has more than her share as well, and despite her ties to the more centrist Cuomo, she says she is refusing to cede the progressive ground to her opponent. Still, Teachout has repeatedly made campaign pledges, like refusing corporate money and demanding hearings in Albany on sexual harassment in state government, and called on her opponents to do the same, and they have not. She’s thus far staked out the most aggressive positions and stance toward her competition, while James has been coalition-building and raising money, Eve has been campaigning around the state, and Maloney has done little on the trail while attending to business in Washington, D.C.
The four contenders are set to share the stage for a live broadcast debate on NY1 on August 28, but Teachout and Eve have both been beating the drum for a series of broadcast debates across the state. Since June, Teachout has proposed six television and radio debates in New York City, Albany, Binghamton, Buffalo, Syracuse, and Long Island. “Four years ago when I ran for statewide office voters were denied a full and frank debate,” Teachout said in a June 27 statement. “The candidates for Attorney General owe them so much better this year, especially given the widespread erosion of democratic norms post-Trump.”
Eve has floated similar terms. Maloney’s campaign has been relatively quiet on all fronts -- he has not appeared at several attorney general forums attended by one or more of the other three, a fact James made reference to on Monday when Gotham Gazette asked if she would accept the debate challenge put forth by Teachout. Maloney’s campaign said he plans to attend a forum in Westchester on Thursday night hosted by the local Indivisible chapter.
James said she is broadly open to the idea of more debates, but did not make reference to the idea of six over the airwaves. "I have a proven record of accomplishments and I have a proven record of being a progressive. I will again debate and share and compare my progressive agenda and all that I have done in the state of New York and particularly in the city of New York against any of my opponents everyday and I’m confident that I will stand the test of time,” James told Gotham Gazette on Monday, shortly after being endorsed by 10 of the 11 women elected to the New York City Council.
[Listen to appearances by Zephyr Teachout, Tish James, and Leecia Eve on the Max & Murphy podcast (Sean Patrick Maloney will be a guest August 8)]
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by Samar Khurshid, senior reporter, Gotham Gazette
@samarkhurshid @GothamGazette
(photo via the Governor's office)
The latest statewide poll from Quinnipiac University shows New York voters’ preferences in the races for governor, attorney general, and others. But it also divulges the issues that New Yorkers say are most important to them in the run-up to the September primary and November general elections.
One question asked what issue voters prioritize most in their vote for governor, with a short list of issues provided to those being polled, as opposed to it being an open-ended question. With 23 percent of those polled, the economy was the number one choice of New York voters, followed by government corruption and health care at 19 percent each, taxes and education at 15 percent, abortion at 4 percent, “don’t know” at 3 percent, and “something else” at 2 percent. Issues like the environment, transportation, affordable housing, and criminal justice were not provided as options, though all are prominent in the public discourse and the gubernatorial campaign.
Among Democrats, health care stood as the most highly prioritized issue of the choices, at 26 percent, with education and the economy at 21 percent each. For Republicans, taxes and the economy co-led at 24 percent; for independent voters, the economy led at 26 percent and government corruption was at 22 percent. Younger respondents were more likely to prioritize the economy than older voters, who were more likely to prioritize health care or government corruption. The poll was taken as federal corruption convictions continued to roll in among former top state lawmakers and former top aides to Governor Andrew Cuomo.
Though transit was not provided as an option in this most recent poll, a February Quinnipiac poll found that just 29 percent of respondents approved of Cuomo’s handling of the MTA, which runs the subways and buses and is largely controlled by the governor, versus 49 percent who disapproved and 22 percent who were unsure. Cynthia Nixon, Cuomo’s Democratic primary opponent, has made the MTA a major focus of her campaign, accusing the governor of negligence and mismanagement.
The percentage of respondents to the July poll who believe government corruption is a very serious or somewhat serious problem is largely unchanged from February, despite the convictions of four high profile government officials, including two with close ties to Cuomo: Joe Percoco, Alain Kaloyeros, Sheldon Silver, and Dean Skelos. In February, 83 percent of respondents said government corruption was a very serious or somewhat serious problem in New York, while in July 85 percent said the same. Among people ages 18-34, there was a drop: 54 percent said government corruption was a very serious problem in February while only 36 percent said so in July. It’s unclear what could account for this.
In February, 47 percent of respondents told Quinnipiac that all current elected office holders in New York State need to be voted out if political corruption is to be addressed, versus 38 percent who said the current crop are capable of addressing the problem. Forty-nine percent called Governor Cuomo “part of the problem.”
The issues of this year’s race diverge somewhat from the issues that defined the 2014 election cycle. A major issue in 2014 that had largely been out of the discussion this year is fracking, with a July 2014 Siena poll showing sharply divided opinion on the process. Cuomo signed an executive order banning fracking in New York State in December 2014, after winning reelection. This year, environmental activists and some candidates are calling for the banning of all fracking-related infrastructure, often meaning piping that moves fracked gas into or through New York from elsewhere, while Republican nominee Marc Molinaro is saying he would undo Cuomo’s order and allow a pilot fracking program in the Southern Tier of New York.
Government corruption, on the other hand, is similarly in focus this year as it was in 2014. That year, Cuomo disbanded the Moreland Commission to Investigate Public Corruption, after its investigators reportedly began to probe prominent Cuomo donors and practices by legislators, and a package of ethics reforms were included in the enacted state budget as part of a deal to shutter the commission prematurely. Some, including former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, accused Cuomo of having disbanded the commission after it began looking into him and his administration’s dealings.
According to an August 2014 NBC/WSJ/Marist poll, 62 percent of New York voters felt Cuomo should not have intervened in the commission, with 52 percent of respondents claiming that the governor’s office had acted unethically, though only 23 percent of respondents said that the Moreland Commission scandal was a “major factor” in their vote choice in November.
Nixon has promised to open a new Moreland Commission on Public Corruption if she’s elected governor, while Molinaro has outlined a slate of government ethics reforms. Molinaro has made corruption in state government, especially in the Cuomo orbit, a major focus of his campaign so far. Nixon -- whose election against Cuomo is September 13, while Molinaro awaits the winner for the general election, along with other, smaller-party candidates -- has unveiled several policy packages, including on education, criminal justice reform, and housing. Molinaro has pledged more policy agenda items in the coming weeks and months, including a major plan to overhaul the state’s property tax system.
For his part, Cuomo has staked his pitch for a third term on his accomplishments from terms one and two, as well as a wish-list consisting of progressive priorities that have not passed the state Legislature. Cuomo largely boasts of accomplishing marriage equality, a major gun control law, a paid family leave program, and a significant minimum wage hike, as well as some criminal justice reforms and massive state investments into infrastructure. He’s said other items will pass next term if he’s returned to the executive chamber and Democrats can swing the state Senate (they already control the Assembly by a wide margin), such as voting, campaign finance and bail reforms, among others.
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by Ben Brachfeld, Gotham Gazette
@GothamGazette
Comptroller DiNapoli (photo: @NYSComptroller)
For New York’s fiscal picture, “Trump’s policies are as great a concern as the economic cycle,” according to State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who spoke at length recently about the state’s finances and economy, which are precarious for a number of reasons.
During a 30-minute interview with Gotham Gazette Executive Editor Ben Max for a special on Manhattan Neighborhood Network that aired Sunday, DiNapoli discussed the state’s limited savings relative to its spending, its high indebtedness, and its weak preparedness for any future economic downturn, whether influenced by federal policy or a more expected cyclical recession.
If the economy sours and tax revenues decrease, New York state government has few methods of recourse beyond cutting spending, DiNapoli said, because of the limited amount that has been socked away. If and when another recession hits, “we don’t have the cushion of reserves to draw on,” since the state maintains savings well below the statutorily-set minimum, the comptroller said. DiNapoli said that, while New York could be setting aside up to $5 billion in reserves, it only maintains around $2 billion, and that the state last made a deposit in its reserve account in 2015. That’s compared to a state budget of about $168 billion for the current fiscal year.
DiNapoli pointed out that the state has decided to spend billions in settlements with financial institutions, as opposed to putting some or most of that money away in savings.
Recession or not, “New York State will suffer” if the Republican Party keeps its majorities in both chambers of Congress, DiNapoli added, with a nod toward the federal tax reform legislation passed by Congress and signed into law by President Donald Trump in late 2017. Trump and Congressional Republicans could fully repeal the Affordable Care Act or further slash funding for social services, DiNapoli warned, both of which could hurt New York.
Otherwise, DiNapoli mostly shied away from political statements; while he is a Democrat, the state comptroller is an ostensibly nonpartisan position, though political ideology certainly has some effect on policy-making and oversight work. It is one of the four statewide elected positions, along with governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general, and it may be the least-known and least-understood. DiNapoli explained he essentially runs New York’s “Office of Accountability” — which audits state agencies, public authorities, and local governments, approves state contracts, comments on state fiscal practices, and manages the state’s pool of unclaimed funds, returning over $1.5 million a day to New Yorkers, among other tasks. The comptroller also manages the state’s massive public employee pension system.
“It’s the best job in government,” he said.
New York, DiNapoli said, is in better fiscal shape now than it was during the Great Recession, noting that the state has gained back the jobs and revenue lost during the financial crisis.
But economic recovery in the state has been fractured, with most gains heavily concentrated in New York City and its surrounding area. DiNapoli described New York’s post-recession recovery era as “a tale of two economies,” with regions like the Southern Tier, Adirondacks, Mohawk Valley, and Central New York far less economically successful than New York City has been.
Still, DiNapoli emphasized, New York is overall in strong economic shape, and he noted that, as opposed to recoveries from previous economic downturns, the state’s post-2008 bounceback was not led by Wall Street. Rather, a more diverse group of industries — technology, healthcare, and tourism, for instance — collectively resurrected the economy. To this day, the state’s financial industry is smaller than it was before the recession in terms of jobs.
“This strong recovery has been stronger and longer than past recoveries,” he said, though, he added, it will end at a certain point. When that time comes, New York may be in trouble.
Beyond maintaining a thin cushion of reserves, New York is one of the country’s most indebted states, DiNapoli said, and it’s only due to “gimmicks” that the state appears to be under its debt cap. So, when a crisis hits, the state may have no choice but to cut spending on social services. DiNapoli urged New Yorkers to be more conservative in their expectations of future revenue and spending, and he spoke of the political challenge of strengthening New York’s long-term financial security.
As the “least partisan of offices,” in DiNapoli’s framing, the Office of the Comptroller is not as beholden to the political logic of short-term decision-making as the governor’s office or state Legislature may be. Crafting the state’s budget, though, is ultimately a political project, meaning initiatives that would bolster New York’s economic future but provide little immediate political gain, like setting aside reserve funds, are often neglected.
DiNapoli expects the Democrats to take control of the state Senate after this fall’s elections, thus bringing unified Democratic rule to Albany in 2018, assuming the governorship and Assembly remain Democratic, which is likely, and for regional interests to dominate spending debates. When asked if New Yorkers should be worried about that possibility -- Republicans often argue that full Democratic control of state government would be fiscally disastrous -- DiNapoli said he does not distinguish between the spending habits of the two major parties — “Republicans are not shy about spending money,” he said — and therefore does not necessarily foresee an increase in spending under Democratic control. Many Democrats are calling for higher taxes on top earners, though, something that Republicans continue to sound the alarm about.
DiNapoli urged voters to “evaluate candidates not just on their party labels, but on who they are.” A lifelong Democrat who grew up in a Republican household on Long Island, DiNapoli said he joined the Democratic Party for its “open and free-flowing” spirit, which both strengthens and hinders it. Though the response to Trump has made the party stronger, brought more young people and women into its fold, and encouraged “open and honest competition,” DiNapoli said, the Democrats “need to not beat each other up and let others win.”
He pointed to the divide in the party exposed and deepened by the Bernie Sanders-Hillary Clinton presidential primary, a “wound reopened” by Clinton’s loss in the general election, as particularly concerning.
The Democrats “often lose elections by fighting each other,” DiNapoli said. Significant intraparty fighting is occurring for Democrats right now in New York, as both Governor Andrew Cuomo and Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul are being challenged in the primary, by Cynthia Nixon and City Council Member Jumaane Williams, respectively, among other contentious legislative races. There is also a wide open primary for attorney general, with four strong candidates campaigning. DiNapoli, who is not facing a primary challenge, told Max he is endorsing Cuomo and Hochul for reelection, but declined to endorse any of the Democratic attorney general candidates — Letitia James, Zephyr Teachout, Sean Patrick Maloney, and Leecia Eve.
The four candidates are “all good friends of mine,” he said. “So we’ll see how that goes.”
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Watch the full interview from Manhattan Neighborhood Network:
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by Daniel Yadin for Gotham Gazette
@GothamGazette
Zephyr Teachout (photo: Gotham Gazette)
Democratic Attorney General hopeful Zephyr Teachout is placing the blame for mass layoffs at the New York Daily News on tech giants Google and Facebook, and plans, if elected, to enforce antitrust laws to battle what she calls a “duopoly” of ad revenue that is crushing local news.
Referring to big tech as a “parasite on journalism,” Teachout unveiled on Wednesday a broad, though somewhat vague, plan to use the antitrust laws available to state and federal prosecutors to break up Google and Facebook’s stranglehold on the news business.
In the wake of tronc, the Daily News’ parent company, laying off half the publication’s staff on Monday, much of the blame has been pinned on the corporation and its executives. According to the Daily Beast, tronc executives told remaining Daily News staff that they had no strategy behind the mass layoffs. Meanwhile, former tronc board chair Michael Ferro, who left the company in March amid a sexual harassment scandal, received a $15 million severance package from the company, drawing criticism.
Teachout, however, says that targeting tronc, while necessary, is piecemeal and would do nothing to save local news.
“I’ll look into illegality wherever it is, or any issues that fall within the jurisdiction of the AG’s office,” Teachout said at a Wednesday press conference outside the Daily News headquarters in lower Manhattan. “But I can’t repeat this enough. If we don’t actually deal with the systemic, structural issues that are squeezing out and starving local journalism, if we keep treating these as one-offs, we’re gonna keep losing local news.”
The larger issues Teachout was referring to were the heavy concentration of digital ad revenue with Google and Facebook, which she said transferred revenue from journalists and publications into the hands of tech giants. She cited a December report from research firm eMarketer estimating that 63 percent of all digital ad revenue in 2017 belonged to the two companies. Microsoft and Oath each accounted for 11.8 percent of revenue, while Amazon took 5.4 percent. Other reports, such as one from software firm Pivotal, estimated Google and Facebook’s duopoly at 73 percent of digital ad revenue in 2017.
Though Facebook and Google still are clearly the dominant forces in online advertising, their share of the market appears to be slipping somewhat, according to the same firm cited by Teachout. A post from March suggests that Google and Facebook will see their share of digital ad revenue decline to 56.8 percent this year, and continue slipping in 2019 and 2020 as companies like Amazon and Snapchat grow their ad businesses faster than the two current juggernauts. None of it points toward ad revenue returning toward news publications themselves.
Meanwhile, Facebook’s profit margins are, according to Teachout, over 40 percent.
“Local newspapers around the country are getting decimated as the digital ad revenue is dropping and being shifted from the newspapers themselves, the journalists themselves, to Google and Facebook,” Teachout said, referring to this as the “ad tech tax.”
Teachout said that lax antitrust enforcement had allowed Google and Facebook to acquire companies and become massive juggernauts in the advertising industry. She said that she would work with other state attorneys general to bring a “major antitrust investigation to look into the ways in which Facebook and Google are wielding and maybe abusing their duopoly powers.”
She also proposed “rigorous enforcement” of state and federal antitrust statutes, like the state’s Donnelly Act, preventing anticompetitive business practices, and the federal Clayton Act, to prevent the proliferation of monopolistic mergers, to bust the duopoly.
As such, she wants to break up Google and Facebook in such a way that creates “healthy ad markets” with hundreds of firms making lower profit margins, and more revenue going to publications and journalists. In that vein, she hopes to block large mergers and acquisitions by companies like Facebook, citing its acquisition of Instagram as an antitrust violation -- both had been competing in the market for user-created photo content.
“We should explore breaking up these companies to allow for healthy ad markets which are necessary to support affordable access to news,” Teachout said. “So instead of newspapers begging for access to readers through Facebook and Google, what we should have instead is a healthy, vibrant, competitive ad market with hundreds of digital ad brokers competing -- with a profit margin, but not 40 percent profit margin -- competing for the attention of those news organizations.”
Responding to a question from Gotham Gazette, Teachout said that Google and Facebook were able to achieve such dominance in the online ad market because their mergers and acquisitions had been allowed to proceed at a hectic pace with little regulatory scrutiny. As such, if the companies were to be broken up into hundreds of smaller ad companies, and enforcement and legislative statutes prevented new mergers from taking place, then a newly competitive market would be sustained by government intervention and the share of revenue demanded by the firms would decrease.
“There isn’t actually a competitive market for different ways to reach readers,” Teachout said.
The Fordham Law professor and constitutional scholar discussed her antitrust plans on the same day she received good news about a lawsuit she helped craft against President Donald Trump, for his alleged violation of the emoluments clause of the U.S. Constitution, which is said to prohibit payments from foreign governments to the president of the United States. A judge, citing Teachout’s work, ruled that a case brought by the attorneys general of Maryland and Washington, D.C. could proceed.
Teachout is facing New York City Public Advocate Letitia James, U.S. Representative Sean Patrick Maloney, and Leecia Eve, a former aide to Governor Andrew Cuomo, in the Democratic primary for Attorney General. The vote is September 13.
One area of antitrust action Teachout said she would pursue would be to prevent Facebook from using its platform to host both news from outside sources, like the Daily News or Gotham Gazette, and its own news content, such as the presentation of trending topics alongside posts from news services. Teachout referred to this as a “clear” violation of antitrust laws.
She also said she would support state legislation to prevent content discrimination on social media platforms, saying that large media organizations like the New York Times could afford to cut deals to better promote their content in a way that a smaller outlet -- she cited the Poughkeepsie Journal -- could not.
“I do see it as a combination of legislation and enforcement, but we gotta start with enforcement. We’re just not even enforcing existing laws.”
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by Ben Brachfeld, Gotham Gazette
@GothamGazette
Ben Max, left, of Gotham Gazette, and Jarrett Murphy, right, of City Limits
July 25, 2018 - Max & Murphy Podcast: Attorney General Candidate Leecia Eve
Leecia Eve is one of four Democrats vying for the party's nomination to become the next Attorney General of New York. Eve has a long resume practicing law and serving in government, including work for then-Senator Joe Biden, then-Senator Hillary Clinton, and Governor Andrew Cuomo. Eve, most recently an executive with Verizon, joined Max & Murphy for the second show on WBAI radio, discussing her career and her candidacy for attorney general.
The podcast includes the full Max & Murphy hour on WBAI, including the conversation with Eve, listener calls, and other discussion of the recent political news.
Listen to the full conversation and let us know what you think -- we're on Twitter @TweetBenMax and @JarrettMurphy. You can listen to the show through the embedded audio below or download the episode wherever you get your podcasts, under "Max & Murphy," and listen to the show on Wednesdays at 5 p.m. on WBAI radio, 99.5FM or wbai.org
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by Ben Max, Gotham Gazette
@tweetBenMax @GothamGazette