By Rich Bockmann
State Sen. Malcolm Smith (D-Hollis), who is awaiting trial on charges he tried to buy his way into the 2013 mayoral race as a Republican, boasted to a government informant that he spent tens of thousands of dollars in 2008 in order to get elected majority leader, federal prosecutors claim.
The witness cooperating with the feds, who busted Smith last year for allegedly trying to bribe GOP leaders to let him run on their ticket in 2013, told authorities the southeast Queens senator bragged about putting other members “on the payroll” a few years earlier by lining their campaign funds with thousands of dollars, according to a memo submitted to the court by the federal prosecutor’s office.
“Smith said he spent ‘like 50 or 60’ thousand dollars in payments to other members to buy their votes for majority leader in 2008, a process he again called putting them ‘on the payroll,’” U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara wrote in a memo asking to have the background information submitted at Smith’s corruption trial set to begin next month.
“In particular, he said that he contributed $1,000 per week to the campaigns of approximately 10 members of the state Senate during the last week of their elections,” the Manhattan prosecutor said. “In return, he gained their votes for majority leader.”
The cooperating witness has been identified by several news outlets as real estate investor Moses Stern.
Smith ran unopposed for re-election in 2008, a year when many politicians were spending big bucks as Democrats mounted a campaign to take back the Senate.
The court papers do not name which politicians he made contributions to, but state Campaign Finance records show that between Oct. 1 and Nov. 4 he doled out $65,600 to a dozen candidates.
Then-Sen. Craig Johnson (D-Mineola) and Suzi Oppenheimer, who was elected to represent Mamaroneck, received $9,500 each.
Sen. Joe Addabbo (D-Howard Beach) was one of six politicians to receive $6,000.
Addabbo said there was no quid pro quo going on.
“Never once did anyone, including Malcolm Smith, say, ‘If I give you this, I need this,’” he said. “It was that kind of year. People were just raising a lot of money because a lot was at stake.”
Addabbo pointed out Smith was already minority leader in 2008, and the vote to elect him leader when Democrats became the majority was unanimous.
“If he was the minority leader, you assume that if and when we became the majority, he would become the leader,” he said.
Following the 2008 election, Democrats took control of the state Legislature’s upper chamber and elected Smith the majority leader the next year.
Later in 2009, however, a pair of Democratic senators split from the caucus and Smith was voted out of power.
According to the federal prosecutor, Smith told the informant at a meeting last summer that he planned to use the same process again to become a leader in the Senate.
Reach reporter Rich Bockmann by e-mail at rbockmann@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4574.
