2 August 2021: Cuomo's Scandal Legal Expenses To Cost NY Taxpayers At Least $6.5 Million

AG extending contracts of team investigating Cuomo

In addition to reporting on the contract extention for the law firms NY Attorney General Tish James hired to investigate Andrew M. Cuomo's alleged sexual harassment of multiple women, which we're covering in a separate timeline entry, this report also indicates the cost to NY taxpayers for Andrew M. Cuomo to defend himself from the legal consequences of his multiple scandals while in office will not be small:

Walden Macht, which was retained to represent the Executive Chamber in response to an investigation into the sexual harassment allegations against Cuomo, will be paid up to $2.5 million, according to OpenBookNewYork.com, a website maintained by Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli’s office.

Morvillo Abramowtiz, the law firm representing Cuomo’s office in response to a federal investigation into the suppression of nursing home death data, will also be paid up to $2.5 million.

And New York Law Journal reported that another law firm, Fried Frank, will be paid up to $1.5 million by the state Department of Health. The contract reportedly states that the law firm is responding to investigations by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York, the New York County (Manhattan) District Attorney’s office, and the attorney general's office, among others....

The contract information for another law firm working in similar capacity for Cuomo’s office, Arnold & Porter, still isn’t publicly available. That's despite the firm also having done months of taxpayer-funded work responding to the sexual misconduct inquiry into Cuomo, which is being conducted by Kim and Clark.

When disclosed, the Arnold & Porter contract could add millions more to the taxpayer-funded total.

The running tally of Andrew M. Cuomo's known legal bills for NY taxpayers is $6.5 million and counting. The figures presented here do not include Cuomo's diversion of funds contributed to his election campaign to pay for his legal expenses.