Erie County Democrats today endorsed Leecia Eve for New York State Attorney General. Eve is an accomplished attorney and the daughter of renowned Buffalo residents – former Deputy Speaker of the New York State Assembly Arthur O. Eve and educator and women’s rights activist Constance B. Eve. Eve currently serves as a Commissioner of the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey. Most recently she served as the Deputy Secretary for Economic Development for New York and in that role, as the chief economic development advisor to Governor Andrew M. Cuomo. She has held senior roles in the U.S. Senate – first, as previous counsel to former Senator Joseph R. Biden, Jr., ranking member of the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, where she worked on civil rights and justice issues, and later as counsel and homeland security advisor to then Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton – and also as a key advisor to Clinton’s 2008 presidential bid. “More than ever New Yorkers must be protected from ongoing attacks to their basic rights. I will stand strong as an independent and passionate advocate for justice in the fight to defend all New Yorkers,” said Leecia Eve. “It is an honor to receive the endorsement and support of my hometown democratic party and have the opportunity to continue my family’s legacy of service to this community and the people of New York State,” Eve continued. “Leecia Eve is a daughter of Western New York and a woman of Harlem, someone who understands this community and whose roots here could not be stronger or deeper. We need an attorney general who will stand for all New Yorkers, who knows what life is life is like north of Rockland County and west of the Hudson, one who will restore the public’s faith in the integrity and purpose of this important office. Leecia Eve is the right choice, for her hometown and all of New York State,” said Erie County Democratic Chair Jeremy J. Zellner. “I was proud to put forth her nomination at the state convention in Hempstead two weeks ago, and I’m proud to call her our nominee today,” Zellner continued. “Next January Western New York will have two outstanding women, Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul and Attorney General Leecia Eve, representing them and fighting for them.” “Leecia Eve should be the next Attorney General of the State of New York,” said Buffalo attorney and former City Court Judge Margaret Murphy. “Leecia is a person of great ability and substance whose counsel has been sought by Democratic leaders of our state and nation. Now she stands on the precipice of history, guided by her parents’ example and positioned to complete the footsteps of another woman of grace and great intelligence, M. Dolores Denman, former Chief Justice of the Fourth Department Appellate Division and 1978 Democratic candidate for Attorney General. I am proud to be with Leecia Eve.” “Leecia Eve may well be the most qualified person to ever seek the office of New York State Attorney General. She is in this race to fight the Trump’s administration attempt to roll back civil rights protections, environmental safeguards and anti-discrimination laws in housing. If ever there was a time we need the best New York State has to offer, it is now and that person is Leecia Eve,” said Len Lenihan, former Erie County Democratic Chair. “Not only does Leecia Eve have the government and legal experiences to become our next Attorney General, she has a deep commitment to public service that she learned around the dinner table from her parents, Arthur and Constance, who did so much for this community over more than a generation,” said former Erie County Legislator Betty Jean Grant. Eve attended Buffalo public schools and is a graduate of City Honors School. She holds an A.B. from Smith College, a M.P.A. from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. Eve began her legal career as a judicial clerk to New York State Court of Appeals Associate Judge Fritz W. Alexander, II. She served as an associate at Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C. and as a partner at Hodgson Russ, LLP in Buffalo. She is the former founder and chair of Show Up New York, a state-wide organization that focused on increasing the level of civic participation among young people. Eve previously served in the Cuomo Administration as Executive Vice President and General Counsel of Empire State Development. She is currently the Vice ]]>
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FEMA pressures staff to rat out colleagues who have criticized Trump anonymously: report
A number of Federal Emergency Management Agency staff that openly criticized President Donald Trump are under intense investigation from FEMA leadership, and under threats of termination should they refuse to reveal the names of their colleagues who criticized Trump anonymously, Bloomberg reported Thursday.
Nearly 200 FEMA employees signed onto a letter in August pushing back against the Trump administration’s cuts to FEMA, warning that the cuts could jeopardize the agency’s ability to adequately respond to disasters.
More than a dozen FEMA employees – all of whom signed onto the letter – were soon placed on leave. Now, remaining staff that had signed onto the letter using their name are being investigated by agency leadership, being threatened to reveal the names of their colleagues who signed the letter anonymously, according to insiders who spoke with Bloomberg and documents reviewed by the outlet.
“The interviews with FEMA workers have been carried out by the agency's division that investigates employee misconduct, and those interviewed have been told they risk being fired for failure to cooperate,” Bloomberg writes in its report. “The employees have been instructed not to bring counsel, according to people familiar with the process.”
The revelation that FEMA staff under investigation were being instructed not to bring legal counsel was revealed, in part, by Colette Delawalla, the founder of the nonprofit organization Stand Up for Science, the same organization that helped FEMA staff publish its letter of dissent.
“They are not really given an option not to comply,” Delawalla told Bloomberg. “They don’t have guidance while they’re in there.”
Trump has previously said he wanted to phase out FEMA and “bring it down to the state level,” with the agency struggling to respond to emergencies such as the deadly Texas flood in July following new Trump administration policies that led to funding lapses for the agency.
A previous batch of FEMA employees – 140 of them – were placed on leave back in July for signing onto a different letter of dissent, which itself followed a number of FEMA employees being forcibly reassigned to work for Immigrations Customs and Enforcement amid Trump’s mass deportation push.
Critics have characterized the FEMA purges as a blatant violation of the Whistleblower Protection Act, which provides clear protections for government employees from retaliation for disclosing information that is a “specific danger to public health or safety.”