ALBANY — The state Senate passed a pair of bills on Wednesday directly targeting President Donald Trump on the subjects of presidential pardons and his personal finances, possibly setting the stage for a congressional end run around the IRS as congressional Democrats attempt to obtain Trump’s taxes.
“The president and his administration has repeatedly shown a true hostility to the rule of law and presidential customs,” Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins said. “Today, we are sending a message: No one is above the law.”
One of the bills would let the Department of Taxation and Finance share state returns with three congressional committees upon the request of their chairs. Since Trump has likely paid New York taxes for the entirety of his adult life, these would presumably be similar to the federal returns that the Democratic-controlled House has failed to obtain.
"Congress will be allowed to fulfill its lawful oversight activities and provide accountability and transparency to the American people,” said Sen. Brad Hoylman (D-Manhattan), the bill’s sponsor. “The administration is stonewalling a co-equal branch of government. If they won’t do it, New York can.”
The other bill would change New York’s double jeopardy statute to let prosecutors like Attorney General Tish James bring state-level charges against individuals who have received presidential pardons for similar federal crimes. It would not be retroactive, applying only to cases where jurors have not yet been sworn in — if Michael Cohen were pardoned, for example, he couldn’t be tried on related state charges.
“New York is a sovereign entity, and if a law was broken here, we should not tie the hands of our prosecutors or citizens to seek redress for that,” said Sen. Todd Kaminsky (D-Nassau), the sponsor of the measure.
Senate passage is only the first step in a lengthy process towards implementation. But it’s the furthest any bills targeting Trump on a personal level have advanced in his home state, and potentially gives them some momentum.
The Senate's action shows "that this is an issue that many New Yorkers care about,” said Assemblyman David Buchwald (D-White Plains), the sponsor of the tax bill in his house.
Buchwald is currently recruiting co-sponsors for the measure, and expects his conference to deliberate on it soon.
The double jeopardy bill likely faces a greater hurdle in the Assembly, where the Democratic supermajority generally is leery of anything that reduces the rights of defendants. Assemblyman Joe Lentol (D-Brooklyn), the measure's sponsor, said that much of his conference had “categorically rejected it” the last time it was discussed, but expects it to meet a kinder fate when it comes up again “within the next couple of weeks.”
“The attorney general, to her credit, didn’t rest on her laurels and did due diligence in reaching out to the members and has, I think, persuaded enough of them to vote for the bill,” Lentol said. “We’re in a good place now.”
Gov. Andrew Cuomo has categorized the double jeopardy idea as a “good move.” It’s less clear if he’d sign the tax measure. When asked about it during a recent radio interview, he responded with a discourse on how state legislators should release their taxes to the public.
And even if the bills become law, they’d need to withstand judicial scrutiny. Hoylman was asked if he expects a lawsuit.
“I don’t think the president is known to be very litigious, so no,” he replied with a smirk.
Both bills passed the Senate largely along party lines. Sen. Monica Martinez (D-Suffolk) opposed the double jeopardy measure, making her the only member to break party ranks on either of the votes in a chamber with 39 Democrats and 22 Republicans.
Republicans argued the bills took New York down a dangerous path.
“’A legislative act that singles out an individual or group and declares them guilty of some crime without a trial,’” Sen. Andrew Lanza (R-Staten Island) said while reading the definition of a bill of attainder. “Sounds familiar to me.”
Lanza and other Republicans also argued that the measures violated safeguards against practices like ex post facto laws and violations of privacy.
“We’re going to be blinded by our hatred, blinded by political considerations,” Lanza said. “We’re going to throw not only the baby out with the bathwater, we’re going to throw freedom into the garbage heap.”
“This is a blatantly political act and we should be spending our time worrying about what we should be doing for New Yorkers,” Minority Leader John Flanagan said on Tuesday after word of the imminent Democratic actions began to circulate.
Democrats insisted that the measures did not apply solely to one individual. The double jeopardy changes would apply to all future presidential pardons, and Congress could obtain the tax returns of any New Yorker under investigation.
But they didn’t deny their political motivations.
“The last I heard we were in politics,” Hoylman said. “It’s kind of our job.”
Article originally published on POLITICO Magazine