The state attorney general’s office has intensified its probe of Gov Cuomo, issuing subpoenas to former aides who have accused him of sexual harassment, The Post has confirmed.
The subpoenas issued in the last two weeks by Attorney General Letitia James require the four women to provide testimony under oath, indicating the probe, which began in March, has entered a more critical phase.
Ana Liss, who served as a policy and operations aide to Cuomo between 2013 and 2015, told The Post she received her subpoena to testify in the inquiry on Thursday. Liss said that Cuomo asked if she had a boyfriend, touched her lower back at a reception and once kissed her hand when she got up from her desk.
The lawyer for an unidentified former aide who accused Cuomo of groping her breast confirmed to The Post Saturday that his client had also received a subpoena from the attorney general’s office within the last few weeks.
Mariann Wang, a lawyer for Alyssa McGrath, told The Post Saturday that her client had also received a subpoena. McGrath, a current aide, said that unidentified accuser had confided in her that Cuomo touched her breast under her blouse at the Executive Mansion in Albany late last year. “She froze when he started doing that stuff to her,” McGrath reportedly said.
Cuomo had asked the unidentified former aide not to discuss the alleged incident with McGrath because they knew they were friends who regularly spoke and texted each other.
McGrath also spoke about her own alleged encounters with Cuomo, saying that he once looked down her blouse to compliment her on her necklace, and told her, in Italian, that she is beautiful. She also said that Cuomo commented on her lack of a wedding ring, and while she said that he did not touch her inappropriately, she believed his actions amounted to sexual harassment.
A spokeswoman for Charlotte Bennett, a former aide who said Cuomo made sexual advances towards her when they were alone in his office, confirmed she had received a subpoena.
Bennett tweeted an excerpt from a New York Times report on the subpoenas Saturday, adding “looking forward to this.”
Lindsey Boylan, the first woman to accuse Cuomo of sexual harassment, said she had also received a subpoena. Boylan, a candidate for Manhattan Borough President, worked as a special advisor to the governor and has accused him of several instances of inappropriate behavior, including inviting her to play strip poker and joking that he would “mount” her if she were a dog.
The investigation into the governor’s alleged sexual harassment is expected to continue through the summer, according to a source cited by the New York Times.
