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Carter Peterson would be the first Black woman to represent Louisiana in Congress if elected

Though Richmond did not endorse her, she noted that she has a long relationship with him. She said her opponent may have golfed with Richmond, but she fished with him.

Carter Peterson chaired the Louisiana Democratic Party for eight years, ending her term in 2020. She also served as vice chair of civic engagement and voter protection at the Democratic National Committee, where she developed relationships with national party leaders.

Her backers included Georgia voting rights advocate Stacey Abrams, Higher Heights for America PAC, which supports progressive Black women, and EMILYs List, which backs Democratic women committed to protecting abortion rights.

Women Vote, the independent expenditure arm of EMILYs List, spent $599,000 on media and mailings supporting Peterson and opposing Carter, according to disclosures with the FEC. American Jobs and Growth PAC, a conservative Republican super PAC, spent $84,000 on digital ads opposing Peterson.

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Runoff will pick the Democrat to replace Cedric Richmond in Louisiana's 2nd District - Roll Call

With backers of the recall against Gavin Newsom formally submitting the last of their petitions Wednesday, Democrats from California to Washington were readying what they hope will be a united front to keep the embattled governor in office.

Newsoms campaign is trying to keep the party focused on fighting the recall and preventing prominent Democrats from getting into the race to replace him if it qualifies for the ballot as expected. He has racked up high-profile endorsements from Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), among others, and hopes to tie the recall campaign to former President Trump and extremist groups.

The governor went on a national media tour this week, speaking out against the recall and generating both cheers from supporters and some controversy.

Nathan Click, Newsoms campaign spokesman, said he expected heavy support to fight the recall at the Democratic Party State Convention, scheduled for the end of April. Volunteers will spread out across the state to do text banking and other digital stumping in the upcoming weeks, he said.

Its been a steady drumbeat over the last few weeks of Democrats saying that [they support Newsom], Click said.

But its still unclear whether any Democrats will enter the race to replace Newsom as an insurance policy against the growing field of Republican candidates, something that happened during the 2003 recall that ended with voters ousting Democrat Gray Davis and replacing him with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

To secure the full strength of the Democrats support, Newsom may need to put in some work to court members of his own party.

While Democrats are united in keeping a Trump Republican out of the governors mansion, progressive caucus chair Amar Singh Shergill said some more left-leaning party members are waiting to see Newsom deliver on progressive policy promises such as a universal healthcare bill making its way through the state Legislature, a fracking ban and support for eliminating the filibuster in the U.S. Senate.

If Gov. Newsom doesnt get on board with these progressive issues and fight for them, then hes going to put his own candidacy at risk. Right now, were not looking at any other candidates, but we know theres a simple formula for him to win, Shergill said. He has got to start fighting for those issues and show us that he is making progress.

Though the state wont finish certifying the signatures for several weeks elections officials must determine how many are valid by April 29 Newsom acknowledged Tuesday that he expects the recall effort to qualify.

Recall supporters said Wednesday night that they gathered more than 2.1 million signatures, more than the roughly 1.5 million they need for an election to take place. Volunteers handed in last-minute petitions to the registrar Wednesday as the campaigns leaders celebrated the years-long effort.

Later this fall, the voters of California will be able to participate in this historic, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to participate in a recall of their chief executive officer, said Randy Economy, senior advisor for the recall effort. Its a very, very powerful moment.

On Tuesday, former GOP Rep. Doug Ose added his name to the list of other Republicans in the race to replace Newsom should the recall qualify for the ballot, including former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer and businessman John Cox, who unsuccessfully ran against Newsom for governor in 2018.

As the recall campaign neared Wednesdays deadline, Newsoms supporters united behind him in defense of his record as governor.

Im completely devastated with the fact that people have even gone out to try to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom, said Taisha Brown, chairperson of the California Democratic Partys Black Caucus. He has done some amazing work in the short time hes been in office. We wholeheartedly support Gavin, and will be working to fight back against the recall.

Brown applauded Newsoms handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, though she said he didnt always have the right tools from the federal government under Trump. She and Norma Alcala, vice chair of the Chicano Latino Caucus, praised Newsoms efforts to provide rent, food security and vaccines to essential workers, many of whom are people of color. They also pointed to Newsoms several appointments of Black and Latino people to statewide positions as another success.

Both caucuses have pledged to use their various campaign methods including radio ads, counterprotests and caravans to campaign for the governor.

Its basically just an attempt by the Republicans they cant win any elections, so theyre going to try and do a special election, Alcala said of the recall effort.

The California Democratic Party has pledged $250,000 to the campaign against the recall and launched a website, stoptherepublicanrecall.com, that Newsom promoted in a tweet on Monday when making his most direct comments yet about his fight against the effort. Other Democrats echoed Newsoms comments in condemning recall organizers as anti-vaxxers, QAnon conspiracy theorists and nationally funded Republicans.

This was something that was done under the Republican Administration under the thumb of the Trump followers, said Mark Gonzalez, chair of the Los Angeles County Democratic Party. Republicans knew they were losing their power nationally, and theyre trying to trickle it down here to California, and now here under this administration.

Recall advocates have maintained that one-third of petition signers are not Republicans, though polling shows the effort is far more popular among those in the GOP than Democrats or unaffiliated voters. Gonzalez said he believes Republicans were duping Democratic voters who signed the petitions into blaming Newsom for their situation during the pandemic.

The governors handling of the pandemic remains a banner issue for recall advocates. Democratic leaders across the state are hopeful that by the time a recall election rolls around, likely in the fall, coronavirus cases will be down and the economy will be in better shape. California has already delivered more than 13 million vaccine doses, and the federal relief package just passed by Congress will help peoples wallets and bolster state and local budgets.

Some in the California Democratic Party, including rural caucus chair Joy Sterling, said the recall is distracting state leadership from what should be its singular focus: tackling the pandemic.

Did he do everything perfectly? Did anybody do everything perfectly? No. Including my hero, Dr. [Anthony] Fauci, Sterling said. I think you just have to be, Oh, OK, that didnt work, now we try this.

Though Newsoms supporters believe his record will stand up to attacks from the recall campaign, they are also keeping close watch on any errors that could alienate voters in a race where he needs all the support he can get.

In the eyes of some Democrats, Newsom stumbled Monday when he told MSNBCs Joy Reid that, should California Sen. Dianne Feinstein retire, he would appoint a Black woman to replace her, noting that he already had a list of several Black women whom he would consider. Newsom came under pressure late last year to fill Vice President Kamala Harris seat with a Black woman, but instead appointed then-Secretary of State Alex Padilla, Californias first Latino senator.

Feinstein reiterated that she had no plans to retire and Newsom downplayed his statement the next day but not before riling up some members of the state Democratic Party Womens Caucus, who voiced their frustrations to chair Christine Pelosi that Newsoms theorizing about the senators replacement before she left office was not a good way to start the anti-recall campaign.

I would hope that they remember there are a lot of women who vote in the recall, and its not a very good look to pit women together to save the job of a man, Pelosi said of those organizing Newsoms campaign.

Pelosi agreed that stopping a Republican from getting into office isnt enough to galvanize voters, adding that grassroots organizers want to hear from the governor directly about what his message will be.

Dont just assume that because were Democrats and were Democratic delegates that you dont have to ask us, she said. If you dont respect us, dont expect us.

Staff writer John Myers contributed to this report.

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Democrats show united front to keep Gov. Gavin Newsom in office - Los Angeles Times

While were young, Chuck. Photo: Kevin Dietsch-Pool/Getty Images

Joe Biden isnt going to have an FDR-size presidency.

Or, at least, the odds that Biden will fundamentally transform the role of the state in the U.S. economy, more than double Americas union membership rate, lead the U.S. to victory in a world war, reinforce residential segregation, put tens of thousands of U.S. citizens into internment camps on the basis of their ethnicity, or enact similarly epochal changes to American life over the course of 12 years in office are very low. And his prospects for equaling LBJs feats of welfare-state expansion, civil-rights promotion, and crimes against humanity are similarly dim.

But size isnt everything. And Scranton Joe has a real shot at assembling the most progressive domestic legacy of any president who didnt put Americans in concentration camps or incinerate foreign civilians by the hundreds of thousands.

Which is kind of remarkable. As I noted last week, once it became clear that Democrats would have only a bare majority in the U.S. Senate and thus that a moderate from a deep-red state would have veto power over the partys agenda most observers assumed Biden would need to shelve his campaign platform in favor of bipartisan half-measures.

But the difference between a 49-member Senate Democratic Caucus and a 50-member one has proven far larger than anticipated. The Democrats triumph in the Georgia runoffs didnt merely secure Biden the power to appoint a Cabinet without Mitch McConnells permission; it cleared the way for a $1.9 trillion stimulus package that will cut child poverty in half, deliver thousands of dollars to every non-rich family in the country, rescue union pension plans, transform state-level fiscal politics, turbocharge economic growth, and potentially remake the conventional wisdom about macroeconomic policy in the U.S. for a generation.

The American Rescue Plans vast scope and high price tag did make some moderate Democrats nervous, but the American publics response to its passage has likely mitigated their concerns. A core tenet of contemporary political science and one lesson of Congress members own recent experience is that the American people do not take kindly to sweeping policy change. Public opinion tends to be thermostatic, growing more liberal when a Republican president enacts right-wing reforms and more conservative when a Democratic president enacts left-wing policies. A large majority of Americans believed the government had a responsibility to make sure everyone had health-care coverage until Barack Obama tried to honor that responsibility in 2009. And when Donald Trump attempted to undo his Democratic predecessors handiwork, Americans decided that socialized medicine was great again.

But Bidens COVID-relief bill has triggered no such backlash. Recent polls from CBS News and Morning Consult found that more than 70 percent of Americans approve of the legislation. In the latter survey, 44 percent of Republican voters endorsed the law, despite the congressional GOP voting unanimously against it. Some centrist Democrats wanted Biden to settle for a smaller stimulus for the sake of securing bipartisan buy-in. But the American Rescue Plans extraordinary popularity has enabled Democrats to have their Bernie Sanderssize fiscal policy and Republican validation, too, as multiple GOP lawmakers who voted against the package have taken to pretending they voted for it, thereby tacitly vouching for Bidens bona fides as a bipartisan dealmaker.

For once, an exercise of liberal ambition has provoked hand-wringing from Republicans instead of Democrats. As Politico reports:

The overwhelming sentiment within the Republican Party is that voters will turn on the $1.9 trillion bill over time. But that wait-and-see approach has baffled some GOP luminaries and Trump World figures who expected Republicans to seize their first opportunity to cast newly-in-charge Democrats as out of control. Instead, they fear the party did little to dent Bidens major victory a victory that could embolden the administration in forthcoming legislative fights and even the lead-up to the midterm elections.

The article features some quotes from conservative ideologues and/or grifters who are certain a different messaging strategy could have persuaded the median voter to dislike a bill that gave their family thousands of dollars. But other GOP consultants offer a more clear-eyed perspective on the partys problem. The basic issue is that fearmongering about Democratic fiscal profligacy just doesnt capture the bases imagination as it used to. There are several plausible explanations for this. By passing multi-trillion-dollar, deficit-financed tax cuts and relief packages under Trump, Republicans may have persuaded their own voters that Keynesian stimulus and Stalinism are actually different things. But it also seems as though conservative media has a harder time casting liberal economic initiatives as covert attacks on American values now that the Democrat in the White House is a (very) old white guy. Ultimately, conservative media will always put its own financial interests above the GOPs strategic ones. And libertarian critiques of the child tax credit just dont rate as well as the martyrdom of Dr. Seuss. As one Republican strategist told Politico, Whenever there is something that goes into pop culture, and now all this cancel-culture stuff, it is catnip for the base and the media, and Republicans are going to talk about that.

Centrist deficit hawks have been caught similarly flat-footed. For decades, the Beltways advocates for austerity could count on the Federal Reserve to tell the public that their profoundly political, empirically tendentious views were objective facts: The national debt was an unsustainable burden on Americas grandchildren, Social Security was going bankrupt, runaway inflation was near at hand, etc. But this is no longer the case. Instead of coercing the Democratic president into budget balancing with the threat of interest-rate hikes as Alan Greenspan did to Bill Clinton in the 1990s Fed chair Jerome Powell has served as a cheerleader for Bidens expansionary fiscal policy. And unable to sanctify their agenda by appealing to the Feds papal authority, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has struggled to explain why an entirely hypothetical future debt crisis should take precedence over minimizing current poverty and unemployment.

All of which is to say: Biden is strong, and the enemies of progressive economic policy are weak. Meanwhile, Americas vaccine rollout is proceeding apace, and Wall Street analysts expect the U.S. will enjoy a higher rate of economic growth this year than it has experienced since 1984 a development that should fortify the presidents political standing and business elites complacency about the deficit.

Put all these factors together and you get an exceptionally favorable environment for securing durable progressive change. Amid a post-pandemic boom, Democrats will face few political headwinds to making the temporary (de facto) child allowance in Bidens relief permanent. And much the same can be said for the laws increases to Affordable Care Act subsidies. Progressives will push for a strong public option, as well they should. But as Dean Baker notes, merely making the higher ACA subsidies permanent could be enough to unravel the employer-provided health-insurance system, which would itself erode a major obstacle to more thoroughgoing health reforms. Making the ARPs emergency rental-assistance benefits and its funding increase for K12 education into permanent budget items would be similarly transformative.

There is much else that Democrats can and should do with their tenuous grip on power. Most pressingly, the party must redress the gross underrepresentation of its constituents in Congress by banning partisan redistricting and granting statehood to D.C. and any other U.S. territory that wants it. And it must breathe new life into the countrys beleaguered labor movement, whose decline has been a disaster for both the Democratic Partys electoral fortunes and working peoples financial well-being.

But those reforms cant be advanced through budget reconciliation, which means they cant be enacted until the legislative filibuster is eroded. Whether Chuck Schumers moderates can be persuaded to meaningfully weaken the filibuster remains to be seen. What does seem clear, however, is that they arent prepared to cross that Rubicon until they have given McConnell the opportunity to waste their time.

Which is maddening, but whatever. Joe Manchins gonna Manchin. In the meantime, Democrats can move rapidly to consolidate the relief bills gains. Establishing a permanent monthly child allowance would constitute a historic expansion of the welfare state, one that would spare millions of kids the trauma of poverty every year in perpetuity. And this can be accomplished through a budget-reconciliation bill. Whats more, thanks to the Trump tax cuts, Democrats have a wide array of politically painless pay fors they can use to offset the cost of the child allowance (to make a program permanent through budget reconciliation, it must not add to the deficit after ten years). Merely restoring Obama-era tax rates for corporations and the wealthy would be more than sufficient to meet the child payments roughly $100 billion-a-year cost. Add in a capital-gains-tax hike, a financial-transaction tax, a wealth tax, and various other highly popular affronts to the one percent, and Democrats should be able to make the bulk of the ARPs programs into pillars of a new and improved American welfare state.

This fruit is ripe and low hanging. An irrevocably less cruel American society is right there for the taking. But if Democrats dont act quickly, Bidens chance to secure a not-quite-FDR-size-but-still-pretty-big presidency could disappear in a heartbeat.

Manchin, Jon Tester, and Sherrod Brown are not young men, and all represent red states in which Republican governors have the power to fill Senate vacancies with appointees of their choosing. If either of New Hampshires Democratic senators were forced out of public life by illness, tragedy, or scandal, Republican governor Chris Sununu would pick their successors. Vermonts Republican governor, Phil Scott, would have the power to replace a departed Bernie Sanders or Pat Leahy with a GOP lawmaker for at least six months (Scott has promised to replace them with ideologically similar substitutes, but his sincerity cannot be ensured).

The point is straightforward: Democrats currently have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to entrench a more generous welfare state. But that opportunity could quite literally expire at any moment. Thus, the party needs to stop pretending that ten Senate Republicans may be willing to support a $4 trillion infrastructure package that raises taxes on the rich and instead develop a reconciliation bill that combines green infrastructure spending with permanent versions of the ARPs best features as quickly as possible and get Bidens legacy into the law books before its too late.

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Democrats Need to Move Fast and Fix Things - New York Magazine

Were not fans. Were grown folks that have the power of our vote, Sharpton said during the launch of Build Back Bolder.

Rev. Al Sharpton spoke during the online launch event for the Build Back Bolder plan and called on Black politicians to commit to making change beyond holding their landmark positions.

Read More: Al Sharpton files for divorce from wife after 17 years of separation

The Los Angeles Times reported the Black to the Future Action Fund released the agenda and garnered the support of Sharpton, the Rev. William Barber II of the Poor Peoples Campaign, LaTosha Brown of Black Voters Matter, Ns Ufot of the New Georgia Project, and Deborah Scott of Georgia STAND UP. Build Back Bolder is a Black mandate issued to the history-making President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris administration.

We did not put you there for symbolism. We are past the Jackie Robinson days, Sharpton said during the online launch for Build Back Bolder, according to the LA Times. We dont want a Black in the game. We want to win the game.

What weve learned is that we only are going to get what we fight for, he continued. And even though some [politicians] may be better mannered, it does not mean that theyre going to do what is right for our agenda. Were not fans. Were grown folks that have the power of our vote.

Reverend Al Sharpton speaks during the Juneteenth celebration in the Greenwood District on June 19, 2020 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. (Photo by Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images)

Alicia Garza, Principal at Black to the Future Action Fund, worked closely on the project.

America has consistently failed to deliver on its promise to Black communities, Garza said, according to the Times. But when we are focused, when we are organized, when we are determined, Black America has been successful in delivering on our promise to not rest until freedom comes. We pushed the Biden-Harris campaign to victory, not for them, but for us, because we cant wait any longer.

Build Back Bolder recommends that in the first 100 days, the Biden-Harris White House expand Social Security payments, guarantee priority for Black-owned small businesses in the next round of PPP and ensure racial equity in COVID-19 vaccine distribution, among a broader list of suggestions. In the long-term, the plan hopes to simply hold the government accountable.

Story continues

Government, and the people who operate it, must be held accountable for laws, policies, and practices that marginalize and perpetuate disparities for Black communities and Black people, the plan states. Policymakers must take action to bridge racial gaps in health, wealth, and other social outcomes by eliminating laws, policies, and practices that do harm to Black people, as well as by outlawing private sector practices that exploit racial disparities in order to boost profits.

Harris made history when she became the first Black and the first Southeast Asian-American to hold the position of vice president. During her first national sit-down interview since the historic win, the Howard University graduate sat with Errin Haines, editor-at-large at the non-profit, independent news outlet The 19th News, and was questioned on her significant role and plans while in office.

I feel a great sense of responsibility. When I took that oath on Jan. 20, there were a whole lot of people standing on that stage with me, she said. And you may not have seen them, but they were in my heart, they were in my mind when I had my hand on the Bible and raised my hand to take that oath. And I feel the weight of the responsibility that comes with that.

She also spoke to being a first, but hopefully, not the last.

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at the White House during a Black History Month Virtual Celebration on February 27, 2021 in Washington, DC. . (Photo by Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)

Read More: Sharpton eulogizes George Floyd, demands America get your knee off our necks

I do it with a sense of optimism, knowing that we are still, yes sadly making a lot of firsts, but we are doing it and if we keep at it, soon perhaps we will be talking about the second and the third and the fourth, and it will be common and not something that we need to write about because its happening everywhere.

Watch the full interview below:

Correction: A previous version of this article misstated Alicia Garzas title.

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Al Sharpton on Black firsts in politics: We did not put you there for symbolism - Yahoo News

As he faced the worst political crisis of his tenure, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo visited a Black church in Harlem this week to get vaccinated against the coronavirus.

But he clearly had another agenda as well. One Black minister or political figure after another rose to offer praise for Mr. Cuomo, with the leader of the states chapter of the N.A.A.C.P., Hazel N. Dukes, even referring to the governor as her son, insisting that he aint white.

Then Charles B. Rangel, the former longtime congressman and New York political icon, heralded the importance of due process, telling people to back off until you get some facts.

When opposition starts piling up, said Mr. Rangel, now 90, You go to your family, you go to your friends because you know they will be with you.

As Mr. Cuomo navigates a deepening scandal over allegations of sexual harassment, he has leaned on his deep well of support in the Black community, which has reliably backed him and twice helped him win re-election. The governor and his associates have been working the phones, seeking the support of Black leaders and elected officials who could serve as a firewall against the barrage of calls for his resignation or impeachment.

The phone calls have been supplemented by the governors recent visits to vaccination sites, often flanked by Black and Latino members of the clergy. The Rev. Al Cockfield, who joined Mr. Cuomo at the Javits Center in Manhattan for one of the events, said he attended to send a purposeful message: Im standing with the governor.

Of course, some of the governors most prominent critics have also been Black officials, such as Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the State Senate majority leader, who was one of the earliest leaders to call on Mr. Cuomo to resign.

Yet a number of other Black leaders have helped Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, blunt some of the blowback, with many saying they support investigations into the harassment claims instead of the governors immediate resignation.

Representatives Hakeem Jeffries and Gregory Meeks, two high-ranking Black Democrats from New York, are among the few members of the states congressional delegation who have not called on Mr. Cuomo to immediately resign. Mr. Jeffries and Mr. Meeks refused requests to be interviewed for this article.

Ms. Dukes was one of the first to issue a forceful rebuke of those calling for Mr. Cuomos resignation. Other Black women, such as Assemblywomen Crystal D. Peoples-Stokes and Inez E. Dickens, as well as Laurie Cumbo, a Brooklyn councilwoman, have been among his most vocal defenders.

It strikes a nerve for African-Americans at a lot of levels, said Charlie King, a longtime ally of Mr. Cuomo who was his running mate during his failed bid for governor in 2002. I think for African-Americans, in general, we believe for a lot of reasons that this rush to judgment never works out well for people of color and we believe deeply in seeing how it plays out before you convict somebody.

A number of women, including former and current aides, have accused Mr. Cuomo of inappropriate remarks and behavior, including unwanted touching and unwelcome sexual advances.

Mr. Cuomo has defiantly rejected calls for him to resign, while denying that he has touched anyone inappropriately and apologizing for comments he said may have been interpreted as unintentional flirtation.

A poll by Siena College released this week suggested that the governor had some support: Fifty percent of voters believed he shouldnt step down, compared to 35 percent who said he should.

The poll suggested that the governors support was stronger among the Black electorate. Nearly 70 percent of Black voters surveyed said Mr. Cuomo should not immediately resign, compared to 50 percent among all voters. The governors favorability rating was also higher among Black voters, 61 percent, than white voters, 37 percent.

Many of Mr. Cuomos achievements, like raising the minimum wage and passing paid family leave, for example, have made him popular among Black voters.

The governors team is now eager to reach an agreement with the State Legislature to legalize recreational marijuana, a long-stalled initiative with strong appeal among Black and Latino communities that have suffered from the disparate enforcement of drug laws. A deal could be announced this week, far sooner than originally anticipated, according to lawmakers familiar with the matter.

To many, Mr. Cuomos attempts to rally support among Black influencers was just the latest example of the Democratic Partys reliance on its Black base in moments of political peril.

Former President Bill Clinton employed a similar strategy during his impeachment battle in the late 1990s to weather the allegations related to his conduct with an intern, Monica Lewinsky, in the Oval Office. Mr. Cuomo was Mr. Clintons federal housing secretary at the time.

Mr. Cuomo may also be taking cues from Gov. Ralph Northam of Virginia, a Democrat who survived widespread calls for his resignation over a racist photograph in his medical school yearbook. Although the politics in New York and Virginia are different, Mr. Northam retained the support of Black voters throughout the controversy, with polls showing most of them favored him remaining in office.

Race has already been thrust into the debate over Mr. Cuomos fate, with some of his defenders drawing on problematic comparisons between the allegations against the governor and the wrongful persecution of African-Americans.

In a Facebook post, George Latimer, the Westchester County executive, compared those calling on Mr. Cuomo to resign to the mob that lynched Emmett Till, the 14-year-old Black boy who was wrongfully accused of offending a white woman in Mississippi more than 60 years ago. (Mr. Latimer, who is white, has since edited the post, noting that the comparison was offensive to some.)

Some lawmakers, such as Assemblywoman Rodneyse Bichotte, a Democrat from Brooklyn, have invoked the Central Park Five the group of Black and Hispanic teenagers who were wrongfully convicted of assaulting a white female jogger in 1989 in arguing for a thorough investigation into the claims against Mr. Cuomo.

The Rev. Al Sharpton, an influential Black power broker, said there are concerns among members of his National Action Network of setting a precedent of calling for someones resignation before the investigation was completed, because it could be used against Black officials in the future.

Some Black supporters have forcefully defended Mr. Cuomos right to due process, with many saying it is a reflection of deep-seated skepticism among members in their communities who have not received fair trials or have been wrongfully convicted on false charges.

The three-term governor is confronting two crises simultaneously:

Progressive Democrats like Jumaane Williams, the New York City public advocate, have emphasized that they, too, support due process. They said, however, that the debate over the governors fate now centered on a question of his political judgment, one that also involved his past transgressions.

For me this is the last straw in a long line of wrongdoings for which the governor shouldnt be governor, said Mr. Williams, citing Mr. Cuomos attempt to hide the full extent of nursing home deaths during the pandemic and his abrupt disbandment of an anti-corruption panel known as the Moreland Commission.

Mr. Cuomo angered Black voters and stakeholders in 2002, when he ran a bruising campaign in a Democratic primary against Carl McCall, damaging Mr. McCalls bid to become the states first African-American governor. But Mr. Cuomo has regained the support of many of them since then.

Mr. Williams has pushed for Mr. Cuomo to resign, but he acknowledged the governors ties to Black voters.

I think the Cuomo name has particular meaning in the Black community, Mr. Williams said. Theyre also sensitive of being accused of things and not being able to defend yourself.

Like Mr. Williams, some of Mr. Cuomos most prominent foils throughout this crisis have been Black elected officials.

Ms. Stewart-Cousins, a Democrat from Westchester County, was, at the time, the most powerful Democratic politician to call on Mr. Cuomo to step down earlier this month.

Carl E. Heastie, the Assembly speaker, directed the Assemblys judiciary committee to begin a broad investigation into Mr. Cuomo that could potentially lead to the states first impeachment in more than a century.

The investigation, which could take months, gave Mr. Cuomo some breathing room, leading some critics to speculate it was actually a mechanism to delay impeachment. Even so, it could fuel Mr. Cuomos eventual departure.

And Akeem Browder, a criminal justice reform advocate, said that seeing Mr. Cuomo getting vaccinated Wednesday at a Black church in Harlem reminded him of why he began distancing himself from the governor three years ago because he felt as if he were being used.

Mr. Browder, whose brother, Kalief Browder, killed himself in 2015 after facing abuse at Rikers Island during the three years he was held there for allegedly stealing a backpack, went from being a guest at the governors State of the State address to endorsing Mr. Cuomos primary challenger, Cynthia Nixon, in 2018.

Mr. Browder felt the governor was not pushing hard enough for bail reform while benefiting politically from his presence at events.

I thought how indicative it was of how willing he is to use and leverage his position, Mr. Browder said of Mr. Cuomos appearance at the Black church this week. He was literally pandering to the Black community to get his name out from under fire.

And then there is Letitia James, the state attorney general, who is overseeing a separate investigation into the sexual harassment claims.

Ms. James, the first woman and first Black woman to be elected to the position, presents a dual threat to Mr. Cuomo: She has been talked about as a potential candidate to challenge him next year.

It has been the Black community that has kept up the governors numbers, said Mr. Williams, the public advocate. I think there will be erosion if the governor tried to run again and there was a credible person who ran against the governor.

Reporting was contributed by Shane Goldmacher, Maggie Haberman and Jeffery C. Mays.

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Battered by Scandal, Governor Cuomo Leans on Black Leaders to Build His Defense - The New York Times