Former Westchester County Deputy Executive Larry Schwartz, who has had nine lives as a political advisor to Governor Andrew Cuomo and others, abrutply resigned his volunteer role in State government as the Vaccine Czar, overseeing the state’s distirbution of the COVID vaccine for the past five months.
His resignation came on April 28, hours before state legislators passes a law banning persons working for NY State from lobbying for a two-year period. Schwartz would have been subject to the new law if he remained in his post, even though it was a volunteer role.
Governor Andrew Cuomo had issued an executive order at the beginning of the pandemic waiving any lobbying bans, but the legislative action taken by the State Senate and Assembly, repeal Cuomo’s order, with some legislators and the media have calling their action the “Larry Schwartz Rule.”
Most recently, Schwartz has been accused of calling County Execuitve’s across the state to gauge their support, or lack thereof, of Governor Cuomo in the wake of a series of sexual harrassment allegations made against him by former and existing state employees. Some viewed Schwartz’s phone calls, and the fact that he controlled where COVID vaccines would go, as an unethical and unprofessional combination.
At the time, Westchester County Executive George Latimer said that he had spoken with Schwartz and because of their longtime working relationship, felt no pressure to answer one way or the other.
But that recent incident is just one of many of Larry Schwartz’s greatest hits of political, professional and ethical misbehavior over his more than 20 years in State government and prior to that in Westchester County government.
In Westchester during the 2000’s, Schwartz served as County Execuitve Andy Spano’s ‘hatchet man’, keeping man democrats in line by laying down the law and how it was going to be. Schwartz then left White Plains for Albany to serve as Governor David Patterson’s Secretary, and then served as Governor Andrew Cuomo’s top aide until a New York Times story in 2014 linked Schwartz to the containment and eventual closure of the Moreland Commission, a State panel set up by Governor Cuomo to root out corruption in Albany. The Commissioner was disbanded by Cuomo before it could make any difference in ethical wrongdoing by legislators, lobbyists and power brokers in NY State.
The New York Times reported that Schwartz was accused of aggressively controlling information harmful to Cuomo’s political interests by the Moreland Commission. He was investigated by then US Attorney Preet Bharara but was never charged. He quietly left State Government in 2015, receiving a position with OTG, an airport management and concessions company.
He remained silent for three years, occasionally penning an op-ed defending his old boss, Governor Andrew Cuomo.
Schwartz’s name returned to the spotlight in a negative way during the 2018 Democratic primary for Governor between Andrew Cuomo and Cynthia Nixon. During the final days of the campaign, an inflammatory flyer was mailed to several thousands Orthodox Jews that suggested that Nixon was anti-Semitic.
The flyer stated that Nixon was “against funding Yeshivas, and “was silent on the rise of anti-Semitism.” It was paid for by the State Democratic Committee. Nixon is not Jewish but is raising her two children in the Jewish faith.
In a statement, Lis Smith, a spokeswoman for Mr. Cuomo’s campaign, laid the blame on Larry Schwartz. “Larry Schwartz, who serves on our campaign in a volunteer capacity, was reviewing mail pieces in an ad hoc fashion, but he only saw the positive section of the mailer and never saw the negative section,” Ms. Smith said. “Had he seen it, it would have never gone out. We have said all along that the mailer was inappropriate and a mistake and have worked with the state party to change the approval process going forward to ensure this never happens again.”
Despite Schwartz’s denials, many democrats weren’t buying any of it.
The outrage to the flyer reached the highest levels of New York Democrats. Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, whose wife, Sharon Kleinbaum is the Rabbi at the synagogue that Nixon attends, wrote,
From Sharon Kleinbaum and Randi Weingarten
“Tonight, we saw a mailer from the NYS Democratic Party directed to Jewish Voters. We are both used to rough and tumble political advertising, particularly this close to Election Day, but this piece was beyond the pale. Amongst other distortions, it suggested Cynthia Nixon was ok with anti-Semitism, stating she was “silent on the rise of antisemitism for many reasons, we have both maintained our neutrality in the primary between Governor Cuomo and Cynthia Nixon. We know them both well, and Sharon is Cynthia’s Rabbi. Cynthia is no anti Semite. It’s a baseless lie.”
At the time in 2018, the NY Post reported, ‘Schwartz was very involved with the mailer and signed off on it,’ a Democratic source said, describing the aide as a ‘henchman’ and ‘enforcer.’ The source added: ‘It obviously blew up.’”
State Senator John Liu said, “The public officers law is intended to ensure that state officials bear nothing but the public’s best interest in mind when rendering decisions about public policy and resource allocation, and it should never have been subverted by gubernatorial executive order. Amid reports of political chicanery and other conflicts of interest in vaccine distribution, this legislative resolution cancels the governor’s order that waived ethics and transparency rules, and re-imposes much-needed integrity to the executive branch.”
Gov. Cuomo’s spokesman Rich Azzopardi nastily shot back at Liu’s comments, “John Liu should be ashamed of himself. Larry Schwartz was working 16-hour days while (Liu) was sitting in his … underwear.”
For those of us committed to reforming State government, we hope that Larry Schwartz has seen his finaly days of public service. By “running out of the doors” of state government before a law passed to stop him from lobbying in the future points to the fact that Larry thinks he has one more life left…as a lobbyist.
Good Grief!
