Governor Andrew Cuomo Aides called on former staff members to discredit the accuser

According to several recipients, the calls were made by current administration officials and former aides who are still near the governor’s office. The outreach was made at the urging of Melissa DeRosa, the governor’s chief aide, according to people who knew the effort.

“I felt intimidated and I felt bewildered,” said Ana Liss, a former aide to the governor who received one of the calls.

Ms Liss, who earlier this month accused Mr Cuomo of misconduct, said Rich Azzopardi, Mr Cuomo’s senior adviser, called him on December 21st. Twitter that the governor sexually harassed her.

Mrs Liss had not worked for the governor for more than five years and did not remember the last time the administration had been in contact, she said.

She said Mr Azzopardi reminded him of all he had achieved during his time working for the governor and asked him if he had received a message from Mrs Boylan. She told him no, and said the conversation ended on a friendly note.

Azzopardi said in a statement: “After Ms. Boylan’s tweets in December, she, her lawyers and members of the press began contacting former members of the House, many of whom never worked with her. former members of the chamber called to let several staff know and convey that they were upset about the spread.As a result, we proactively contacted some former colleagues to register and make sure they had the none ”.

Azzopardi said the calls were not coordinated by Ms. DeRosa. “There was no directed effort: that spread happened organically when everyone’s phone started to explode.” He added that they did not intimidate anyone.

In Twitter posts after this story was published, Ms. Boylan said she did not contact anyone in December and had no attorney at the time.

Three former employees of his time as governor and a current aide to Mr Cuomo have accused the governor of misconduct or sexual harassment in the workplace, prompting senior Republicans and state Democrats to resign.

Democrats dominating the state assembly have launched an impeachment investigation that will examine the allegations, as well as how the Cuomo administration treated Covid-19 in residences. State Attorney General Letitia James is now overseeing an investigation into the allegations of the former aides and how Mr. Cuomo’s office handled the complaints.

Mr. Cuomo has denied touching someone inappropriately and has apologized for any behavior that could have been misinterpreted. He has also called for New Yorkers to hold trial until Ms. James’ investigation is complete.

Ms. Boylan has said Mr. Cuomo tried to kiss her on the lips in his office and, during a 2017 flight on his plane, suggested they play poker.

A spokeswoman for Mr Cuomo has denied Mrs Boylan’s allegations.

Another former aide, Charlotte Bennett, said Mr. Cuomo asked her about her sex life and whether she had sex with older men. Mrs Liss has said she asked him if he had a boyfriend, touched his lower back at a reception and once kissed his hand as he got up from his desk. This week, a fourth woman accused the governor of touching her inappropriately during a meeting at the executive mansion last year.

In a statement on Wednesday, Mr Cuomo said: “As I said yesterday, I have never done anything like this. The details of this report are appalling. I will not talk about the details of this or any other allegation given the ongoing review, but I am confident in the outcome of the Attorney General’s report. “

The governor, in previous statements, has encouraged women to come forward and said his office would cooperate with Mrs James’s investigation.

But Mr Cuomo and his aides have gone after accusers and rivals, according to court documents and former staff members.

In October 2000, Mr. Cuomo, when he was secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, was charged with discrimination and sexual harassment in an internal note filed by Susan Gaffney, a former HUD inspector general. He accused Mr. Cuomo and other HUD officials of intimidation and harassment after initiating a Congressional-requested audit of some of the work Mr. Cuomo had overseen.

Mrs. Gaffney testified in Congress in 1998 that Mr. Cuomo’s aides tried to discredit her, including advertising an anonymous letter Mr. Cuomo had allegedly received saying it was aimed at minorities.

At one point, Mr. Cuomo assured him he had nothing to do with the actions of key aides, he said. “I suggested that if his key aides acted without his approval, he fired them; the secretary did not respond, “she said in the 1998 testimony, adding that the tactics used by Mr. Cuomo and his aides were” dirty tricks “to force her to resign.

Mrs. Gaffney could not be contacted.

After Ms. Boylan tweeted her account in December, she said in a Feb. 24 media release that the media received “parts of an alleged confidential staff file” from her time in administration. . Mrs. Boylan said in the message that she had never seen the file and that it was an effort to smear it.

In response to Ms. Boylan’s complaint about her staff history, Beth Garvey, the governor’s acting attorney, said, “With some limited exceptions, it is generally at the discretion of the government entity to share records. drafted, including cases where members of the media request such public information and when it comes to correcting inaccurate or misleading statements. “

Mrs. Boylan also said in the Medium publication that “the governor’s loyalists called for the city, asking for me.”

A recipient of a call said the caller asked in December if Ms. Boylan had been in contact with the recipient and what she thought of hers.

Another recipient of a call said an interlocutor, a current Cuomo administration official, asked if he had contacted reporters about Ms. Boylan and wanted to confirm the nature of the recipient’s experience with Ms. Boylan. “The subtext was clear: I was being asked to get him dirty,” the recipient said.

Write to Khadeeja Safdar at [email protected], Deanna Paul at [email protected] and Jimmy Vielkind at [email protected]