18 May 2021: More Revelations on Cuomo's Pandemic Leadership Book Deal

Andrew Cuomo Netted $1.5M On COVID Book in 2020, Spokesman Says

This report provides additional information about how Governor Andrew Cuomo's pandemic leadership book deal is structured.

The embattled governor was paid $3.1 million as part of his book deal in 2020 and donated $500,000 of his earnings to the United Way and vaccination efforts, his office said. He paid $1.5 million in taxes and reported $117,000 in expenses, according to his office and federal tax filings made public Monday.

The remaining million made from the book last year, released in October as New York entered a second deadly wave of the pandemic, was put into a trust for his daughters, Cuomo’s office said.

Rather than returning the money to the source from which it came, politicians embroiled in scandals where either they or their campaigns took money they shouldn't have will often donate the money they received to charities. For them, it is a way to build public favor and to gain influence with the charities' other benefactors, where they trade money they realize they cannot keep for political capital.

At the same time, putting money into trust for their children might seem wholesome, but it is a way of protecting and retaining the assets if they might be at risk of being seized, such as might happen through criminal and civil legal proceedings. Here's what MyBankTracker learned from Brooklyn lawyer and financial planner Alfred Polizzotto III on that topic back in March 2021:

For those who want to do things completely by the book, and have considerable means at their disposal, there are trusts. Trusts are Mr. Polizzotto’s specialty.

Parents of means might put some of their money in a child’s name by creating a trust with their children as beneficiaries -- this also helps sidestep gift and estate taxes.

The assets in a trust are not the parents’, but the parents can still exert a bit of parental control on the assets.

While we typically think of the trusts as protecting the offspring of the wealthy from their own drug and Faberge egg habits, that’s not always the case says Polizzotto.

“They can get divorced, they can die, they can develop bad habits, they can become spendthrifts, and that money that you thought was secure could end up being diminished or dissipated, even through no fault of the child.”

For asset protection purposes, irrevocable trusts are the way to go. They provide what he called “the walls that protect assets from." Creditors cannot take that money from you if they come looking, because it simply is not yours.

Want to guess what kind of trusts Governor Andrew Cuomo has funded with $1 million for his three daughters?