Former Gov. Cuomo Uses Campaign Funds for Self-Promotion, to Test Waters for New Campaign

By Yehudit Garmaise

Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who resigned in disgrace on Aug. 10, 2021, has not formally declared that he is running for office, but he has been dipping into the $16.4 million that he had accumulated in his campaign war chest to mount a public relations campaign that suggests he is considering running again.

In addition, from July 2021 to early January 2022, Cuomo has used $2 million from his campaign funds to pay attorneys for ongoing litigation and investigations related to multiple scandals.

After good government watchdog groups complained that Cuomo was using his campaign finance funds after he resigned, Michael L. Johnson, New York’s Board of Elections chief enforcement counsel and a Cuomo appointee, said that the former governor is within his rights to mount a new campaign. 

“Election law does not prohibit a former office holder, or anyone else from using campaign funds to test the waters for a future political candidacy,” Johnson said. “Although former Gov. Cuomo has not announced any explicit plan to run for a specific public office, his conduct fits the definition of a candidate set forth in election law.”

On Sunday, Cuomo spoke at a church with a black congregation in Brooklyn, in an attempt to claim that he was merely one of the latest victims of “cancel culture” brought low by “political enemies” and a press out to get him.

“This isn’t right that someone can leave office with a gigantic sum of money and then basically spend it in a campaign of relentless self-promotion,” said Blair Horner, the executive director of the New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG), one of the good government groups that has complained that Cuomo is violating campaign finance laws.

While Cuomo claimed on Sunday, “G-d isn’t finished with me yet,” the New York Post said that New York voters are done with the former governor, as polling shows the majority of NY residents believe the many accusations against him: even if he has escaped prosecution.

Photo: Flickr