Leaked audio shows New York Democrats divided on how to deal with Governor Andrew Cuomo

“These days any one of us in this place could be accused,” Carl Heastie said in the meeting.

It’s on this basis that he, the speaker of the New York Assembly, decided an impeachment probe was the most appropriate route in addressing mounting accusations against Governor Andrew Cuomo.

He believes sworn witness statements are a step up from newspaper reports. However it’s thanks to this (long read!) from Yahoo News we have an inside look at how New York state politicians discussed how to deal with problems surrounding the Cuomo administration.

The meeting took place on March 11th. As previously reported, Heastie announced "after meeting with the Assembly Majority Conference today, I am authorizing the Assembly Judiciary Committee to begin an impeachment investigation, led by Chair Charles D. Lavine, to examine allegations of misconduct against Governor Cuomo."

A particular insight is what exactly the judiciary committee’s focuses are going to be. They plan to investigate three: nursing home deaths, the multitude of women accusing Governor Cuomo of sexual misconduct, as well as controversy surrounding a bridge construction project. The latter of which was named after Cuomo’s father.

“I try to come up with something that’s best for the body. Everybody might not love it, everybody may not like it, but I try to get us to a comfortable place that protects the integrity of this house,” Heastie said in the audio according to Yahoo News.

The main takeaway being that Heastie’s route will take a lengthy amount of time to embark down. The speaker himself even expressed doubts that articles of impeachment against Cuomo are guaranteed.

What’s clear is that Carl Heastie was very annoyed with leaks. During the meeting he stopped to take the time to read the following tweet from Zack Fink, which characterized Heastie’s decision-making as buying “the predator more time so he can turn down the temperature.”

(As an aside, Yahoo News implies that assembly members will not have conferences via video from here on out.)

A source close to Heastie told Yahoo News that this maneuver by him is a delay tactic in the hopes that public pressure dies down and people move on. “He knows that the judiciary committee has no teeth,” the source told the outlet.

A few assembly members expressed their annoyances that Heastie was moving too slow to deal with Governor Cuomo. Assemblyman Ron Kim previously came out about Cuomo’s behaviors behind the scenes, including an episode of intimidation over the nursing home scandal.

“We have a moral duty, a constitutional duty, to remove him from office if he does not resign. We can punt it, but everyone now is watching every single thing we do. We can make excuses, we can do a number of different things, but we know what’s going on. We know what the truth is.”

Assemblywoman Jessica Ramos is quoted as saying: “The idea of a committee feels like we’re just kicking a can to be quite honest. I don’t think the judiciary committee goes far enough and I do worry we’re just buying time.”

Yahoo News lays out this dual consensus in which assembly members both supported Heastie’s strategy, but simultaneously have no faith in Cuomo’s leadership whatsoever.

State Senator Gustavo Rivera is reportedly outspokenly against the “due process” argument. He told Yahoo News: “First of all, anybody who says that … is trying to change the subject because due process is in reference to potential criminal liability, which is something that we do not have the authority to determine. The attorney general or ... the state police, or the Albany police or something would be the ones to determine that. … That due process will continue. This is a political process that has to do with whether he is trustworthy enough to be able to govern.”