Justice Department is investigating former NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo
Cuomo, who's running for New York mayor, was a major opponent of President Donald Trump during his first term in the White House.
- The probe represents another example of what critics say is the Justice Department's readiness to move against President Donald Trump's political rivals.
- A Cuomo spokesman called the investigation "lawfare and election interference plain and simple."
- Cuomo is challegning New York Mayor Eric Adams. Trump's Justice Department dropped corruption charges against Adams earlier this year.
WASHINGTON − Remember election interference? Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is turning the accusation, a staple of Donald Trump's four criminal indictments, against the Justice Department amid reports that Cuomo − now running for mayor of New York City − is under federal investigation.
“We have never been informed of any such matter, so why would someone leak it now?" Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi said. "The answer is obvious: This is lawfare and election interference plain and simple − something President Trump and his top Department of Justice officials say they are against."
Trump's Justice Department earlier this year dismissed a federal corruption indictment against New York Mayor Eric Adams in part, acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove wrote, because it “improperly interfered with Mayor Adams’ campaign in the 2025 mayoral election.”
In a letter to prosecutors, Bove cited a Trump executive order titled "Ending the Weaponization of the Federal Government."
Cuomo is now favored to win New York's June 24 Democratic mayoral primary and would face Adams, a Trump ally running for reelection as an independent, in the general election.
"They chose to leak this one month from the primary," Azzopardi said of the investigation.
The investigation of Cuomo's closed-door testimony to the House of Representatives on New York's Covid-19 response was first reported May 20 by the New York Times and later by Reuters and Fox News.
A 2021 report by New York state Attorney General Letitia James alleged Cuomo's administration undercounted nursing home Covid-19 deaths by as much as 50%.
The new federal probe represents another example of what critics say is the Justice Department's readiness to move against President Donald Trump's political rivals. Trump, who has painted past legal cases against him as an improper political use of law enforcement, has in a number of instances called for probes of his foes.
A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment.
Cuomo resigned as governor in August 2021, when a report from state Attorney General James accused him of sexual harassment and other transgressions. Cuomo, 67, denies the allegations.
Last year, a Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee referred Cuomo to the Justice Department for possible prosecution based on closed-door testimony he gave to the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, the Times reported.
"Governor Cuomo testified truthfully to the best of his recollection about events from four years earlier, and he offered to address any follow-up questions from the Subcommittee − but from the beginning this was all transparently political," Azzopardi said in a statement.
Trump frequently said the four criminal indictments and several civil cases he faced in 2023 and 2024 were part of a Democratic vendetta to prevent his reelection. “The Democrat Party is guilty of the Worst Election Interference in American History,” he wrote in October after a federal judge unsealed documents in a case alleging he tried to overturn his 2020 election loss.
Federal charges that Trump sought to reverse the 2020 election and hoarded classified materials at his Florida mansion were dismissed after he defeated Kamala Harris in November.
A Georgia state election racketeering case against Trump and numerous other defendants is stalled. He was convicted on numerous felony counts on May 30, 2024, in New York state court, on charges he falsified business records to hide hush-money payments to an adult film star before the 2016 election. Trump is appealing that conviction.
Contributing: Reuters