Kathy Hochul Will Do “Everything” to Force an Anti-Union Judge Onto New York’s Highest Court

New York Governor Kathy Hochul barely held onto her seat in the last election, and now she’s alienating her own party by nominating Hector LaSalle as chief judge for the state Court of Appeals.

LaSalle, an appellate court judge, is set to have a hearing next Wednesday before the state Senate Judiciary Committee, which will then vote either to advance or tank his nomination. A majority of the committee has expressed skepticism thus far. Hochul for her part has said she will do “everything” to get LaSalle through the committee, arguing the whole Senate should be the one to vote.

LaSalle has built a reputation as a generally experienced, knowledgeable judge. Proponents cite things like the New York State Bar Association deeming him “well qualified.” They also point to the history to be made upon his appointment: LaSalle would be the court’s first Latino chief judge, if confirmed.

Meanwhile, opponents—progressives, moderates, and, yes, Latinos, among others—find parts of his record contrary to the kinds of liberal ideals Hochul would presumably stand for. LaSalle’s record on issues including abortion, criminal justice, and labor would have massive implications on the already-conservative court. And Democrats are still reeling from the impacts of an antagonistic court. During the midterms, the party suffered in part due to unfavorable district maps drawn by the state’s highest court, whose conservative majority was constructed by Andrew Cuomo. So scrutiny on any appointment is warranted, especially one whose record is like LaSalle’s.

Over a decade ago, the New York state attorney general launched an investigation into potential fraudulent practices being carried out by an organization that ran so-called “crisis pregnancy centers,” which pose as real health clinics but are actually run by anti-abortion activists. LaSalle voted to intervene, hindering the probe by preventing investigators from reviewing even promotional materials from the centers.

In 2014, LaSalle joined an opinion holding that a criminal defendant could not appeal his conviction of a weapons possession charge because he knowingly waived the right to appeal when he entered a guilty plea. However, when the defendant entered the guilty plea, he was told by the trial judge that he could still appeal “certain constitutional issues.” And he was indeed seeking to appeal his conviction on the basis of a constitutional issue: He claimed he was subject to an illegal police search. Nevertheless, LaSalle signed onto the majority opinion that denied the appeal.

In 2015, LaSalle voted alongside a majority opinion allowing cable television company Cablevision to sue union officials who were criticizing the company—contrary to legal precedent that protected organizing workers from such corporate lawsuits. In other words, LaSalle upended state legal precedent in favor of a company, and against workers.

The Court of Appeals—which LaSalle is now nominated to—overturned the latter two decisions that LaSalle joined.

These are just some of the troubling opinions LaSalle has joined. Others include preventing a victim of vicious domestic abuse from filing suit against the police for repeatedly ignoring her pleas for help, and that a 15-year-old who could only read at a fourth-grade level needed no special protection during interrogation.

That Hochul had many other options and still chose LaSalle shows either a lack of conviction in her purported beliefs or severe political ineptitude. At least 14 of the 42 Democrats in the state Senate have come out against LaSalle, with even more expressing uncertainty. That leaves Hochul with maybe 28 Democrats and 21 Republicans to work with; she’ll likely need Republican support to help push the nomination through. Meanwhile, a massive array of unions, reproductive rights and immigrant advocacy organizations, local and state elected officials, and political organizing groups have all similarly come out against LaSalle.

And yet Hochul has held fast—to an impressive extent.

Just this week, Ironworkers Vice President James Mahoney criticized Hochul’s nomination at a press conference, saying the nomination felt like being put “on the menu,” especially after he and other labor organizers worked so hard to elect Hochul in the first place. Afterward, Hochul allegedly revoked Mahoney’s invite to her State of the State speech the following day (a speech with prepared remarks that did not mention LaSalle or even utter the word “union”).

Hochul’s decision to nominate LaSalle at all is questionable. Her resolve in sticking by it is remarkable. As seems evident, again and again, a certain ineptitude or simple lack of conviction is almost a sufficient condition for powerful New York Democrats.

Laura Ingraham tried to use the discovery of classified documents in Joe Biden’s home as proof the president is corrupt, but she ended up calling out someone else entirely.

The Fox News host argued that Biden was more focused on his family’s “corrupt business interests” than being president.

Her Thursday night comments demonstrate both a staggering lack of self-awareness and excellent ironic timing, as they came the day before the Trump organization was sentenced for a 15-year tax fraud scheme.

Former President Donald Trump repeatedly showed more interest in protecting his business interests than actually leading the country. An analysis of his tax returns by the Joint Committee on Taxation appears to indicate that Trump used his office to steer federal business to his own companies. He and other government officials would stay at his hotels while traveling abroad. Foreign officials spent more than $750,000 at the Trump Hotel in Washington, D.C., in an attempt to curry favor with the president. And at one point, Kellyanne Conway said on television people should “go buy Ivanka’s stuff.”

Trump’s tax returns also show that he paid little to no income tax in the past few years and may have withheld details about certain payments and sales to avoid paying tax on those funds.

When it comes to caring for the country, as Ingraham said, the record is equally clear: Trump was impeached the first time for trying to pressure Ukraine into secretly investigating Biden and his family. The January 6 investigative committee unanimously recommended criminal charges against Trump for his role in the insurrection, and he is under investigation by the FBI for taking classified documents to Mar-a-Lago.

Biden, on the other hand, has sought to pass major legislation that would massively benefit the United States, such as the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. When his lawyers discovered the classified documents at his former office and private residence, they immediately returned them to the National Archives and have been cooperating with the investigation. Biden is not perfect, but at least he actually seems invested in his job.

The Trump Organization was fined $1.6 million Friday morning for tax fraud, conspiracy, and other crimes as part of a 15-year scheme that compensated top executives off the books.

Two subsidiaries of the organization, Trump Payroll Corp. and Trump Corp., were hit with the highest possible fines under New York State law at the Manhattan criminal hearing.

The two companies were found guilty last month—just weeks after Donald Trump announced his third consecutive run for president—on 17 criminal counts, including scheming to defraud, conspiracy, tax fraud, and falsifying business records.

The sentence will not dissolve the company, nor send anyone to jail. But Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg was sentenced Tuesday to five months in jail for his role in leading the scheme to defraud state and federal tax authorities for over 15 years. Weisselberg himself had been accused of receiving some $1.7 million in secret compensation throughout the scheme.

“Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg used his high-level position to secure lavish work perks such as a rent-free luxury Manhattan apartment, multiple Mercedes Benz automobiles and private school tuition for his grandchildren—all without paying required taxes,” said Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg in a statement.

Weisselberg was able to net a lighter sentence after agreeing to testify on the scheme.

Trump, denying any wrongdoing even while not being a defendant in the first place, called the case “a continuation of the Greatest Political Witch Hunt in the History of our Country.”

Numerous documents have implicated Trump to some degree. Jeff McConney, the senior vice president at Trump Corp., even implicated Trump in the scheme at first but then walked back that testimony. McConney’s legal fees are paid for by the Trump Organization.

Trump still faces numerous other investigations—on the state and federal level—for his seizure of classified documents after he left the White House, his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, and the accuracy of the Trump Organization’s financial records and valuations.

The New York attorney general is also pursuing a $250 million civil lawsuit into whether Trump’s asset valuation statements were indicative of fraud. Last week, a judge denied Trump’s appeal to dismiss the case, calling his legal team’s arguments “frivolous.” Among financial penalties, Trump and his family could be barred from leading business operations in New York ever again.

Among George Santos’s many lies and embellishments and cover-ups is how, exactly, he came into so much money so quickly.

Just a few years ago, Santos claimed no major assets and a $55,000 salary. Two years later, his net worth skyrocketed and he apparently boasted a nearly seven-figure salary and millions in dividends. He even loaned some $700,000 to his campaign. Santos has thus far refused to answer where this inordinate amount of money actually came from, especially so quickly. And on Thursday, while speaking on friendly territory, he still avoided the question.

On Steve Bannon’s War Room program, guest host and Santos’s colleague Representative Matt Gaetz asked Santos about the $700,000.

“I’ll tell you where it didn’t come from. It didn’t come from China, Ukraine, or Burisma,” Santos quipped with a grin. “How about that?”

Santos has claimed a net worth as high as $11.5 million—all from the newly formed Devolder Organization from which Santos claimed to receive a $750,000 salary and between $1 and $5 million in dividends. Gaetz followed up on Santos’s quip, giving him an easy out to offer any simple explanation for where the money came from. Instead, Santos remained cryptic and even more dishonest.

“Look, I’ve worked my entire life. I’ve lived an honest life. I’ve never been accused—sued—of any bad doings,” Santos said, contributing yet another lie to his already massive pile. “You know, it’s the equity of my hardworking self that I’ve been invested inside of me,” he continued, nonsensically.

“Like I said, it didn’t come from Burisma, it didn’t come from Ukraine, Russia, China—unlike some folks that we all know that get money from those sources,” Santos concluded, relieved to somehow have stumbled his way to the end of his vacuous sentence.

Gaetz marched forward with the conversation, perhaps with second-hand embarrassment after watching Santos fumble even the most generous layup opportunity.

Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Thursday he has appointed a special counsel to investigate the classified documents found in President Joe Biden’s home and former private office.

Biden’s personal attorneys found about a dozen documents in total at the two locations. It is unclear what the documents contain or how sensitive they are. The White House immediately alerted the National Archives, returned the documents the following day, and has been cooperating with the investigation into how the papers got there.

After the initial department investigation, “I concluded that under the special counsel regulations, it was in the public interest to appoint a special counsel,” Garland told a press conference.

He said he had picked Robert Hur, who was nominated to be U.S. attorney in Maryland by former President Donald Trump, to lead the investigation. Before serving as U.S. attorney, Hur worked with the Department of Justice in the early 2000s, focusing on counterterrorism and corporate fraud.

While serving as the U.S. attorney for the district of Maryland, Hur supervised cases dealing with national security and public corruption, including a high-profile case in 2020 in which a white nationalist Coast Guard lieutenant was charged with domestic terrorism.

Since the documents were discovered, Republicans have slammed what they consider a double standard in treatment for Biden and Trump. Senator Lindsey Graham called for a special counsel to be appointed to lead an investigation into Biden.

It’s worth noting that Trump’s and Biden’s situations are nowhere near similar. Trump took hundreds of classified documents, insisted he had done nothing wrong, and resisted all federal efforts to retrieve the papers. Ultimately, the FBI raided his Mar-a-Lago residence to find the documents. As for Biden, as late-night host Seth Meyers noted, “The FBI doesn’t raid someone who’s already cooperating.”

Garland’s decision to appoint a special counsel has produced a mixed reaction. Elie Mistal, the justice correspondent for The Nation, criticized the attorney general’s relative speed in appointing Hur, compared to the nearly two years it took him to appoint Jack Smith as special counsel to investigate Trump.

But national security reporter Marcy Wheeler, who goes by the Twitter handle @emptywheel, argued that doing so would essentially throw Republicans a bone, giving Smith more breathing room for his investigation.