THE #METOO PLOT TO BRING DOWN NY GOV. ANDREW CUOMO
NEVER-BEFORE-TOLD-STORY WHAT WENT ON BEHIND-THE-SCENES AMONG THE FIRST WOMEN ACCUSING NY GOVERNOR ANDREW CUOMO OF SEXUAL HARASSMENT AND BETWEEN JOURNALISTS REPORTING IT
Then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo with his former partner Sandra Lee and daughters, on their way to Mario Cuomo’s funeral, New York, New York, Jan. 5, 2015. Photo Credit: JB Nicholas.
THE FREE LANCE NEEDS YOUR DONATIONS TO SURVIVE. DONATE HERE.
Two former aides to then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo had alleged he sexually harassed them and the powerful State Senate majority leader said she would call for him to resign if a third woman accused him.
That's when WNYC's Gothamist news website published what it claimed were the allegations of a third former aide, Ana Liss. Gothamist's Mar. 4, 2021 report began with a dramatic claim Cuomo was a leering pervert who liked to eye-fuck young, attractive women so much he had one working inside his Albany office to victimize at will.
"Ana Liss was in her twenties when she won a fellowship to work in Governor Andrew Cuomo’s office in 2013," Gothamist's report claimed. "She was surprised, upon arriving, to be quickly invited by senior staffers to sit at a desk positioned right near the governor—in his 'line of sight,' as she described it."
One problem. It was a lie—and Gothamist knew it. Liss actually worked several offices away from the Governor’s office.
That's according to Liss's sworn testimony, given under oath, in a court proceeding called a deposition in July. The Free Lance obtained the entire transcript of the deposition, small parts of which are redacted.
Liss's account reveals the never-before-told story of what went on behind-the-scenes among the first women alleging then-Gov. Cuomo sexually harassed them and between the journalists reporting it.
The deposition is part of a federal sex discrimination lawsuit filed against Cuomo by an anonymous State Trooper only identified in court papers as "Trooper No. 1." The lawsuit remains ongoing. No judge or jury has ever found Cuomo sexually harassed anyone. He has never been charged with a crime.
Liss's involvement started with a telephone call—from Lindsey Boylan.
Boylan was the first woman to publicly accuse then-Gov. Cuomo of sexual harassment. Boylan worked for the Cuomo administration for 44 months, 2015 to 2018. She worked as Deputy Secretary for Economic Development and then Special Advisor. After departing state government, Boylan ran a failed campaign to be elected to Congress in 2019.
She was running another failed political campaign, this time for Manhattan borough president, when she first accused Gov. Cuomo of sex harassment.
"Yes, @NYGovCuomo sexually harassed me for years," Boylan Tweeted Dec. 12, 2020.
Boylan refused to detail her allegations to journalists. “I have no interest in talking to journalists,” she also Tweeted.
Two months later, in an essay self-published on social media Feb. 4, 2021, Boylan alleged Cuomo once asked her to play strip poker and, also once, tried to kiss her in his Manhattan office.
Meanwhile, Boylan sent a direct message via Twitter to Liss. The two became acquainted during the brief time their tenures in state government overlapped.
"Hey, would you ever be open to having a conversation?," Boylan asked her, according to Liss's sworn testimony.
Liss said she didn't respond, but received a telephone call from Boylan anyway around Mar. 1.
"Somehow she called me, and she said that she was confidentially working with Rebecca Traister," a New York Magazine reporter. Boylan told Liss Traister wanted to speak with her "about my experiences and communicated that it would add to—it would help to paint a more accurate picture of what the culture was like working there."
Boylan promised her "it was a safe space because I didn't have to reveal my identity."
Boylan emphasized to Liss that Cuomo "was a bad man, and that he surrounded himself with other bad actors."
Liss agreed to speak with Traistor, on background. Not because Cuomo had sexually harassed her, but because she didn’t like his managerial style: "It just felt like, you know, like he was the king of New York State and not the Governor of New York State."
Ana Liss via Twitter. Photo Credit: Screengrab, Aug. 13, 2023.
Meanwhile, Gothamist's Gwynne Hogan telephoned Liss. Liss doesn't know how Hogan got her name or telephone number. The two talked at first on background like Liss had spoken to Traister.
Liss graduated with a degree in journalism from Ithaca College in 2007. She worked covering breaking news as a TV-journalist for New York's Southern Tier NBC affiliate.
"I was very young and I was making very little money and I was hardly able to pay rent," Liss testified, even though she "worked seven days a week."
Two-and-a-half years later, she was back in school. This time earning a masters in public administration from the University of Pennsylvania. She returned to her hometown, Rochester, after graduating in 2011. Her new job entailed traversing the state "working with municipalities to help them with cost savings plans."
Then a friend from U Penn told her about a fellowship in state government. She applied for it, and won. She considered her candidacy "a long shot" but Cesar Perales, Secretary of State, selected her in 2013. Her new job was formulating regional economic development initiatives. Her first project was to see if Formula 1 racing could be brought to New York.
Physically, she worked in a cramped space accessed via a spiral staircase at the end of a labyrinth.
Four months later, she was reassigned to work for Howard Glazier, Director of State Operations.
"It was like being pulled up from J.V. to Varsity. At least that's what I felt like" at first, Liss testified. But the office turned out to be "Mad Men-esque," with a dress-code.
Maybe. Liss wasn't sure. Men were supposed to wear white shirts, she'd been told by a co-worker. But she acknowledged men actually wore shirts in a rainbow-like range of colors. She was sure Cuomo only wore ties by the Italian menswear designer Salvatore Ferrigamo, and he expected his people to look as good as he did.
Office gossip she called "lore" said the governor once got down on his knees to polish a male worker's shoes to demonstrate the high-degree of shine he expected.
There was also a dress code for women. Maybe. Again, Liss wasn't sure.
Suzanne Brackett, an administrative assistant in the Office of State Operations, wore Versace perfume and "always looked lovely." Everyone called her "Suze," Liss said. Suze told Liss to wear high-heels when the governor was in Albany. This was even though Brackett herself wore sneakers—under a desk her work rarely required her to leave.
Still, Bracket was a survivor. She'd been there for more than a decade, going back to when Elliot Spitzer was governor.
"I took her word very seriously because of her years of experience working in that environment," Liss explained. "She knew the rules of engagement, and the etiquette, and expectations. And if Suze didn't like you, you were iced out."
Ultimately, the office was like a snake-pit.
"And it was sort of survival of the fittest,"Liss explained, "there was jostling for position and proximity to the Governor and others that were in power."
In order to meet Cuomo's "extraordinarily high standards" and be successful, Liss said, "you have to be as vicious as you are educated and connected."
It didn't hurt to be pretty, either.
"I observed that the young women around him that were close to him frequently, particularly, the briefers and administrative individuals, were consistently—looked a certain way and were beautiful," she said.
The New York Post, a tabloid newspaper, nicknamed them "Mean Girls."
Liss quit before her fellowship was over in June 2015. She took a job at Cornell. When she was interviewed in 2021 about her time in Albany she was Monroe County's director of Economic Development & Community, which she remains today.
Then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo at his father Mario Cuomo’s funeral, with his mother and widow, Matilda, New York, New York, Jan. 5, 2015. Photo Credit: JB Nicholas.
Liss never told Hogan, Gothamist's reporter, that she was working inside Gov. Cuomo's personal office, Liss testified.
She was actually working for Director of State Operations Howard Glazier. Glazier's office was three offices away from Cuomo's. Not only that, but Cuomo mostly worked out of his New York City office. He was rarely in Albany. Only when he was, did he sometimes walk into Glazier's office. It was only then that she entered Gov. Cuomo's "line of sight."
"I didn't mean that I was placed within his regular line of sight," Liss testified.
"I wasn't trying to lead anyone to believe that I was sitting in his direct purview," Liss emphasized, "within his direct line of sight when he was seated at his workspace."
Yet that's how Gothamist reported it, to what Liss says was her “consternation.”
"I did take some issue with some of the way that my narrative was presented by the news media and, you know, had some—had some consternations about it," she testified. "And I won't be characterized the way that ... Gothamist put the—the story."
Liss said she "was just thrown into this group of women who said the Governor sexually harassed me and I wanted to be clear that the Governor didn't sexually harass me."
The former journalist blamed it on the reporters. They will, Liss complained, "cherry-pick what you say to suit a narrative that will elicit more clicks and eyeballs."
Gothamist did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Hogan no longer works at Gothamist; now she covers Brooklyn for another non-profit local news website. She also ignored a request to comment.
Gothamist wasn't the only news organization to mis-report Liss's story.
The Wall Street Journal's Jimmy Vielkind traveled to Rochester to meet her Mar. 5. Unlike the other reporters who contacted her, Liss knew Vielkind. They both lived around Albany. They both worked at the Capital. Vielkind, Liss said, "was there all the time. And knew that I worked there and knew who I was. And I think we followed each other on Twitter."
Feeling more comfortable with the man she called "Jimmy," she decided to go on-the-record with him. Liss never told Vielkind—or Hogan or any reporter—the she'd been sexually harassed. She did say the governor had touched in the small of her back while posing for a photograph, called her sweetie and kissed her hand.
But, she emphasized, she didn't feel sexually harassed. Objectified, infantilized, trivialized maybe, not sexually harassed.
"I don't believe in any—at any point in time ever did I say the Governor sexually harassed me."
The Wall Street Journal published what it called Vielkind's "exclusive" Mar. 6—two days after Hogan's anonymously-sourced Gothamist report. "Cuomo Faces New Accusations of Inappropriate Behavior From Third Former Aide," was its headline. Its sub-hed reported "Ana Liss says the New York governor asked if she had a boyfriend, called her sweetheart and kissed her hand."
The Wall Street Journal's report, Liss testified, "was a headline. A way to grab a headline and get a scoop."
Vielkind "pulled from the interview and put in center stage, as part of the story, that little Ana Liss from Rochester, New York, thinks Andrew Cuomo sexually harassed her ... and that therefore he's a bad person."
"And that's not what I was trying to do," Liss said.
Both the Wall Street Journal and Vielkind ignored emailed requests for comment.
After Liss allowed Vielkind to name her, Gothamist amended its report to name Liss as well.
Besides Liss and Boylan, Charlotte Bennett claimed Cuomo asked about her sex life and whether she had relationships with older men. Bennett allegedly falsely accused a male student of sexual misconduct in college. The college paid to settle the young man’s lawsuit.
Anna Ruch, who didn't work for state government, was at a wedding reception in 2019 when Cuomo grasped her on the shoulders like a mafia don and asked to kiss her.
“I was so confused and shocked and embarrassed,” she told the New York Times Mar. 1.
"Reporters and photographers have covered the governor for 14 years watching him kiss men and women and posing for pictures," a spokesperson for Gov. Cuomo said in a news release at the time. "At the public open house mansion reception there are hundreds of people and he poses for hundreds of pictures. That's what people in politics do."
Combined, the reports led more women to claim what news headlines broadly characterized as "sexual harassment” and “inappropriate" behavior.
Letitia James, the State Attorney General, opened an investigation. Five months later, James released a 168-page report relying on the allegations of 11 women. James’ report concluded "the Governor engaged in conduct constituting sexual harassment under federal and New York State law." He touched people who didn't want to be touched and made "numerous offensive comments of a suggestive and sexual nature that created a hostile work environment for women."
A week later, Gov. Cuomo announced his resignation during an Aug. 10 news conference in his New York City office.
"I deeply, deeply apologize," Cuomo said. "I thought a hug, or putting my arm around a staff person while taking a picture was friendly."
I’ve also "slipped, and called people 'honey,' 'sweetheart' and 'darling.' I meant it to be endearing. But women found it dated, and offensive."
Given the circumstances, the governor said, "the best way I can help now is if I step aside and let government get back to governing."
Then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo arriving at bill signing ceremony for the Raise the Age act, with Akeem Browder, brother of close-Rikers martyr Kalief, Harlem, New York, Apr. 7, 2017. Photo Credit: JB Nicholas.
Cuomo's Lieutenant Governor, Buffalo-based Kathy Hochul, succeeded him by law Aug. 24.
In a twist, Liss revealed in her deposition that the first office she worked out of in Albany wasn't Cuomo's. It was Hochul's.
"I was assigned to the second floor atrium area of the office of the lieutenant Governor," she said.
After Cuomo resigned, Liss gave an interview with Rochester's local CBS affiliate. She said she heard "good things about Lt. Governor Kathy Hochul, she’s by the book."
"I’m glad that part of the outcome here is we’re going to get the first woman as governor of New York State," she added.
Liss did not respond to text and voicemail messages inviting comment.
The claims against Cuomo not only motivated James to begin an investigation, it motivated her to start campaigning for governor herself, against Hochul. James quit after six weeks. Hochul underperformed in the 2022 election, but beat Republican challenger Lee Zelden anyway. She’s New York’s first female governor, and its first elected female governor.
Lawyers for Cuomo weren't the only ones learning things during their deposition of Liss. Liss was learning things too.
Boylan stayed in touch with Liss by text, at least throughout 2021.
After James, the State Attorney General, opened an investigation into Cuomo she subpoenaed records from Liss. Liss didn't tell the Wall Street Journal's Jimmy Vielkind but he found out about it anyway—from Boylan. Despite advice from her lawyer to stop talking to the press, Liss confirmed it and Vielkind scored another scoop for the Journal.
That night Boylan texted Liss: "I'm very proud of you, love you very much, I hope you know you're helping to change the world?"
Later that evening, Boylan texted her again: "everything you do and everything you stand for helps women who have fewer options than we do, and I know that's the kind of person in government I admire most."
Liss texted her back, "I love you."
"Would it have bothered you if you learned that Lindsey Boylan told Jimmy Vielkind that you got a subpoena, if she had tipped him off?," Cuomo's lawyer, Rita Glavin, asked Liss during the deposition, implying it was true.
One of the things Boylan told Liss to convince her to talk to the press was that Cuomo was allegedly having actual affairs with subordinates.
"And she had alleged that she knew," Liss said of Boylan, "and she had direct knowledge that the Governor had sexual affairs with women that were in his employment. And like she spoke to it as if it were an unimpeachable fact."
Boylan, Liss said, "was drawing that connection and perhaps trying to help me understand that there was something more serious going on."
No one has come forward to claim Cuomo had an affair with them.
Boylan, however, allegedly had an affair with New York's economic development czar in 2017—then used an encrypted messaging app to threaten him if he revealed details about it.
“I can’t wait to destroy your life, your [sic] s–t follower,” Boylan messaged the married man, according to Glavin.
After The Free Lance emailed the Wall Street Journal, Gothamist, Hogan and Vielkind for comment, Boylan pre-emptively blocked this reporter on Twitter—before he even reached out to her for comment or tried to follow her.
Near the end of her deposition, Liss seemed to have a moment of clarity.
Speaking of Boylan, "She's become the poster child,” Liss said. "She's kind of in the centerpiece of all of this."
But for her, Liss reflected, "I don't think I would have become embroiled in it."
"I don't love Lindsey Boylan,” Liss concluded, “I respected what she did, I guess, if, you know."
THE FREE LANCE NEEDS YOUR DONATIONS TO SURVIVE. DONATE HERE.