Gov. Cuomo is tapping his $35 million campaign war chest to pay for a legal eagle hired to deal with the mess over his Moreland Commission.
Prominent criminal defense lawyer Elkan Abramowitz said “the governor doesn’t want to have taxpayers pay for this,” so public funds won’t cover the legal bills.
“The Cuomo campaign is going to pay my retainer,” he said.
US Attorney Preet Bharara is investigating the sudden dissolution of the anti-corruption commission by Cuomo in April, and this week threatened to pursue obstruction-of-justice charges as well.
Abramowitz said he was hired in May to represent the entire executive chamber — not Cuomo personally — but says his retainer didn’t appear in July campaign filings because he didn’t submit his bills right away.
The campaign for Cuomo’s GOP November election opponent — Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino — said the arrangement raised some questions.
“This all looks very unusual, as does just about everything involving Moreland and Andrew Cuomo,” said Astorino spokesman Bill O’Reilly. “One wonders if the governor is paying his criminal defense lawyer with contributor funds so that the records never have to be made public.”
Abramowitz, a longtime associate of Cuomo who in December was appointed by the governor to the board of the Long Island Power Authority, declined to say how much he was charging the campaign.
“If you want to pay my retainer, you’ll find out,” he told The Post.
But other lawyers said someone of Abramowitz’s stature could charge a sky-high rate without turning heads, although some lawyers tend to charge a lesser rate when working for government entities.
“The high-profile criminal defense lawyers — especially the white-collar criminal defense lawyers — I would say they could be charging anywhere close to, or even, $1,000 an hour,” said Norman Siegel, a longtime civil-rights attorney.
Cuomo said this week he’ll no longer comment on Moreland after Bharara wrote a letter expressing concern about witness tampering in the midst of a probe.
Cuomo’s office is not the only entity to have lawyered up.
The commission has its own lawyer, Mike Koenig, who will be paid by taxpayers. His contract is under review by the state Comptroller’s Office. The state Assembly also hired an attorney, whose taxpayer-funded bill has already reached $345,000, according to the Comptroller’s Office. Cuomo’s top aide, Larry Schwartz, and counsel, Mylan Denerstein, have retained their own lawyers.