Zopacalypse Now

 

 

In a historic victory, 34-year-old democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani was projected to become New York City’s 111th mayor on Tuesday night — the first Muslim candidate ever elected to the highest office in America’s largest city.

ABC and NBC called the NYC Mayor’s Race for Mamdani just after 9:35 p.m., with roughly 75% of the vote counted. With almost all precincts now reported, Mamdani had slightly over 50% of the vote (1,012,850) over independent former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who nabbed 41.6% (837,398), according to unofficial results from the city Board of Elections. This election had a historic turnout, with more than 2 million votes cast — the highest number in a mayoral election since 1969. 

Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa, who remained in the race until the very end despite immense pressure from Cuomo and others to drop out, came in third place with 7.16% (144,123).

Mamdani will take office as mayor on New Year’s Day, succeeding Eric Adams, who dropped out of the general election amid low poll numbers in late September and had recently endorsed Cuomo. The mayor-to-be, currently a Queens Assembly member, will also be the second-youngest mayor in the city’s history; Hugh Grant, who served between 1889 and 1892, was the youngest in history, having entered office at just 31 years of age.

 

 

Socialist beats sociopath to win NYC mayoral democrat primary

NY Post 

Dark-horse socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani staged a stunning upset Tuesday night by knocking off former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the Democratic mayoral primary.

“Tonight we made history,” Mamdani told supporters at his victory party after midnight. “In the words of Nelson Mandela, ‘It always seems impossible until it is done.’ My friends, we have done it. I will be your Democratic nominee for the mayor of New York City.”

The 33-year-old Queens assemblyman defied polls and expectations as he notched a likely insurmountable 7-point lead over Cuomo, the three-term governor who hoped to make a political comeback after resigning in disgrace in 2021.

“Tonight is his night. He deserved it, he won,” a seemingly shell-shocked Cuomo, 67, said as he conceded to Mamdani.

The first round of the ranked-choice voting contest had Mamdani ahead with 43.51% of votes, followed by Cuomo’s 36.42% and city Comptroller Brad Lander’s 11.31%, Board of Elections unofficial results show. Mamdani carried roughly 432,000 votes to Cuomo’s 362,000, the results show.

 

The state lawmaker didn’t crack 50% of votes, so the contest will still be decided July 1 once the other rounds of ranked-choice votes are calculated.

But the first-round totals still put the avowed democratic socialist within sight of becoming New York City’s next mayor.

Cuomo conceded he lost the primary as he addressed his campaign’s watch party — and signaled he may not run in the November general election on an independent line, as widely assumed.

“Tonight was not our night,” Cuomo said, as he praised Mamdani’s grassroots campaign, which mobilized young, far-left voters with catchy campaign promises and slogans focusing on affordability.

“It’s affordability, stupid,” quipped longtime New York City political operative Kevin McCabe, in a reference to Bill Clinton, about the issue that decided the race.

A win by Mamdani is bound to have sweeping impacts beyond the Big Apple and signal the rising power of the Democrats’ progressive wing, especially over aging party stalwarts such as Cuomo.

His near-insurmountable lead hints he could be replicating what his backer and fellow progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez did in 2018, as she ran as a charismatic outsider to topple entrenched Democrat Joe Crowley — only he did it across the whole city, a political veteran told The Post.

Cuomo could barely be seen actually on the campaign trail as he relied on his name recognition, backing of powerful unions and attacks against Mamdani’s thin legislative record and ample history of criticizing Israel.

The scandal-scarred ex-governor entered the race in March as the clear frontrunner, but saw his polling lead steadily chipped away by Mamdani, who waged a social media-friendly campaign heavy on proposed freebies — which he plans to pay for by hiking taxes on billionaires and businesses.

“He should’ve learned a lesson from the terrible, Rose Garden race that Joe Crowley ran against AOC. Like Crowley, Cuomo was arrogant and grossly underestimated his opponent,” said Democratic operative Ken Frydman.

Queens man runs for mayor

  

 PIX 11 News

Andrew Cuomo announced he’s running for New York City mayor in the upcoming election after months of speculation. 

The former New York governor will take on incumbent Mayor Eric Adams in the Democratic primary. 

“We know that today our New York City is in trouble,” Cuomo said in a 17-minute announcement video posted to social media.

“These conditions exist not as an act of God, but rather as an act of our political leaders, or more precisely, the lack of intelligent action by many of our political leaders,” he continued.

Before Cuomo entered the race, many polls showed him as an early favorite for New York City voters. A February poll by PIX11 News, Emerson College and The Hill showed Cuomo was the first choice for 33% of Democratic voters. Some 10% of voters said Adams was their first choice for mayor. 

Cuomo served as New York governor from 2011 to 2021, when he resigned after an independent investigation found he had sexually harassed multiple women, including state employees. His resignation also came on the heels of criticism and investigations related to his handling of nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Yes, 12,473 elderly people died but that's not why he resigned, he stepped down because he got too handsy and kissy with a lot a women he worked with and random women he met on occassions.

 

It's now legal in New York to write an autobiography during a pandemic while people are dying

 

Politico 

Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo won a lawsuit Tuesday in which he challenged New York’s defunct ethics agency’s attempt to seize his profits from a $5.1 million book deal about the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Joint Commission on Public Ethics determined last year that Cuomo improperly used state staff and resources while writing his 2020 memoir on the pandemic, “American Crisis.” It ordered him to surrender his compensation to the state.

But Cuomo’s legal team refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of the JCOPE ruling, and Albany County Supreme Court Justice Denise Hartman issued a decision that sided with him on Tuesday afternoon.

Hartman determined that JCOPE’s actions against the ex-governor would “violate due process” by not following the proper procedures for bringing an action and overstepping its authority.

“JCOPE was seeking to impose sanctions for Cuomo’s alleged non-compliance with JCOPE’s outside activities rules,” she wrote. But state law says it can “impose sanctions only for violation of the statute, not for violations of JCOPE’s rules.”

Cuomo’s team quickly praised the decision.

“JCOPE’s utter lawlessness in its treatment of Governor Cuomo has been exposed and the rule of law prevailed,” attorney Rita Glavin said in a statement. “JCOPE’s conduct was shameful, unlawful, and a waste of taxpayer’s funds.”

The Democratic governor resigned a year ago amid sexual harassment allegations, and the book was widely criticized for its large payout to Cuomo and months later when a state report found his administration undercounted Covid-19 deaths in nursing homes by as much as 50 percent.

Governor Kathy bails out Mario's son's machinators on the two year anniversary of the edict for nursing homes to treat COVID-19 patients

 

NY Post

Gov. Kathy Hochul is seeking to spend up to $5 million in taxpayer money to pay the legal bills of dozens of current and former state employees who got caught up in the sexual harassment scandal that forced ex-Gov Andrew Cuomo from office, The Post has learned.

The move could benefit Cuomo cronies who stayed loyal to the disgraced ex-governor to the very end of his scandal-scarred tenure — including former aide Melissa DeRosa.

But DeRosa, when reached by phone Wednesday night, said, “I am not seeking reimbursement for either the nursing-homes investigation or the attorney general’s sexual-harassment investigation.”

But, she added, it was “appropriate” for the other public employees to get reimbursement for outside counsel at the advice of the state.

Hochul has been discussing the matter with Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli and Attorney General Letitia James, sources familiar with the matter said.

Sources said Hochul has been working to determine what, if any, legal avenues exist that would allow the state to cover the bills.

 The governor’s office expects law firms representing about 30 current and former chamber employees to apply for any such reimbursement estimated to be up to $5 million, a source said.

NY Post 

Lawmakers and advocates commemorated the more than 15,000 nursing home deaths in New York amid the COVID-19 pandemic on Wednesday, as they pitched a measure to get to the bottom of the missteps made under disgraced ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo that caused the fatalities in elder-care facilities.

During a press conference in Albany, an ideologically diverse coalition rallied behind a bill to designate March 25 as “We Care Remembrance Day,” and another to create a body tasked with studying the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic response on deaths in nursing homes.

Friday marks exactly two years since the state Department of Health under then-commissioner Howard Zucker implemented a directive that required nursing homes to readmit residents who tested positive for the coronavirus. 

“It wasn’t just an executive order — it was a declaration of eldercide in the state of New York,” charged Assemblyman Ron Kim (D-Queens), a fierce Cuomo critic whose uncle died in April 2020 of COVID-19 in a Flushing nursing home. 

“This executive order was one of the biggest mistakes in the history of the state of New York,” Kim said.

The infamous state Department of Health order, rescinded under public pressure on May 10, 2020, forced sickened seniors into facilities housing those most vulnerable to COVID-19 and increased the death toll among residents of them, according to a New York State Bar Association report.

Senate and Assembly vote for accountability infrastructure for shady state deals

 

 Gotham Gazette

In their separate one-house budget resolutions passed this week both houses of the State Legislature included a "database of deals," a public register of state business subsidies that would shed light on billions of dollars in government incentives to corporations.

The legislation, which has been around for years but not passed, would require the state to publish a searchable database of state subsidies for economic development projects that would document the corporate recipient, the state benefits received, and number of jobs committed to and created.

Supporters of the proposal including legislators and transparency advocates say the tool would allow the government and the public to evaluate the efficacy of roughly $5 billion in annual business and economic development incentives and could make it possible to track the total flow of state money to businesses across the state.

Passage in State Senate and Assembly budget resolutions does little more than show significant legislative support for the proposal. In order to become law, it would have to survive final state budget negotiations, which are now unfolding among Governor Kathy Hochul and legislative leaders ahead of the April 1 start of the next state fiscal year. Alternatively, the bill could be passed at any time by the two houses of the Legislature.

Hochul has not taken a public position on a database of deals nor did she put it in her $216 billion executive budget or State of the State policy agenda, both released in January.

Calls for a database of state economic development deals and subsidies have grown over the years amid related corruption scandals, high-profile failures, evidence of pay-to-play politics, and general questions about the necessity and effectiveness of such tax breaks and other incentives favored by former Governor Andrew Cuomo.

"The public wants to know how their dollars are being spent and we think this database of deals legislation will go a long way to ensure that we can capture exactly what is happening, especially in economic development projects," said State Senator Leroy Comrie, a Queens Democrat who has sponsored the bill.

The legislation will "help the public see which businesses are getting state subsidies, how much they are receiving, and whether those subsidies are creating jobs, as intended," said Assembly sponsor Monica Wallace, in an email statement urging lawmakers to back its inclusion in the final enacted budget.

Economic development subsidies can take many forms, from government grants and loans to tax benefits to utility assistance. They can be administered through a range of state agencies where reporting on them is decentralized and often incomplete. One of the largest, the New York State Film Tax Credit Program, gives $420 million a year in tax breaks to businesses that produce films in New York.

Opaque and unaccountable subsidies have helped prop up billionaires and political insiders. Tech mogul Elon Musk received upwards of $950 million in state incentives to open a spectacularly overvalued solar panel factory in upstate New York that created few jobs before being absorbed by Musk's company Tesla. Another economic development project, the billion-dollar nanotech initiative spearheaded by Cuomo as part of “the Buffalo Billion,” incubated one of the biggest bid-rigging scandals in recent state history and ended with close Cuomo allies going to jail.

Like her predecessor, Hochul has continued to tout state incentives for major economic development projects, like the "Finger Lakes Forward" initiative that includes a $500 million state investment promised to “incentivize private business to invest well over $2.5 billion” to revitalize the region and create “up to 8,200 new jobs.”

As part of that effort, on Wednesday Hochul announced that a French yogurt and desserts company, La Fermière, “will establish its U.S. production operations in New York State” and committed to constructing a large new production facility in Batavia. The company, the governor’s office said in a press release, “expects to create up to 135 new jobs in the region.” The press release did not say what types of incentives the company was getting from the state.

Dinner with Andrew

  

NY Post

New York’s very sociable new mayor cleared his busy schedule for a lengthy dinner meeting with run-out-of-office ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Tuesday night.

Mayor Eric Adams supped with Cuomo — who resigned in July after a damning sexual harassment report from the state Attorney General’s Office that had him facing impeachment — for about two hours at Midtown hotspot Osteria La Baia, sources told Page Six.

A restaurant onlooker said Cuomo was seen entering the eatery on West 52nd Street “in a dark suit and blue tie,” looking “clean-shaven.”

“He worked the room,” the source said, adding that he shook diners’ hands as he headed into a private room.

Another source said Cuomo was “greeted pretty warmly on the way in by people in the restaurant.” Adams entered wearing a suit and no tie, we hear.

Another insider said of the private meeting between the mayor and the ex-pol, “There were some policies, ideas that the governor wanted to discuss with the mayor,” and that the meeting was “set up very recently.” 

  Mayor Adams meets with a lot of former government officials to talk about governance, which is particularly important in these unprecedented times. There was nothing political about the conversation, and the mayor stands by his earlier comments that the former governor should have stepped down, as he did,” said Fabien Levy, a City Hall spokesman.

A rep for Cuomo declined to comment.

Cuomo ordered the skate — which is apparently the restaurant’s specialty, a source said. It was not clear what Adams, a former diabetic-turned-vegan, ordered.

The dinner with Cuomo went down around 7 p.m., we hear. Adams had earlier attended a wake for slain NYPD Officer Wilbert Mora at St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Mario's other son gets whacked by CNN

 

Variety 

CNN said it suspended Chris Cuomo “indefinitely, pending further evaluation,” following new disclosures about how he helped his brother, former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, in the midst of a scandal over sexual harassment allegations, a move that leaves the WarnerMedia network without the services of its most-watched anchor.

“The New York Attorney General’s office released transcripts and exhibits Monday that shed new light on Chris Cuomo’s involvement in his brother’s defense. The documents, which we were not privy to before their public release, raise serious questions. When Chris admitted to us that he had offered advice to his brother’s staff, he broke our rules and we acknowledged that publicly. But we also appreciated the unique position he was in and understood his need to put family first and job second,” CNN said in a statement Tuesday evening. “However, these documents point to a greater level of involvement in his brother’s efforts than we previously knew. As a result, we have suspended Chris indefinitely, pending further evaluation.”

Fredo in the loop

  

THE CITY

Over 10,000 pages of interviews, emails and text messages released Monday by state Attorney General Letitia James stemming from her office’s investigation of former Gov. Andrew Cuomo detail his inner circle’s actions to deflect accusations of sexual misconduct.

Key links in that circle were employed outside of the governor’s office — most prominently the governor’s brother, CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, revealed in messages to have used his media-world connections in a bid to blunt scrutiny of his older sibling’s actions.

The new materials, from an investigation culminating in an August report, also show current and former staffers mobilizing to discredit Cuomo’s first two public accusers, Lindsey Boylan and Charlotte Bennett. The troves follow a document drop earlier this month that included the governor’s evasive interview with investigators hired by James’ office, as well as testimony from multiple women who alleged harassment.

Cuomo, who has repeatedly denied the harassment accusations, resigned in August under threat of impeachment from the state Legislature. Last month, he was charged with a misdemeanor sex crime in Albany stemming from an allegation he forcibly touched an aide in the Executive Mansion.

The thousands of pages of testimony, conducted under oath, offer a glimpse into how members of the Cuomo administration and some of his closest advisers crafted a public relations strategy to discredit the women who accused him — and used their extensive connections to try to get ahead of the allegations.

The reams of documents that accompany them are a fraction of the material collected by investigators enlisted by James, who is now running for governor.

In mid-August, following the attorney general’s bombshell report, the younger Cuomo assured his CNN viewers that he “tried to do the right thing” and advised his brother to resign as governor, after The Washington Post reported that the TV journalist joined strategy calls with the governor’s advisers.

“I wasn’t in control of anything,” Chris Cuomo told viewers. “I was there to listen and offer my take. And my advice to my brother was simple and consistent — own what you did, tell people what you’ll try to do to be better, be contrite.”

But materials released Monday show the depth of the younger Cuomo’s involvement — which included drafting statements for his brother to deny the alleged sexual misconduct and offering edits and insights on statements crafted by his senior aides. 

 “As the situation started to accelerate, my brother asked me to be in the loop,” Chris Cuomo told investigators, the transcript of his interview shows.

But text messages between the pair also show DeRosa deploying Chris Cuomo and his media-elite connections to shield his big brother.

DeRosa sent requests to the CNN host asking for “intel” on a then-unpublished story by The New Yorker’s Ronan Farrow, whose exposes had previously uncovered sexual misconduct by media mogul Harvey Weinstein and former New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. Chris Cuomo responded 10 minutes later, saying that the story was “not ready for tomorrow.”

And while the younger Cuomo testified under oath that he did not reach out to sources to get information about the complainants or do opposition research on them, text messages, documents and other testimony gathered by investigators show the contrary.

The CNN host told investigators that he would reach “sources — other journalists — to see if they had heard of anybody” who was planning on accusing the governor.

On March 4, Chris Cuomo texted DeRosa to tell her that he had a “lead on the wedding girl” — an apparent reference to Anna Ruch, who accused the governor of grabbing her face and making her feel uncomfortable at a wedding they both attended.

Caption Cuomo's new look

Also...

Name this band

Wrong answers only pic.twitter.com/AtwnVxzM9F

— This is JQ LLC (@ImpunityCity) November 27, 2021

Cuomo shitted where he ate with deRosa

 

Ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo and his then-top aide, Melissa DeRosa, were allegedly spotted by a state police bodyguard “making out on the sidewalk like high schoolers,” The Post has learned.

The alleged May-December romance was apparently revealed in the sworn testimony of a female state trooper who has accused Cuomo of sexually harassing her and whose interview transcript was released by Attorney General Letitia James earlier this week.

Although DeRosa isn’t identified as Cuomo’s kissing partner in the 143-page document, three sources with knowledge of the proceedings said her name is among several that were blacked out and replaced with job titles, which in her case is “Senior Staffer #1” — the person with whom the then-governor was allegedly seen canoodling.

The unseemly possibility of Cuomo, 63, getting hot and heavy with the married DeRosa, 39, emerged during the probe that uncovered evidence he sexually harassed 11 women — including nine current or former state workers — while serving as the state’s highest elected official.

James’ Aug. 3 report detailing the avalanche of allegations led Cuomo to resign under pressure of impeachment a week later and now has him facing a misdemeanor charge for allegedly groping the breast of another aide, 33-year-old Brittany Commisso, inside Albany’s Executive Mansion, the governor’s official residence.

During a May 19 Zoom interview, the unidentified trooper — who served on Cuomo’s security detail — was asked by an outside lawyer hired by James whether her colleagues ever said they “observed anything between the Governor” and any of his Executive Chamber subordinates, according to the transcript.

Governor Kathy's ethics czar is fine with Cuomo's pandemic profiteering

 

NY Post

Martin Levine, JCOPE’s deputy general and then co-executive director, last year approved Cuomo’s profit-making book contract.

Cuomo agreed that state government resources would not be used to prepare the book under the ethics agreement with JCOPE.

“I move to void the opinion of the deputy general counsel [Martin Levine] acting in the capacity as acting co-executive director approving Gov. Cuomo’s publishing activity on the ground that there was a failure of required concurrence by the other acting co-executive director,” Lavine, who was appointed by Senate Minority Leader Rob Ortt (R-Lockport).

Lavine was referring to Monica Stamm, the legal counsel, who was then the co-executive director because CEO executive director Setha Agata resigned.

An amendment to the motion said the book deal was approved based on “material facts that were omitted” or “misrepresentations.”

The defeated motion also would have given Cuomo, who is no longer in office, 20 days to re-apply for JCOPE’s blessing.

JCOPE last month also voted to allow Cuomo to keep the profits from his book, “American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic.”

LaGuardia air train derails

 

NY Post 

Gov. Kathy Hochul has told the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to find an alternative to disgraced ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s $2.1 billion “AirTrain” pet project between LaGuardia Airport and eastern Queens.

“I have asked the Port Authority to thoroughly examine alternative mass transit solutions for reducing car traffic and increasing connectivity to LaGuardia Airport,” Hochul said in a statement Monday afternoon — hours before elected officials representing the impacted section of Queens were set to hold a press conference against the boondoggle.

“We must ensure that our transportation projects are bold, visionary, and serve the needs of New Yorkers,” Hochul said. “I remain committed to working expeditiously to rebuild our infrastructure for the 21st century and to create jobs – not just at LaGuardia, but at all of our airports and transit hubs across New York.”

“I don’t feel obligated to accept what I have inherited,” Hochul added later Monday at a press conference in Brooklyn. “There were alternatives on the table that even the FAA said that people were saying people were not looking at as close as they should.”

The author of the Cuomo's nursing home edict steps off

NY Post

Embattled state Health Commissioner Howard Zucker will step down from his position as soon as a replacement can be found, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Thursday.

Zucker was a key figure in the administration of disgraced Gov. Andrew Cuomo, where critics charged he played a central role in its efforts to minimize and disguise the pandemic’s death toll across the state and in its nursing homes.

“He understands that, in this time, I’ve wanted to take the first 45 days to assemble a new team going forward,” Hochul said, announcing Zucker’s departure. “That process is ongoing, and he understands and he respects that.”

She added: “He also has an opportunity to move on to new ventures and I appreciate his service.”

Hochul said that a search for a replacement is underway.

“I think it’s the first step; but, just like with Andrew Cuomo, a resignation does not equate to accountability and Howard Zucker and all of Cuomo’s enablers must be held accountable,” said Assemblyman Ron Kim (D-Queens), a progressive lawmaker who was among Cuomo’s most vociferous critics on the handling of nursing homes.

 

Governor Hochul will continue Cuomo's High Line boondoggle

 

Gothamist 

The Empire State Development Corporation — the state's main development arm — will pay $20 million of the estimated $50 million price tag, a spokesperson for Hochul confirmed. The rest will be privately funded by Brookfield Properties and Friends of the High Line, with the Port Authority contributing the land.

Like much of Cuomo's developer-friendly plans for Midtown, the extension has attracted scrutiny. It will bring the High Line directly into the arms of Brookfield's new seven-million-square-foot mixed-use development, likely benefitting the developer substantially.

In a statement, Brookfield Properties Executive Vice President Sabrina Kanner praised the "vibrant gateway connecting Moynihan Train Hall directly to the entirety of the High Line and the new West Side."  

The state has also been accused of prioritizing the posh park, while ignoring critical safety and quality-of-life issues on the pedestrian-hostile streets below. The Port Authority has long used the area for construction staging and parking.

Mysterious fire ignites on top of Far Rockaway hospital

 

PIX News 

In one of Mario's Son's last attempts to abuse his power to benefit his donors before all those woman exposed what a serial sexual deviant he was, Andy tried to downsize this hospital during a pandemic.

And who knows how many thousands would have survived if he didn't kill Peninsula Hospital 9 years earlier.

Caption Captain

Carl Heastie lets Andrew Cuomo escape

Newsday 

 The state Assembly won’t pursue impeachment charges against Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo once his resignation takes effect, Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie announced Friday.

Heastie (D-Bronx), in an interview with Newsday, said an Assembly investigation found "credible evidence" against Cuomo and likely would have resulted in impeachment charges.

But the primary purpose of the impeachment proceeding was to determine whether the governor should stay in office following sexual harassment claims and other allegations regarding actions that Cuomo took during the pandemic, Heastie said.

The governor’s decision to step down, announced Tuesday, effectively makes the question moot. Cuomo's resignation is to take effect Aug. 24.

 Heastie said another driver in the decision to "suspend" proceedings is that the state constitution doesn’t clearly "authorize the Legislature to impeach and remove an elected official who is no longer in office."

"We don’t believe we do" have the authority to continue once Cuomo departs, Heastie said. The speaker added that he understood and agreed with Cuomo accusers who say the governor should be held accountable, but impeachment wouldn’t be an available avenue once the governor leaves.

 Legislators would not have finished their investigation before Aug. 24.

Instead, the Assembly will do the "next best thing": turning over its evidence to various law enforcement agencies investigating Cuomo, Heastie said.

The attorney general has been looking into Cuomo’s $5.1 million book deal, Heastie noted. The U.S. Justice Department is investigating the nursing home data. And prosecutors in five counties, including Nassau, have said they are looking into alleged sexual harassment incidents.

"The thing is, the federal government, the ... [attorney general] and local ... [prosecutors] are doing their own investigations," Heastie said. "We have not finished gathering evidence and we didn’t want to interfere with their investigations. So the next best thing to do is to turn over our evidence so they can conclude" their investigations.

Because of those other ongoing investigations, the Assembly won’t make the evidence publicly available at this time, a Heastie spokesman said.

Cuomo will be gone but nothing will fundamentally change.

Homeless Cuomo leaves tenants and landlords hanging for rent aid.

 

NY Post

 Gov. Andrew Cuomo has been missing in action as the state failed to release the vast majority of $2.6 billion in federal funds for tenants on the brink of eviction, the head of the emergency rental relief program testified Tuesday, just before the accused sexual harasser announced his resignation.

“I have not had conversations with the governor about this,” Michael Hein, commissioner of the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance, admitted to lawmakers at an Assembly hearing in Lower Manhattan.

Assemblyman Mike Lawler (R-Rockland County) had asked Hein when was the last time he’d spoken with Cuomo about the Emergency Rental Assistance Program passed by Congress in January.

That’s when Hein answered that he’d never spoken to the governor about the program. Instead he communicates with Cuomo’s deputies, Hein testified.

While Hein’s office has paid out $140 million to contractors to administer the program that’s beset with tech problems and only recently added a “save and resume” button to the lengthy online application, only $100 million has been distributed to tenants and landlords since June 1.

That’s just 3.7 percent of the $2.6 billion pot. The state risks forfeiting the federal funds if 65% of the money isn’t paid out by Sept. 30.

“I think what this shows is that the administration is incapable of administering this program,” Lawler fumed.

Mario's Son Governor Cuomo has resigned

 

That's all folks.