A former aide accusing ex-gov Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment has decided to drop her federal lawsuit, just days before she was due to give a marathon deposition.
Charlotte Bennett announced that she had voluntarily withdrawn her lawsuit against Cuomo late Monday and claimed the former executive had used “unlimited” taxpayer funds meant for his defense to attack her to the point that she felt she’d be “better off dead than endure more of his litigation abuse.”
“Andrew Cuomo is going to claim this as some kind of victory, which should be viewed, of course, as pathetic,” said Erica Vladimer, co founder of the Sexual Harassment Working Group. “Instead, New Yorkers will see him for what he is: an abusive, empty pit of a man who wasted $25 million of taxpayer money to cover up his own mistakes.”
Just days ago, The Post reported that Cuomo had sought a gag order to prevent Bennett’s from publicly discussing the $28 million in taxpayer funds paid out to defend him and others related to his cases, moneythat the former governor is legally entitled to.
Cuomo’s lawyers hailed the withdrawal, and called Bennett’s accusations “baseless.”
“Ms. Bennett’s decision to drop her baseless lawsuit should be viewed as a complete capitulation and a desperate attempt to avoid being confronted with the mountains of exculpatory discovery– including contemporaneous texts and videos that the AG’s office never obtained– that completely refute her claims against Governor Cuomo,” said Cuomo lawyers Rita Glavin and Theresa Trzaskoma in a statement.
“If New York State does give in to her public pressure campaign and settles,” the attorneys added, “it will not be on the merits and should require the public release of all the evidence so that New Yorkers finally know the truth: Governor Cuomo never sexually harassed anyone.”
Back in Febuary 2021, Bennett, then 25, was the second woman to publically accuse the former gov of sexual harassment, claiming that Cuomo would ask invasive sexual questions — including if she had a penchant for intimacy with older men.
She filed her federal complaint in September 2022 and included allegations that Cuomo “subjected her to sexualized comments about her appearance, assigned her humiliating and demeaning tasks, and beginning in early June 2020, subjected her to invasive and unwanted questions about her personal life, romantic and sexual relationships, and history as a survivor of sexual assault.”
“He told her he was ‘lonely,’” wanted a girlfriend who lived in Albany, and was willing to date someone over the age of 21 years old,” the suit claimed.
Bennett had stood out as one of the most vocal accusers against Cuomo, a point his supporters were quick to highlight.
“After falsely smearing Governor Cuomo for years, Ms. Bennett suddenly withdrew her federal lawsuit on the eve of her deposition to avoid having to admit under oath that her allegations were false and her claims had no merit,” Cuomo’s attorneys said.
On Monday, Vladimir additionally called for state comptroller Thomas DiNapoli to “audit Cuomo’s unreasonable use of public dollars,” echoing her claims that public money enables “state-sanctioned harassment” of Cuomo’s accusors.
“New York State cannot claim to support survivors when it fully enables the kind of ‘lawfare’ Cuomo is waging against his victims,” Vladimir said.