Albany lawmakers come to deal on discovery in budget talks, passed another extender and left town for weekend
Apr. 17—ALBANY — Progress seems to have been made on changes to the state's discovery laws in the after hours of Wednesday.
Speaker of the Assembly Carl E. Heastie, D-Bronx, told Spectrum News Capitol Tonight reporter Kate Lisa "discovery's done" in the halls of the Capitol on Wednesday night, after a meeting with the Senate Majority Leader and Governor Kathleen C. Hochul.
Albany's leaders do not discuss specifics of the deals they reach in private regarding policy until the entire budget package is completed and presented to the state legislature for a vote.
Heastie's comments came just hours after Gov. Kathleen C. Hochul, speaking in Manhattan to push again on her proposed changes to alter the state's discovery laws, said that talks were not completed yet but at the "five yard line," using a football allegory.
On Tuesday, Heastie had told reporters he'd developed the "framework" of a deal on discovery after spending the Passover weekend talking with the five District Attorneys that represent New York City.
Hochul, who was at the same time speaking in Kingston, Ulster County, wasn't quick to sign onto that deal on discovery language, and spent Tuesday night and most of Wednesday negotiating tweaks with the legislators.
In her original pitch to lawmakers, Hochul had asked to adjust the scope of what evidence a prosecutor has to turn over to the defense in a criminal case, allow for less severe penalties than dismissal when an issue with the prosecution's conduct in discovery is found, and set a deadline for when the defense can file a complaint with the court regarding discovery.
Hochul has argued those changes will protect the victims of crimes by ensuring the cases against their abusers aren't thrown out over technical mistakes. She's tied the issue with domestic violence, retail theft and other crime issues, and leaned on DAs from around the state to argue that the current discovery rules were hurting otherwise concrete cases.
Evidence of this is thin, however; when a case is dismissed it becomes sealed, so the public and the press haven't been able to review any of the cases cited by the DAs or the Governor they claim were dismissed over discovery issues.
And some progressive lawmakers have argued that goes too far, and would allow prosecutors to withhold evidence they find that could exonerate defendants.
A source close to the internal discussions told the Watertown Daily Times on Thursday morning that discovery is settled, and lawmakers are moving on to the final few issues to settle.
Lawmakers still have to come down with a deal on involuntary commitment standards, which those close to discussions say are less likely to be as controversial as the discovery debate has been.
Lawmakers voted to pass another bill to fund the state government through to Wednesday of next week and promptly left the Capitol Thursday ahead of the Easter weekend.
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Yahoo
6 hours ago
- Yahoo
State withheld records in Rio Arriba sheriff death investigation
The New Mexico Department of Public Safety took 42 days — far beyond the 15 days allowed by state statute — to release information this week about the mysterious April death of Rio Arriba County Sheriff Billy Merrifield. Forensic pathologists reported May 15 that Merrifield's Easter morning death was due to the toxic effects of fentanyl and alcohol. Other questions remained unanswered, including whether the sheriff knowingly consumed fentanyl and where he may have obtained it. In the days after Merrifield was found dead in his patrol car April 20, The New Mexican filed a public records request for related police reports and other information. At first, the Department of Public Safety refused to release additional records. Next, it described the request as burdensome, buying the agency more time. After additional complaints from The New Mexican, it released a batch of investigative reports Thursday evening — 42 days after receiving the request. Those records — 105 pages of reports, photos and other documents — show the agency's investigators have not yet determined how Merrifield ingested the fatal dose of fentanyl that caused his death, along with alcohol. The recent secrecy over Merrifield's death reflects a pattern of slow-walked disclosure of public records like state police reports and lapel camera footage, shielding public information on homicides, crashes, police shootings around the state and other public safety-related incidents. The department's initial decision to withhold police reports from the investigation — as well as documents in another unrelated case — appears to have potentially run afoul of state public records laws and a Supreme Court ruling in recent years. Department of Public Safety spokesperson Herman Lovato declined to respond to some questions about the matter in an email Friday, but he wrote each request through the New Mexico Inspection of Public Records Act 'is addressed individually' by department staff. 'If it involves an active or ongoing investigation, records that are complete will be produced if not subject to an exception, even on an active or ongoing investigation,' Lovato wrote. 'If the records have not been completed because of an active or ongoing investigation, they may be temporarily withheld until completed.' He wrote the department's process 'aligns with New Mexico Supreme Court precedent and the requirements of IPRA.' However, the department's written reason for denying a recent request for state police reports tied to Merrifield's death did not appear consistent with the process Lovato described. In response to a request from The New Mexican seeking reports on Merrifield's death, a staff member at the department's records division wrote in early May, 'this is still a active/on going investigation and I was not given the approval to release the documents as they are still being [processed].' About two weeks later, the department's reasoning changed, with a different staffer writing the request for reports was 'overburdensome.' The records were finally released Thursday after The New Mexican submitted a complaint concerning an alleged violation of the Inspection of Public Records Act to the Department of Justice — and after sending emailed questions about the records request to officials that day. Advocate: Court ruling 'clear' Christine Barber, the executive director of New Mexico Foundation for Open Government, said in an interview the department's initial denial of the request appeared to potentially violate a state Supreme Court ruling a few years ago on the specific topic of records in active law enforcement investigations. The ruling came as a result of a lawsuit brought by Andrew Jones against the Department of Public Safety, which had denied his request for records related to a state police investigation into the fatal shooting of his brother by Albuquerque police officers. Barber said the 2020 ruling was clear, holding that 'the status of a criminal investigation as 'ongoing' does not serve to exempt public records related to the investigation from inspection under [the Inspection of Public Records Act].' 'Sometimes government agencies need to be reminded of the law,' Barber said, noting past litigation between the Foundation for Open Government and the Department of Public Safety. In a 2007 settlement between the department, the foundation and several news publications — including The New Mexican — department officials agreed to provide records like incident reports within the 15-day timeline required by state law. An attorney for the government transparency group said at least one other journalist reported receiving a similar response recently when requesting the reports on Merrifield's death, but she added she did not recall other recent instances of state law enforcement agencies explicitly citing an open investigation as the reason for denying or delaying the production of records. The Department of Public Safety cited the Supreme Court's decision in a letter denying a different request from The New Mexican earlier this year for an incident report in a different death investigation. In the letter, staff acknowledged the court ruling stated exemptions to public records law 'cannot be interpreted so broadly as to withhold records simply due to the existence of an ongoing investigation.' The letter described exemptions that allow for redactions of parts of records, like names of potential subjects and informants, and ultimately stated the agency would withhold the entire report. 'Once the investigation is closed and no longer subject to these legal restrictions, certain records may become available for inspection,' the letter states. Weeks to fulfill requests While records are not usually withheld outright by the Department of Public Safety, it often takes several months to disclose reports from an investigation. In the past two years, The New Mexican has submitted at least 24 requests to the Department of Public Safety seeking reports or other documents such as the agency's written policies, lists of employees or financial data — not including requests for records like police lapel camera footage. The department provided the requested records in an average timeframe of more than two months per request. A little more than half of the requests for police reports or other documents were deemed 'broad' or 'burdensome' by the department's record staff, which allows for delays longer than 15 days. As of Friday, records have not been provided in response to two of the requests. Department of Justice spokesperson Lauren Rodriguez said attorneys from the division that investigate public records complaints had contacted the Department of Public Safety earlier this week regarding the complaint from The New Mexican. The investigators — after being assigned a complaint — usually contact the government agency in question to obtain more information, she said. They are trying to determine if there is actually noncompliance as well as whether the agency's staff knew their actions were out of compliance and whether they acted purposely in denying or delaying a records request. Apart from the complaint submitted against the Department of Public Safety by The New Mexican, the department has been the subject of one other records-related complaint so far this year to the Department of Justice, Rodriguez said. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham's office did not respond to an email seeking comment on the Department of Public Safety's practices concerning the release of public records. Lujan Grisham stood behind the department when asked about the issue last year, with a spokesperson writing the governor 'defers to law enforcement authorities to determine when the release of information is appropriate based on the status of ongoing investigations, notification of next of kin, etc.'
Atlantic
9 hours ago
- Atlantic
Where Is Barack Obama?
Last month, while Donald Trump was in the Middle East being gifted a $400 million luxury jet from Qatar, Barack Obama headed off on his own foreign excursion: a trip to Norway, in a much smaller and more tasteful jet, to visit the summer estate of his old friend King Harald V. Together, they would savor the genteel glories of Bygdøyveien in May. They chewed over global affairs and the freshest local salmon, which had been smoked on the premises and seasoned with herbs from the royal garden. Trump has begun his second term with a continuous spree of democracy-shaking, economy-quaking, norm-obliterating action. And Obama, true to form, has remained carefully above it all. He picks his spots, which seldom involve Trump. In March, he celebrated the anniversary of the Affordable Care Act and posted his annual NCAA basketball brackets. In April, he sent out an Easter message and mourned the death of the pope. In May, he welcomed His Holiness Pope Leo XIV ('a fellow Chicagoan') and sent prayers to Joe Biden following his prostate-cancer diagnosis. No matter how brazen Trump becomes, the most effective communicator in the Democratic Party continues to opt for minimal communication. His 'audacity of hope' presidency has given way to the fierce lethargy of semi-retirement. Obama occasionally dips into politics with brief and unmemorable statements, or sporadic fundraising emails (subject: 'Barack Obama wants to meet you. Yes you.'). He praised his law-school alma mater, Harvard, for 'rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt' by the White House 'to stifle academic freedom.' He criticized a Republican bill that would threaten health care for millions. He touted a liberal judge who was running for a crucial seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. When called upon, he can still deliver a top-notch campaign spiel, donor pitch, convention speech, or eulogy. Beyond that, Obama pops in with summer and year-end book, music, and film recommendations. He recently highlighted a few articles about AI and retweeted a promotional spot for Air Force Elite: Thunderbirds, a new Netflix documentary from his and Michelle's production company. (Michelle also has a fashion book coming out later this year: 'a celebration of confidence, identity, and authenticity,' she calls it.) Apparently, Barack is a devoted listener of The Ringer 's Bill Simmons Podcast, or so he told Jimmy Kimmel over dinner. In normal times, no one would deny Obama these diversions. He performed the world's most stressful job for eight years, served his country, made his history, and deserved to kick back and do the usual ex-president things: start a foundation, build a library, make unspeakable amounts of money. But the inevitable Trump-era counterpoint is that these are not normal times. And Obama's detachment feels jarringly incongruous with the desperation of his longtime admirers—even more so given Trump's assaults on what Obama achieved in office. It would be one thing if Obama had disappeared after leaving the White House, maybe taking up painting like George W. Bush. The problem is that Obama still very much has a public profile—one that screams comfort and nonchalance at a time when so many other Americans are terrified. 'There are many grandmas and Rachel Maddow viewers who have been more vocal in this moment than Barack Obama has,' Adam Green, a co-founder of the Progressive Change Institute, told me. 'It is heartbreaking,' he added, 'to see him sacrificing that megaphone when nobody else quite has it.' People who have worked with Obama since he left office say that he is extremely judicious about when he weighs in. 'We try to preserve his voice so that when he does speak, it has impact,' Eric Schultz, a close adviser to Obama in his post-presidency, told me. 'There is a dilution factor that we're very aware of.' 'The thing you don't want to do is, you don't want to regularize him,' former Attorney General Eric Holder, a close Obama friend and collaborator, told me. When I asked Holder what he meant by 'regularize,' he explained that there was a danger of turning Obama into just another hack commentator—' Tuesdays With Barack, or something like that,' Holder said. Like many of Obama's confidants, Holder bristles at suggestions that the former president has somehow deserted the Trump opposition. 'Should he do more? Everybody can have their opinions,' Holder said. 'The one thing that always kind of pisses me off is when people say he's not out there, or that he's not doing things, that he's just retired and we never hear from him. If you fucking look, folks, you would see that he's out there.' From the April 2016 issue: The Obama doctrine Obama's aides also say that he is loath to overshadow the next generation of Democratic leaders. They emphasize that he spends a great deal of time speaking privately with candidates and officials who seek his advice. But unfortunately for Democrats, they have not found their next fresh generational sensation since Obama was elected 17 years ago (Joe Biden obviously doesn't count). Until a new leader emerges, Obama could certainly take on a more vocal role without 'regularizing' himself in the lowlands of Trump-era politics. Obama remains the most popular Democrat alive at a time of historic unpopularity for his party. Unlike Biden, he appears not to have lost a step, or three. Unlike with Bill Clinton, his voice remains strong and his baggage minimal. Unlike both Biden and Clinton, he is relatively young and has a large constituency of Americans who still want to hear from him, including Black Americans, young voters, and other longtime Democratic blocs that gravitated toward Trump in November. 'Should Obama get out and do more? Yes, please,' Tracy Sefl, a Democratic media consultant in Chicago, told me. 'Help us,' she added. 'We're sinking over here.' Obama's conspicuous scarcity while Trump inflicts such damage isn't just a bad look. It's a dereliction of the message that he built his career on. When Obama first ran for president in 2008, his former life as a community organizer was central to his message. His campaign was not merely for him, but for civic action itself—the idea of Americans being invested in their own change. Throughout his time in the White House, he emphasized that 'citizen' was his most important title. After he left office in 2017, Obama said that he would work to inspire and develop the next cohort of leaders, which is essentially the mission of his foundation. It would seem a contradiction for him to say that he's devoting much of his post-presidency to promoting civic engagement when he himself seems so disengaged. To some degree, patience with Obama began wearing thin when he was still in office. His approval ratings sagged partway through his second term (before rebounding at the end). The rollout of the Affordable Care Act in 2013 was a fiasco, and the midterm elections of 2014 were a massacre. Obama looked powerless as Republicans in Congress ensured that he would pass no major legislation in his second term and blocked his nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court. 'Obama, out,' the president said in the denouement of his last comedy routine at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, in 2016. In Obama lore, this mic-drop moment would instantly become famous—and prophetic. After Trump's first victory, Obama tried to reassure supporters that this was merely a setback. 'I don't believe in apocalyptic—until the apocalypse comes,' he said in an interview with The New Yorker. Insofar as Obama talked about how he imagined his post-presidency, he was inclined to disengage from day-to-day politics. At a press conference in November 2016, Obama said that he planned to 'take Michelle on vacation, get some rest, spend time with my girls, and do some writing, do some thinking.' He promised to give Trump the chance to do his job 'without somebody popping off in every instance.' But in that same press conference, he also allowed that if something arose that raised 'core questions about our values and our ideals, and if I think that it's necessary or helpful for me to defend those ideals, then I'll examine it when it comes.' That happened almost immediately. A few days after vowing in his inaugural address to end the 'American carnage' that he was inheriting, Trump signed an executive order banning foreign nationals from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States for 90 days. The so-called Muslim travel ban would quickly be blocked by the courts, but not before sowing chaos at U.S. points of entry. Obama put out a brief statement through a spokesperson ('the president fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion'), and went on vacation. Trump's early onslaught made clear that Obama's ex-presidency would prove far more complicated than previous ones. And Obama's taste for glamorous settings and famous company—Richard Branson, David Geffen, George Clooney—made for a grating contrast with the turmoil back home. 'Just tone it down with the kitesurfing pictures,' John Oliver, the host of HBO's Last Week Tonight, said of Obama in an interview with Seth Meyers less than a month after the president left office. 'America is on fire,' Oliver added. 'I know that people accused him of being out of touch with the American people during his presidency. I'm not sure he's ever been more out of touch than he is now.' Oliver's spasm foreshadowed a rolling annoyance that continued as Trump's presidency wore on: that Obama was squandering his power and influence. 'Oh, Obama is still tweeting good tweets. That's very nice of him,' the anti-Trump writer Drew Magary wrote in a Medium column titled 'Where the Hell Is Barack Obama?' in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic. 'I'm sick of Obama staying above the fray while that fray is swallowing us whole.' Obama did insert himself in the 2024 election, reportedly taking an aggressive behind-the-scenes role last summer in trying to nudge Biden out of the race. He delivered a showstopper speech at the Democratic National Convention and campaigned several times for Kamala Harris in the fall. But among longtime Obama admirers I've spoken with, frustration with the former president has built since Trump returned to office. While campaigning for Harris last year, Obama framed the stakes of the election in terms of a looming catastrophe. 'These aren't ordinary times, and these are not ordinary elections,' he said at a campaign stop in Pittsburgh. Yet now that the impact is unfolding in the most pernicious ways, Obama seems to be resuming his ordinary chill and same old bits. Green, of the Progressive Change Institute, told me that when Obama put out his March Madness picks this year, he texted Schultz, the Obama adviser. 'Have I missed him speaking up in other places recently?' Green asked him. 'He did not respond to that.' (Schultz confirmed to me that he ignored the message but vowed to be 'more responsive to Adam Green's texts in the future.') Being a former president is inherently tricky: The role is ill-defined, and peripheral by definition. Part of the trickiness is how an ex-president can remain relevant, if he wants to. This is especially so given the current president. 'I don't know that anybody is relevant in the Trump era,' Mark Updegrove, a presidential historian and head of the LBJ Foundation, told me. Updegrove, who wrote a book called Second Acts: Presidential Lives and Legacies After the White House, said that Trump has succeeded in creating a reality in which every president who came before is suspect. 'All the standard rules of being an ex-president are no longer applicable,' he said. Still, Obama never presented himself as a 'standard rules' leader. This was the idea that his political rise was predicated on—that change required bold, against-the-grain thinking and uncomfortable action. Clearly, Obama still views himself this way, or at least still wants to be perceived this way. (A few years ago, he hosted a podcast with Bruce Springsteen called Renegades.) From the July 1973 issue: The last days of the president Stepping into the current political melee would not be an easy or comfortable role for Obama. He represents a figure of the past, which seems more and more like the ancient past as the Trump era crushes on. He is a notably long-view guy, who has spent a great deal of time composing a meticulous account of his own narrative. 'We're part of a long-running story,' Obama said in 2014. 'We just try to get our paragraph right.' Or thousands of paragraphs, in his case: The first installment of Obama's presidential memoir, A Promised Land, covered 768 pages and 29 hours of audio. No release date has been set for the second volume. But this might be one of those times for Obama to take a break from the long arc of the moral universe and tend to the immediate crisis. Several Democrats I've spoken with said they wish that Obama would stop worrying so much about the 'dilution factor.' While Democrats struggle to find their next phenom, Obama could be their interim boss. He could engage regularly, pointing out Trump's latest abuses. He did so earlier this spring, during an onstage conversation at Hamilton College. He was thoughtful, funny, and sounded genuinely aghast, even angry. He could do these public dialogues much more often, and even make them thematic. Focus on Trump's serial violations of the Constitution one week (recall that Obama once taught constitutional law), the latest instance of Trump's naked corruption the next. Blast out the most scathing lines on social media. Yes, it might trigger Trump, and create more attention than Obama evidently wants. But Trump has shown that ubiquity can be a superpower, just as Biden showed that obscurity can be ruinous. People would notice. Democrats love nothing more than to hold up Obama as their monument to Republican bad faith. Can you imagine if Obama did this? some Democrat will inevitably say whenever Trump does something tacky, cruel, or blatantly unethical (usually before breakfast). Obama could lean into this hypocrisy—tape recurring five-minute video clips highlighting Trump's latest scurrilous act and title the series 'Can You Imagine If I Did This?' Or another idea—an admittedly far-fetched one. Trump has decreed that a massive military parade be held through the streets of Washington on June 14. This will ostensibly celebrate the Army's 250th anniversary, but it also happens to fall on Trump's 79th birthday. The parade will cost an estimated $45 million, including $16 million in damage to the streets. (Can you imagine if Obama did this?) The spectacle cries out for counterprogramming. Obama could hold his own event, in Washington or somewhere nearby. It would get tons of attention and drive Trump crazy, especially if it draws a bigger crowd. Better yet, make it a parade, or 'citizen's march,' something that builds momentum as it goes, the former president and community organizer leading on foot. This would be the renegade move. Few things would fire up Democrats like a head-to-head matchup between Trump and Obama. If nothing else, it would be fun to contemplate while Democrats keep casting about for their long-delayed future. 'The party needs new rising stars, and they need the room to figure out how to meet this moment, just like Obama figured out how to meet the moment 20 years ago,' Jon Favreau, a co-host of Pod Save America and former director of speechwriting for the 44th president, told me. 'Unless, of course, Trump tries to run for a third term, in which case I'll be begging Obama to come out of retirement.'
New York Post
a day ago
- New York Post
Andrew Cuomo refuses to condemn Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie for killing bipartisan bill commemorating Oct. 7 attack on Israel
Ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo refused to condemn state Assembly Speaker and longtime ally Carl Heastie for torpedoing a bipartisan bill that would have commemorated Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 terror attack on the Jewish state. Cuomo, the frontrunner heading into the June 24 NYC Democratic mayoral primary, told The Post Saturday he was unaware of the bill or that the Bronx pol went to extraordinary lengths to ensure it didn't reach the Assembly floor for a vote. 'I don't know how it happened, but I have no doubt that the Democrats in the Legislature would all honor the memory of Oct. 7 and stand in unity in honoring Oct. 7,' he insisted after leaving the Attneu Synagogue on the Upper East Side, where he addressed members of its congregation. 4 Ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo insisted Saturday he's an avid Israel supporter — but refused to condemn state Assembly Speaker and longtime ally Carl Heastie for torpedoing a bipartisan bill that would have commemorated Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 terror attack on the Jewish state. William Farrington Although Cuomo wasn't willing to attack Heastie, he quickly jabbed Queens Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani — a socialist who has been polling second only to the former governor in the Democratic mayoral primary race. 'The Democratic Party is 100% in support of the Jewish community, and I'm sure would stand in solidarity in condemning Oct. 7,' he said. 'Democratic socialists, Zohran Mamdani, that's a different story.' 4 Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) went to extraordinary lengths Friday to ensure it didn't reach the Assembly floor for a vote – such as stacking a committee with Democratic allies who'd vote to scuttle it, sources said. Hans Pennink 'The outlier is Zoran Mamdani and the Democratic socialists who said they won't visit Israel, who said they don't acknowledge Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state, but he does not represent the majority of Democrats in the city,' said Cuomo. Cuomo personally '100% support[s]' commemorating Oct. 7, he said. The bill, sponsored in February by Brooklyn Republican Assemblyman Lester Chang, would enshrine Oct. 7 alongside other days of commemoration in the Empire State, such as 'Rosa Parks Day' and 'Susan B. Anthony Day.' 4 Smoke rises from Israel after Hamas terrorists infiltrated areas of southern Israel, as seen from Gaza, October 7, 2023. REUTERS 4 Socialist Queens Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani — who is a staunch Israel critic — is polling second only behind Cuomo in the Democratic mayoral primary. Daniel Efram/ZUMA / Sources told The Post Friday they believe Heastie, the most powerful Democrat in the Assembly, likely didn't want a bill with a Republican as its primary sponsor to reach the floor for a vote, even though 13 Democrats have already signed on as co-sponsors. Chang said he'd let a Democrat take over as the bill's sponsor if it meant the measure would pass.
