ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) - Lawyers helping the New York Assembly investigate whether Gov. Andrew should be impeached have received more than 200 tips and spoken with attorneys for about 70 people and four government agencies, a lawmaker overseeing the probe said Wednesday.
Speaking at a legislative hearing, Assembly Judiciary Committee Chair Charles Lavine provided his first public update in nearly a month on the progress of the investigation.
The probe is focused on whether there grounds to impeach Cuomo over four main issues: sexual harassment and groping allegations lodged against the Democrat by current and former aides, the administration’s efforts to withhold a full count of COVID-19 deaths in nursing homes, the governor’s use of aides to help write his book on pandemic leadership and his administration’s handling of safety concerns about the Mario Cuomo Bridge.
Lavine has said investigators are also examining whether the governor helped family members get special access to coronavirus tests last spring.
The Judiciary Committee has released few details about the ongoing investigation, launched in mid-March.
The Legislature allowed the public to listen to the start of a Wednesday committee meeting on the investigation through an audio stream, but after Lavine gave an eight-minute overview of the investigation’s status, he moved the meeting to executive session.
The Assembly’s probe is being assisted by a team of attorneys from the Manhattan firm of Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP that includes Greg Andres, a former federal prosecutor who was on the team led by Special Counsel Robert Mueller that investigated foreign meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
State Attorney General Letitia James is separately investigating the sexual harassment allegations against Cuomo.
Cuomo has denied touching any women inappropriately.
The governor has rebuffed calls from a majority of state Democratic lawmakers for his resignation. That includes Senate Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, who appeared with Cuomo in public at a Wednesday afternoon press conference at a vaccination site in Yonkers.
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