Cuomo won’t give back Glenwood campaign cash

Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Monday defended his acceptance of more than $1 million in campaign cash from a powerful real-estate firm at the center of the convictions of the state’s former legislative leaders.

Cuomo said he is not influenced by campaign contributions. Glenwood Management, the Manhattan-based firm, has been the single-largest donor to New York political campaigns through dozens of limited liability corporations, and it has given Cuomo more than $1 million, the most of anyone.

“Yes, I received significant funds, donations, from that company,” Cuomo said Monday on WNYC radio. “And I was their opponent as a matter of policy. Because I was advocating for rent reforms.”

Glenwood’s executive Charles Dorego testified in the corruption trial of former Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, R-Nassau County, under a non-prosecution agreement. The company and Leonard Litwin, the company’s 101-year-old CEO, used its influence and campaign cash to influence Skelos and former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan.

Skelos and Silver were both convicted over the past month.

Cuomo has faced pressure to return Glenwood’s contributions. Cuomo’s foe, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, said last week he would return $20,000 he got from Glenwood.

“Why do people donate? A lot of reasons. They think it’s the best candidate. They don’t like the other candidate; they like the smile. Who knows?,” Cuomo said. “People donate and support candidates for all sorts of reason, but you have do your job and exercise your judgment absent who supports you, who doesn’t support you.”

He said no politician should be influenced by campaign cash.

“If I believed that I could be influenced by $1 million or $1,000 or $50, then I’m in the wrong place and I should resign immediately,” Cuomo continued.

In his testimony, Dorego said was “difficult to pin down”—a “wild card” on rent-control regulations, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Cuomo said the problem with money is politics is largely a federal issue after the Citizens United federal court decision in 2010, which barred governments from limiting political expenditures by non-profit groups.

But good-government groups criticized Cuomo’s position on Monday. He said he would offer an extensive ethics package for the Legislature to consider next year to root out the corruption at the Capitol.

Blair Horner, the legislative director for the New York Public Interest Group, said Citizens United should have nothing to do with New York’s effort to close its campaign-finance loopholes and lax ethics enforcement.

He said giving back the Glenwood money would be a start.

“The company was involved in one of the biggest political scandals in New York state history,” Horner said. “They should be treated like a pariah, not just like another one of the businesses that make campaign contributions.”