24 August 2021: Post-Cuomo, Will JCOPE Stay Impotent?

As JCOPE eyes Cuomo, will his appointees remain?

This report seeks to answer two questions. First, with Cuomo out of office, will his appointed lackeys to JCOPE continue protecting his interests? Second, how long will they remain on the impotent body?

We'll have a chance to find out, because on Thursday, 26 August 2021, the normally secretive Joint Commission on Public Ethics will meet to consider whether they should revoke the green light the body's unappointed staff gave to Andrew M. Cuomo to engage in his pandemic "leadership" book deal. The following excerpt explains what they could do if the appointed commissioners revoked their staff's choice:

At a special meeting on Thursday, New York's ethics commission is expected to vote on whether to revoke its staff's approval of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo's lucrative book deal last year.

Gary Lavine, a Senate Republican appointee to the Joint Commission on Public Ethics, plans to introduce the motion revoking Cuomo's permission to write "American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic," which was published in October 2020 and recounts the governor's early handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Lavine believes that JCOPE staff never had the authority to approve the outside income request without seeking JCOPE commissioners' approval. In addition, Lavine says that Cuomo's special counsel, Judith Mogul, made material misrepresentations by promising that Cuomo would not use his government staff to help produce the book, when in fact, Cuomo had already been doing so when she sought the approval in July 2020. If the motion passes, JCOPE could try to force Cuomo to return the millions in proceeds from the $5.1 million publishing deal.

The report goes on to recognize that Cuomo's resignation sets a 1-year time limit on JCOPE to act to refer a criminal investigation to the state attorney general. In that sense, unless Cuomo's appointees break their loyalty to Cuomo, it is likely they'll ride out the clock and ensure JCOPE remains an impotent ethics watchdog overseeing New York state government officials.