Gaetz’s and Barr in a scandal

Months before news broke that the feds were investigating him for sex trafficking, Rep. Matt Gaetz was at the center of a separate internal fight at the Justice Department. The sparring match involved an Oval Office meeting, a foul-mouthed threat from the attorney general and voting in Florida. It has not been previously reported.

In Aug. 2018, President Donald Trump nominated Larry Keefe a former law partner of Gaetz’s at the firm Keefe, Anchors & Gordon as U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Florida. More than a year after he was sworn in, and as Joe Biden was locking up the Democratic nomination, Keefe looked to open a wide-ranging probe into voter fraud in Florida, according to two people familiar with the matter.

To open the probe, he needed approval from the Public Integrity Section at the Justice Department’s headquarters. The lawyers there blanched at the statewide scope of Keefe’s proposal, the sources said, and indicated they thought it would be too broad.

Keefe told Gaetz that he was facing resistance from the Public Integrity Section, according to a third person familiar with the situation.

In a phone interview Gaetz described the conversation this way: “Keefe did not share with me any details of any investigative work, nor would he. We were having a broad discussion about legal doctrine related to jurisdiction and venue.”

Specifically, Gaetz said their conversation was about whether U.S. attorneys whose districts included state capital cities could investigate voter fraud in parts of the state outside their districts.

Gaetz described Keefe’s view of the law this way: Since presidential electors are certified in state capital cities, any harm related to their fraudulent certification would be caused there — meaning the U.S. attorneys whose districts included those cities should have the authority to investigate those crimes.

“I got the sense from Keefe that the DOJ wanted U.S. attorneys to be very passive when it came to election integrity,” Gaetz said.

After Keefe and Gaetz discussed the issue, the congressman had a meeting in the Oval Office of the White House with Trump. Gaetz said Trump brought up his views on fraud connected to mail-in voting. In response, Gaetz brought up Keefe’s legal theory.

“I said to him that an appreciation for the Keefe position on venue would give good U.S. attorneys in every capital city the necessary jurisdiction to root out fraud,” Gaetz said. “I also shared with President Trump that Keefe had faced substantial resistance from the Department of Justice.”

Gaetz said that Trump then told White House counsel Pat Cipollone, who was in the room, to tell Attorney General William Barr that Trump believed Keefe’s legal theory had merit.

When Barr learned about Gaetz’s conversation with the president, he was incensed. The attorney general called the U.S. attorney and gave him an earful, according to two people familiar with the call.

“If I ever hear of you talking to Gaetz or any other congressman again about business before the Department, I am going to fucking fire your ass,” Barr told him, according to one of the people with knowledge of the call.

Gaetz said he didn’t know about any testy conversations.

“I am unaware of any discussion Barr had with Keefe, but I did get a message from Keefe subsequent to my meeting in the Oval wherein Keefe said he was not going to be able to discuss these matters with me, and I got the sense that the politics of the Department of Justice were such that they did not want U.S. attorneys looking for election fraud in this type of very proactive way.”

Barr declined to comment for this story. A spokesperson for Trump also declined to comment. A DOJ spokesperson declined to comment.

Trump won Florida handily in the 2020 race.

Keefe, like almost every other U.S. attorney appointed by Trump, was asked to resign by the Biden administration and left office on Feb. 28. Keefe said in a statement: “It is not appropriate for me to comment on details related to my previous service as a U.S. Attorney. I stand by the decisions I made and the actions I took in honoring and enforcing the laws of this nation during my public service.”

Gaetz is reportedly being investigated for whether he engaged in sex trafficking. He has not been charged with a crime, and no women have publicly accused him of sexual misconduct in the three weeks since the New York Times first reported on the investigation. He has denied any wrongdoing.

At the time of Keefe and Gaetz’s attempted investigation, the issue of voting rights, especially in Florida and other swing states, was a top national political story. Republicans have long raised concerns about voter fraud hurting the legitimacy of elections, even though numerous studies have shown that there are very few actual cases. Voting rights advocates, meanwhile, engaged in a wide-ranging effort to help people convicted of felonies who’d completed their prison sentences register to vote.

A landmark constitutional amendment passed in 2018 restored voting rights to people in this category — some experts have estimated it could have let up to 1.4 million people vote in Florida who couldn’t previously, as ProPublica reported.

However, because of a state law and a court ruling, those people also had to pay any outstanding fines, restitution and fees before being able to vote — what has been called a 21st century poll tax. Former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg offered to help pay down the fees, and Florida’s Republican attorney general asked the FBI to investigate if the move broke any voting laws.

Matt Gaetz’s girlfriend speaks about the situation

Matt Gaetz’s former girlfriend has informed her friends that she is worried that the woman who is key to the federal government’s sex crimes investigation tried to get her to incriminate the Florida lawmaker on a recorded call.

There is a possibility that federal prosecutors have two top cooperating witnesses: the woman who was an alleged sex-trafficking victim when she was a minor and the Gaetz associate already indicted for that crime, former Seminole County Tax Collector Joel Greenberg.

Until now, there were signs the alleged sex-trafficking victim was not cooperating with federal authorities. In August, prior to Greenberg’s sex-trafficking indictment, Greenberg said in a WhatsApp chat with another friend that he was paying for her attorney at the time and that she was resistant to cooperating with investigators.

Gaetz’s former girlfriend has played a bit role in the unfolding public drama — she is the woman who sent the lawmaker a nude video of her performing a hula hoop dance that he showed to other members of Congress.

However, two of her friends, who declined to be identified publicly because of the sensational nature of the case, said she now suspects she was being set up when the alleged victim and another woman involved in the case called her to discuss the lawmaker in what she fears might have been a recorded conference call. The call took place sometime after Greenberg was indicted for the sex crime in August.

The friends did not provide details about exactly what was discussed, but one recounted that Gaetz’s ex-girlfriend said she was opposed to talking to authorities and is now worried that prosecutors might try to charge her with obstructing justice in order to get to Gaetz.

Tim Jansen, an attorney for Gaetz’s former girlfriend, declined to comment about his client. Greenberg’s lawyer, Fritz Scheller, also declined to talk. Gaetz has strongly denied allegations he engaged in any sex crimes.

The three women on the call were all present on a September 2018 trip to the Bahamas that authorities think may shed light on the allegations against Gaetz.

Also present on that trip: Gaetz and two other Florida Republican political players, former Orlando-area aviation authority member and Gov. Ron DeSantis fundraiser Jason Pirozzolo and former state Rep. Halsey Beshears.

However, the names of the women are being held by POLITICO including his ex-girlfriend, because of the sensitive nature of the case and the allegations that while there, some of the women engaged in prostitution.

As the investigation intensified this winter, Beshears abruptly resigned in January as Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation Secretary — a post that made him the state’s top business regulator — noting he had contracted Covid-19. About that time, federal authorities seized the iPhones of Gaetz and his former girlfriend.

Federal authorities are examining the Bahamas trip to see if it violated the Mann Act, which forbids transporting people across state lines to engage in prostitution. One woman on the trip told POLITICO that no one engaged in prostitution.

The alleged victim in the sex-trafficking case had turned 18 almost nine months before the Bahamas trip. But Gaetz has acknowledged he’s the subject of a federal investigation into whether he had improper involvement with her as a 17-year-old.

A source familiar with the investigation wouldn’t say whether the alleged victim was cooperating with authorities. But when asked if she has been talking for months with the federal government, the source said “100 percent.”

While the alleged sex-trafficking victim is key to the case against Greenberg and the allegations against Gaetz, the lawmaker’s ex-girlfriend could play a pivotal role in the investigation of the trip, as well as other related controversies.

Gaetz was criticized for allegedly showing the hula hoop video to congressional colleagues, and he was also accused of engaging in revenge porn against his former girlfriend. But two of her friends say the woman, in her early 20s, did not object to him showing it to friends — provided he didn’t send it to others or post it on social media — because she was proud of her appearance and performance.

“This is the best I will ever look in my life,” a friend who saw the video recalled her saying. “That’s how she is. It’s not revenge porn.”

The former girlfriend first met Gaetz while she attended college in the Orlando area in 2017. Greenberg, who established contact with her on the SeekingArrangement website — a dating website that connects women with so-called sugar daddies — made the connection. Soon after, she began dating Gaetz, although the relationship was not exclusive, friends said.

Gaetz later got her a job interning in the office of another Republican member of Congress, but that member let her go when it was discovered she was a Democrat, according to Democratic Rep. Darren Soto of Orlando, who promptly hired her when Gaetz told him of the matter.

Soto, who is not involved in the investigation, would not name the Republican lawmaker or comment about the case. But he said the woman was a hard worker in his office and that he had no complaints about her, other than some inquiries about whether Gaetz’s relationship with the intern was inappropriate.

“We wanted to protect her privacy from the media. She was just an intern,” Soto said. “I’ll also say she was fired by a Republican for being a Democrat. I found it offensive that she was fired for her political beliefs.”

Gaetz and the ex-girlfriend continued to date until well after the Bahamas trip in 2018. Friends said the two remained on good terms, although she was a source of friction between the lawmaker and Beshears. Beshears had apparently been taking her out on dates in Tallahassee, including a trip to the Florida State University president’s skybox at Doak Campbell Stadium, mutual friends said.

At the time, Beshears had recently been left by another girlfriend after she learned about the Bahamas trip. Beshears, then a state legislator, had flown several of the women on his private plane, which was briefly detained by U.S. Customs upon its return to Florida for questioning about the ages of several of the young women on the trip.

“Here was Halsey with three young women who could have been his daughters, and a Customs agent was like, ‘Whoa, what’s going on here?‘” said a source who was familiar with the incident.

Speaking to the partying group and the drama surrounding them, a different mutual friend said: “Tallahassee is like high school. But no one ever graduates.”

Boehner claims Matt Gaetz should resign if indicated

John Boehner is the former House Speaker. He told USA TODAY that embattled Rep. Matt Gaetz should resign if he is indicted.

Furthermore, Mr. Boehner said if the Florida congressman, Matt Gaetz refuses, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy should move to expel him from the House.

“When a member gets in trouble, it splashes back on all the members,” John Boehner said in an interview about his memoir, “On the House,” which is being published Tuesday by St. Martin’s Press.

“Members are innocent until proven guilty,” he said, but then repeated the policy he followed during eight years as the leader of House Republicans: “If there’s an indictment, that was a clear line members were going to step down.”

Federal law-enforcement officials are investigating Gaetz on allegations of sex trafficking involving accusations that he had sex with an underage girl, then 17, and paid for her to travel with him. Gaetz has not been charged with a crime.

He has denied any wrongdoing and argued that he is the victim of a complicated extortion scheme. An outspoken ally of former President Donald Trump, Gaetz also has accused the news media of waging a partisan campaign against him.

One of Gaetz’s associates, Joel Greenberg, is negotiating a plea deal with prosecutors.

On eight or 10 occasions, Boehner said, he called in congressional Republicans enmeshed in scandals.

“Is there more to this?” he would ask. “Yes? All right, you’ve got one hour to resign, or I’m going to go to the floor and move to throw you out.’

He said all the members who received that warning chose to resign.

“When you’re the leader, you’ve got a responsibility to the institution to be rid of these people, if in fact, they’ve done things that are going to bring disrepute on the House,” Boehner said.

On Thursday, Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger became the first sitting member of Congress to call for Gaetz to resign.

Investigation into Gaetz scandal launched by House Ethics Committee

On Friday The House Ethics Committee had said that it dispatched an examination concerning Rep. Matt Gaetz. The troubled Florida Republican, Matt Gaetz who was already facing a federal criminal sex-trafficking probe.

In articulation, the morals panel said it knows about open charges that Gaetz “may have engaged in sexual misconduct and/or illicit drug use.”

The board likewise noticed that Matt Gaetz is affirmed to have “shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor, misused state identification records, converted campaign funds to personal use, and/or accepted a bribe, improper gratuity, or impermissible gift, in violation of House Rules, laws, or other standards of conduct.”

The 38 year old Florida Republican energetically kept bad behavior since the Department from getting Justice’s examination originally became visible a week ago. He has not been accused of wrongdoing.

Matt Gaetz’s office told CNBC in response to the new ethics probe that; “Once again, the office will reiterate, these allegations are blatantly false and have not been validated by a single human being willing to put their name behind them.”

The Democrat-led morals board additionally uncovered Friday that it has started a test into Rep. Tom Reed, R-N.Y., referring to claims of a conceivable sexual offense. On March 2021, Reed apologized to a woman who accused him of rubbing her back and unhooking her bra at a Minneapolis bar in 2017. Reed said he would not seek reelection in 2022.

Even though Reed’s office did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment, they addressed Politico regarding the matter.

“We have already publicly addressed this situation and consistent with that are cooperating with the House Ethics Committee to bring this matter to conclusion.”

Federal investigators are looking into whether Gaetz had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl and paid for her travels with him.

That test purportedly outgrew an examination concerning Gaetz’s partner Joel Greenberg, a previous area charge gatherer in Florida who is dealing with criminal indictments including sex trafficking of a minor, stalking, wire fraud, and identity theft.

Greenberg, a former county tax collector in Florida who is facing criminal charges including sex trafficking of a minor, stalking, wire fraud, and identity theft. However, he pleases not guilty of the charges.

In addition to that Mr. Greenberg’s lawyer and the prosecutors in his case told a judge Thursday that Greenberg is expected to strike a plea deal.

On Wednesday, NBC reported that the investigators are looking at whether women were paid to travel to the Bahamas with Gaetz for sex and whether Gaetz and Greenberg used the internet to look up women they could pay for sex.

Fritz Scheller, Greenberg’s attorney said on Thursday afternoon that “I’m sure Matt Gaetz is not feeling very comfortable today,”.

Matt Gaetz declared this week he is “absolutely not resigning” from Congress. A staunch supporter of former President Donald Trump, Gaetz has retained Marc Mukasey, a defense lawyer representing the Trump Organization, to represent him.

DeSantis 60 minute scandal related to COVID-19 vaccine?

DeSantis ’60 minute’ scandal has taken over the internet.

A ’60 minute’ report suggests Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida had made a deal to distribute the coronavirus vaccination with Publix Super Market’s pharmacies. Apparently, Governor Ron distributed COVID-19 vaccinations in the South Florida county at Publix Super Market because the company made a donation to his political committee.

On Sunday night, Governor Ron DeSantis warned of unspecified ‘consequences’.

The report focused on the vaccine rollout in Palm Beach County and also suggested Florida’s vaccine distribution had generally favored the wealthy and well-connected.

“These are smear merchants,” DeSantis said during a news conference in Panama City. “They knew what they were doing was a lie.”

The governor said his office had offered people to be interviewed about Florida’s vaccine rollout for the report but the news show declined. He called the “pay-to-play” allegations in the report, “lies built on lies.”

In a statement, CBS said that “60 Minutes” interviewed dozens of people about the story and requested interviews with DeSantis, who declined, and Florida Division of Emergency Management Director Jared Moskowitz, who declined to be interviewed on camera until after the story’s deadline.

“When Florida state data revealed people of color were vaccinated at a much lower rate than their wealthier neighbors, ‘60 Minutes’ reported the facts surrounding the vaccine’s rollout, which is controlled by the governor,” the CBS statement said. “For over 50 years, the facts reported by ‘60 Minutes’ have often stirred debate and prompted strong reactions. Our story Sunday night speaks for itself.”

On Monday, Palm Beach County Mayor Dave Kerner, a Democrat, issued a statement that accused “60 Minutes” of using “intentionally false” information in its criticism of DeSantis’ role in the Publix deal. Kerner said DeSantis had met with him and the county administrator before the announcement, and they had asked DeSantis to “expand the state’s partnership with Publix” to the county.

“They had that information, and they left it out because it kneecaps their narrative,” Kerner said of “60 Minutes.” Responding to the mayor’s statement, Palm Beach County Commissioner Melissa McKinlay said in a tweet, “I respect Mayor but this is NOT accurate.” She said county officials never asked that Publix be the sole distributor of the vaccines.

The state announced in January that Publix, the state’s largest supermarket chain, would have sole vaccine distribution rights in Palm Beach County –- a decision that drew criticism from McKinlay and some state legislators because the chain has no outlets within 25 miles (40 kilometers) of the mostly Black, poverty-stricken sugar farming communities in a rural corner of the county that abuts Lake Okeechobee.

Almost 30,000 people live in Belle Glade and other nearby towns, including about 5,000 residents over 65. McKinlay told The Associated Press and other media outlets at the time that she wasn’t opposed to Publix’s involvement in the distribution effort. She just wanted to make sure Belle Glade residents would have easy access to the vaccine, too.

Within a few days, the state said it would set up a drive-up stand in Belle Glade, just as it had done in numerous wealthier communities across the state.

About 17% of Florida residents are Black, but they make up only 6.5% of the 6.4 million who have received at least one vaccine shot, according to the state. Some of that mirrors a national reluctance among some Black communities to get the vaccine because of past incidents like the Tuskegee Syphilis Study where their ancestors were experimented on by doctors.

The “60 Minutes” report said that weeks before the state announced its partnership with Publix, the supermarket chain donated $100,000 to DeSantis’ political action committee.

Moskowitz, though, said last month that Publix was picked because its pharmacies were the only ones at the time who were able to execute the vaccine distribution. Since then, other major pharmacy chains have been offering vaccines.

Behind the split of Governor Cuomo and Sandra Lee

Cuomo and Sandra Lee split up after 14 years together amid Cuomo’s scandals.

According to the Insider, “Sandra’s gone silent and her silence is deafening,”. “The question is, is Sandra being silent out of grace and dignity, or is she being silenced out of fear of retaliation?” Lee did not comment.

Cuomo told The Post: “Any suggestion that I had a sexual relationship with any member of my staff or that I was unfaithful to Sandy is false.”

Apparently, Lee was kept at arms-length while Cuomo spent time with favored colleagues around the clock – staffers said. The allegations put forward by Cuomo’s staff of improper flirting, touching, and comments going back 21 years have raised questions about whether Cuomo was faithful during his relationship with Lee.

However, investigations are still going on into whether Cuomo sexually harassed staffers in and around the workplace.

“Andrew is toxic. There’s obviously a reason why Sandra moved to California — she literally could not have moved farther away from Andrew. She’s on the edge of the Pacific,” the insider added.

Sources told The Post how Cuomo threw boozy parties at the pool house in the governor’s mansion and “movie nights” attended by female staffers, all without Lee, who often traveled to the West Coast to care for her family.

Five former Cuomo staffers told The Post they are convinced he became involved, or pursued intimate relationships, with a small number of staffers while living with Lee.

“It was an open secret,” said one ex-aide. “Andrew was sleeping with at least one other woman who wasn’t Sandra” before they officially ended their relationship.

A second former staffer told how State Troopers who came to pick up Cuomo one morning at the home Cuomo and Lee shared in Mount Kisco, Westchester, were stunned to see him leave the house with a staffer. Asked if it was possible they had been working, the former staffer said it was doubtful: “There was no reason for this woman to be there so early.”

Cuomo, through a spokesman, denied any staffer ever spent the night at the Mount Kisco house, saying that occasionally staffers would meet him at the house in the morning so they could join his entourage for a ride to an event or meeting.

Staffers also raised questions about Cuomo’s travel arrangements. When Cuomo traveled to Jerusalem in March 2017, a third former staffer claimed the governor and a female staffer were booked into linked, adjoining rooms. Although this could have been entirely innocent, the source said suspicions were raised when official logs were changed to show a State Police officer staying in the adjacent room.

Cuomo claims this was accidental.

“On trips, as a rule, only State Police security or advance staff were assigned to adjoining rooms with the governor — when I saw that the hotel had made a room assignment not keeping with that rule, I switched rooms so that I was in the adjoining room and the other staff person was moved across the hall,” said Steve Cannon, who was the lead advance person on March 2017 Israel trip.

Cuomo denied any liaisons during the Israel trip, and his spokesman provided a busy travel itinerary that showed Cuomo had almost no free time.

“There was no sleep over on this trip — according to our records, after meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the governor and the state delegation arrived back at the hotel around 8.15pm, the governor then had dinner with prominent media officials in the lobby before departing for the airport at 9.45pm,” Cuomo spokesman Richard Azzopardi said.

It wasn’t just geographical distance that may have pushed Lee and Cuomo apart. During the relationship, former staffers described how Cuomo would tell his office not to let Lee know where he was as he enjoyed drinks late at night at Docks, a seafood restaurant in the same building as the governor’s Midtown office, with senior female staff. After entering through a back door leading from the office building to a private room, Cuomo would hold court, according to the former staffers.

Gaetz career is over? – Matt’s sex scandal threatens his career

Gaetz’s rising scandal may be the reason for the end of his political career even though he refuses to resign from Congress.

On Wednesday, the news that Matt Gaetz may be responsible for a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old surfaced all over the internet. The Florida congressman who was the former president Donald Trump’s most visible advocate now has been tangled in a case that may damage his career. His attempts to explain himself only made the situation more confusing and less weighted on his end. The investigation regarding these accusations is now underway.

The Justice Department is reportedly investigating payments Gaetz and an indicted Florida politician, former Seminole County tax collector Joel Greenberg, made to women allegedly recruited online for sex. The investigation is also looking into whether Gaetz had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl.

According to the Times, the investigation in question is centered around the recruitment of women for sex, and the FBI has questioned multiple women in an attempt to stitch together the nature of Gaetz’s involvement. The Times reviewed Cash App and Apple Pay receipts that showed payments from both Gaetz and Joel Greenberg, a former Florida official and initial focus of the investigation, to one of the women. People familiar with the investigation said that in 2019 and 2020 Gaetz and Greenberg would meet women recruited online at various locations, pay them in cash drawn from ATMs, and have sex with them. Some of them took ecstasy, including Gaetz, according to two people familiar with the meet-ups.

While Gaetz told the Journal he has no plans to step down, former Republican Rep. David Jolly of Florida thinks he may not have any other options. “These scandals hit a certain point where there’s no escape,” Jolly, who is no longer a member of the GOP, told the Journal, noting that Florida’s politicians are “assuming” Gaetz’s career is finished. “We’ve clearly hit that point for Matt in politics.”

Furthermore, the 17-year-old Gaetz may have had sex with and “trafficked” by paying for her to cross state lines. The Times reports that a sex-trafficking charge filed against Greenberg in August involves the same girl.

Cuomo asked to resign by Senate Majority leader Andrea

Governor Andrew Cuomo is working on maintaining control amid a sexual harassment scandal. A powerful Democratic leader of the New York State Senate declared on Sunday that the governor should resign “for the good of the state.”

Senate leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Assembly Speaker Carl E questioned the “governor’s ability to continue to lead this state” — suggested that Mr. Cuomo, a third-term Democrat, had lost his party’s support in the State Capitol, and cast doubt on his ability to withstand the political fallout.

In a series of interviews with The Times, Ms. Bennett, 25, said that Mr. Cuomo, 63, had asked her invasive personal questions last spring about her sex life, including whether she had slept with older men, and whether she thought age made a difference in relationships.

Ms. Bennett is one of five women who have come forward in recent days with allegations of sexual harassment or inappropriate behavior against Mr. Cuomo, with one predating his tenure as governor.

Governor Cuomo, however, was adamantly resisting calls for his resignation, arguing he was elected by the people, not “by politicians.”

“I’m not going to resign because of allegations,” the governor said, calling the notion “anti-democratic,” and a violation of the due process clause of the Constitution. “There is no way I resign.”

On Sunday, the Governor made a statement not long after Ms. Stewart-Cousins had informed Mr. Cuomo via a phone call that she was about to call for him to step down, according to a person with knowledge of the conversation; Governor Cuomo then quickly convened his own news conference to pre-empt her announcement.

He told reporters that his remarks were directed at “some legislators who suggest that I resign.”

Later, Ms. Stewart-Cousins fired back, releasing her statement not long after Mr. Cuomo concluded his news conference.

“We need to govern without daily distraction,” said Ms. Stewart-Cousins, citing the allegations of sexual harassment and a “toxic work environment,” and his handling of the state’s nursing homes during the pandemic. “Governor Cuomo must resign.”

Ms. Stewart-Cousins is the most prominent New York State official to call for Governor Andrew Cuomo’s resignation, and her statement carries significance: Her Senate would be the jury for any impeachment trial of the governor, if such an action were passed by the Assembly.

It also carries symbolic weight: In 2008, when Governor Eliot Spitzer resigned during a prostitution scandal, his decision was partially precipitated by a loss of support from Albany’s legislative leaders.

Mr. Heastie did not call for Mr. Cuomo to resign, but suggested that it was time for him “to seriously consider whether he can effectively meet the needs of the people of New York.”

On Sunday, the governor reiterated his message to New Yorkers that they should withhold judgment until an inquiry overseen by the state attorney general, Letitia James, could examine the allegations, a process that could stretch on for months.

Governor Cuomo also suggested some of the claims lacked credibility, taking particular issue on Sunday with an account in The Post concerning Karen Hinton, a former aide who was working as a paid consultant for Governor Cuomo when he was United States secretary for housing and urban development. Ms. Hinton told The Post that in 2000, the governor summoned her to a hotel room and gave her an unsolicited “intimate embrace.” She said he attempted another, which she said she resisted.

Governor Cuomo rejected this account as a lie.

“Every woman has a right to come forward. That’s true. But the truth also matters. What she said is not true,” Governor Cuomo said of Ms. Hinton. “She has been a longtime political adversary of mine.”

Ms. Hinton said in a statement to The Times on Sunday that “truth is the ‘longtime adversary’ that Cuomo fears the most.”

“Trump may be gone, but Cuomo has stepped right into his shoes by blaming the abused for his own abusive behavior,” she added.

He said those seeking his resignation, including some Democratic lawmakers in Albany and Representative Kathleen Rice, a Long Island Democrat, before a full investigation had been completed were doing so for political reasons.

“I have a news flash for you: There is politics in politics,” Governor Cuomo said, laughing a little at his own joke, saying he had political differences with those saying he should resign. “They don’t override the people’s will. They don’t override elections.”

However, the scrutiny over Governor Cuomo’s behavior and a separate firestorm over his top aides concealing data on nursing home deaths in the pandemic has already altered the balance of power in New York, loosening Governor Cuomo’s once firm grip on state governance.

Governor Cuomo said he would sign the Legislature’s measure limiting his own powers. Lawmakers will now have the ability to review and comment on any changes to pandemic guidance such as his decision, which he announced on Sunday, to increase restaurant capacity outside of New York City to 75 percent.

The second account that emerged on Saturday night came from Ana Liss, a former aide who told The Wall Street Journal that the governor had made her uncomfortable by asking her questions about her romantic life and kissing her on the hand. On Sunday, Ms. Liss said on Twitter she shared her story because she believed it “may help bolster those shared by other women.”

“This is just ‘how things are’ for women in Albany, in politics, in any high-pressure workplace,” she wrote. “I think we deserve better.”

Governor Cuomo said that exchange was consistent with his general comportment with his staff.

“I say to people in the office, ‘How are you doing? How’s everything? Are you going out? Are you dating?’” Governor Cuomo said when asked of Ms. Liss’s accusations. “That’s my way of doing friendly banter.”

Ms. Bennett said the governor had complained to her of being lonely and wanting a girlfriend in Albany, and said he “was fine” with being involved with women in their 20s, statements she took as clear indications of a sexual overture.

“I understood that the governor wanted to sleep with me,” Ms. Bennett told The Times. “And felt horribly uncomfortable and scared.”

Governor Cuomo did not deny asking personal questions of Ms. Bennett and others, but has tried, repeatedly, to argue that he was not making advances, and that some of his statements may have been misconstrued.

“I never knew at the time that I was making anyone feel uncomfortable,” he said at a news conference on Wednesday. “I certainly never, ever meant to offend anyone or hurt anyone or cause anyone any pain. That is the last thing I would ever want to do.”

Ms. Bennett’s allegations closely followed an account by another former aide, Lindsey Boylan, a former top economic development official in the Cuomo administration, who said that the governor had once invited her to play “strip poker” and given her an unwanted kiss on the lips in his Manhattan office in 2018. Governor Cuomo has flatly denied these accusations.

Mr. Cuomo has seemingly expressed the most contrition about Ms. Bennett’s claims — which she repeated during two nights of interviews on CBS last week — including apologizing last week to “the young woman who worked here who said that I made her feel uncomfortable.” On Sunday, Mr. Cuomo repeated his assertion that he “was never aware at the time that Ms. Bennett felt uncomfortable.”

Shortly after her encounter with the governor, Ms. Bennett reported his actions last June to the governor’s chief of staff, Jill DesRosiers, and had quickly been transferred to another job, with an office farther from Mr. Cuomo. Ms. Bennett also told a special counsel to the governor, Judith Mogul, about her experiences, before deciding she did not want to pursue an investigation.

Ms. Bennett said she made it clear to Ms. Mogul that she believed the governor was grooming her for sex, but also that she feared retaliation for reporting his behavior. In a statement on Friday, Ms. Mogul said she had “acted consistent with the information provided, the requirements of the law, and Charlotte’s wishes.”

Last week, Ms. James ordered Ms. Mogul and others in the Cuomo administration to safeguard any records related to the pending investigation. The inquiry could focus on both the individual claim as well as the state’s response.

Ms. James is said to be close to choosing an outside law firm to conduct the investigation of Mr. Cuomo. A source with knowledge of her thinking said that Ms. James was committed to continuing her investigation, regardless of what action the governor takes.

Until that report is issued, however, Governor Cuomo says he wants to “do my job.”

“This is not about me, and accusations about me,” he said. “The attorney general can handle that.”

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