WEBVTT - Former Attorney General Eric Schneiderman 0:00:00.400 --> 0:00:03.920 This is Alec Baldwin, and you're listening to Hear's the thing. 0:00:04.880 --> 0:00:09.639 What follows may make for difficult listening. New York Attorney 0:00:09.720 --> 0:00:14.160 General Eric Schneiderman sat down with me last Thursday, days 0:00:14.240 --> 0:00:17.720 before news broke in the New Yorker magazine that four 0:00:17.760 --> 0:00:23.040 women have accused him of physical violence. Schneiderman came to 0:00:23.120 --> 0:00:27.520 his high office thanks to the left women's groups in particular, 0:00:27.680 --> 0:00:31.160 and in our talk you'll hear him return multiple times 0:00:31.200 --> 0:00:35.440 to his record in support of women's rights. Looking back 0:00:35.560 --> 0:00:39.280 on our preparations with his office, there were signs maybe 0:00:39.320 --> 0:00:44.959 something was amiss. His communications director requested surprisingly to us 0:00:45.000 --> 0:00:49.560 that we not mention the Harvey Weinstein case or hashtag 0:00:49.680 --> 0:00:54.720 me to, or the Attorney General's past relationships. It is 0:00:55.040 --> 0:00:59.280 a complicated thing listening to a man I respect and 0:00:59.360 --> 0:01:03.200 who has in fact done much to support progressive causes 0:01:03.280 --> 0:01:06.760 over his twenty five years in public service. But we 0:01:06.880 --> 0:01:10.360 thought it was important to post this now so the 0:01:10.400 --> 0:01:13.759 public has access to what turns out to be Eric 0:01:13.760 --> 0:01:18.840 Schneiderman's last long form interview as Attorney General. I want 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:21.600 to just read from among the top elements in your bio, 0:01:21.840 --> 0:01:26.080 we roll marveling on the production staff here. The only 0:01:26.160 --> 0:01:28.000 child grew up in the Upper West Side, father was 0:01:28.040 --> 0:01:32.559 born in tenements. Became big shot corporate defense lawyer, chairman 0:01:32.600 --> 0:01:36.200 of City Opera. You graduated from Trinity and seventy three 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:40.040 and Amerston seventy seven. Studied abroad in Hong Kong, double 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:43.880 major in English and Asian studies. Eventually you graduated from 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:46.559 Harvard Law School in eighty two. When it is here 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:49.640 that you were the deputy sheriff of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, from 0:01:49.680 --> 0:01:52.760 nineteen seventy seven nineteen seventy nine, is that a fact? 0:01:53.880 --> 0:01:57.440 It is? I was a deputy sheriff in Berkshire County. 0:01:57.880 --> 0:01:59.760 I dropped in and out of school a lot. When 0:01:59.760 --> 0:02:02.080 I was seventeen, I graduated from high school and it 0:02:02.160 --> 0:02:04.000 was a year before Roe V. Wade. Instead of going 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:05.600 to college, I went I got a job in an 0:02:05.600 --> 0:02:09.079 abortion clinic in Washington, d C. Abortion was legal in DC, 0:02:09.240 --> 0:02:11.639 illegal in the whole Southeast United States. No one thought 0:02:11.720 --> 0:02:14.960 role was coming, and so at seventeen I was going 0:02:14.960 --> 0:02:17.359 out to National Airport meeting women flying in from states 0:02:17.360 --> 0:02:19.760 where they couldn't. What do you think motivated you to 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:23.320 do that at that age? Why you know, I mean 0:02:24.360 --> 0:02:28.200 I was seventeen. It wasn't really that carefully thought through. 0:02:28.440 --> 0:02:32.760 I you know, I had some sort of office job initially, 0:02:32.840 --> 0:02:35.960 and it was really boring. And what did your parents say, 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:38.440 you're their only child. I was just gone. I mean 0:02:38.480 --> 0:02:41.320 I left Toma, never went back, and I just had adventures. 0:02:41.360 --> 0:02:43.720 There were people setting up clinics because they believed Washington 0:02:43.760 --> 0:02:46.400 would be the only outpost for decades, that women would 0:02:46.400 --> 0:02:49.160 have to come there from Georgia and South Carolina and Tennessee, 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:51.720 um because no one thought role was coming, so people 0:02:51.720 --> 0:02:54.320 were setting up clinics. I thought it sounded really interesting 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:59.239 and the people who were doing it were really amazing people, 0:02:59.280 --> 0:03:03.480 and so, you know, I just had never really occurred 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:07.560 to me that it was as controversial as I later 0:03:07.800 --> 0:03:10.720 learned it was. And it had a big impact on me. 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:14.080 I mean, it was seeing women essentially fleeing oppression in 0:03:14.120 --> 0:03:17.280 their states, coming in secret, arguing with the doctors that 0:03:17.400 --> 0:03:19.480 had to go home before this medical staff thought they 0:03:19.480 --> 0:03:22.079 were ready because they snuck out on their families, their 0:03:22.080 --> 0:03:24.280 employers a lot of the times, their husbands they don't 0:03:24.280 --> 0:03:26.520 want them to find out. So it's just an amazing 0:03:27.520 --> 0:03:29.920 But when you when you add that, it only puts 0:03:29.919 --> 0:03:32.360 a finer point on what I'm saying, which is you 0:03:32.440 --> 0:03:36.080 have a very eclectic path to running for your first office. 0:03:36.080 --> 0:03:37.720 You you, you when you, when you, when you go, 0:03:37.920 --> 0:03:40.600 you study abroad in Hong Kong. This was under Amherst. 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:43.640 I took a year outside of Hong Kong while I 0:03:43.680 --> 0:03:48.280 was in college, so abortion clinic, gopher semester, drop out again, 0:03:48.840 --> 0:03:52.800 go back for a semester. Meet Bob Thurman, who was 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:56.520 my Tibetan Buddhism professor, and he inspired me to study Chinese. 0:03:57.160 --> 0:04:00.800 This gravitation towards Asian studies was that something in your 0:04:00.800 --> 0:04:05.920 home or not really, I mean I just was there 0:04:05.960 --> 0:04:07.920 like a leaf in the wind here it was now 0:04:08.000 --> 0:04:11.280 was it was a time of big ideas. I mean, 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:13.840 this is the era of the Ana Vietnam War movement, 0:04:13.880 --> 0:04:16.920 the civil rights movement. I was in demonstrations when I 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:19.680 was fourteen, fifteen years old then in Washington, and there 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:23.120 was just a sense of tremendous possibility. It's a time 0:04:23.160 --> 0:04:25.640 it's hard to explain to people now and what I 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:28.719 feel from the young people rising up today, this is 0:04:28.720 --> 0:04:31.240 the first time I felt that level of energy since then, 0:04:31.640 --> 0:04:33.760 that this is this reminds me of the late sixties 0:04:33.760 --> 0:04:36.200 and early seventies what we're seeing now. And look, it 0:04:36.240 --> 0:04:39.040 was also a time of you know, rebellion. We were 0:04:39.080 --> 0:04:40.960 all we grew our hairs along. We were you know, 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:46.039 we were not really that interested in what our parents thought. 0:04:46.080 --> 0:04:47.599 We thought they were squares and we were going to 0:04:47.640 --> 0:04:50.120 change the world. Your first job in law enforcement is 0:04:50.160 --> 0:04:52.400 as a deputy sheriff in Pittsfield. This is many years 0:04:52.440 --> 0:04:54.760 before you become the Attorney General of the many years 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.160 and what was that experience life was it? Was it 0:04:58.320 --> 0:05:01.839 kind of lighthearted and not that serious or was being 0:05:01.839 --> 0:05:06.320 a sheriff in Pittsfield that have some It was dangers, 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:10.400 not much. I mean it was really you know, most 0:05:10.400 --> 0:05:13.080 of the folks in the jail were low level offenders, 0:05:13.080 --> 0:05:15.320 it was, but it was a huge lesson for me 0:05:15.560 --> 0:05:18.720 in you know, how the people at the bottom of 0:05:18.760 --> 0:05:23.159 the system function because these were mostly poor, uneducated people 0:05:23.240 --> 0:05:26.719 who were in and out of the system. So yeah, 0:05:26.839 --> 0:05:29.720 and rural poor because back then there was we had 0:05:29.720 --> 0:05:33.200 moonshine runners in the jail from South South Berkshire County 0:05:33.279 --> 0:05:36.000 And was one guy who had been born in jail 0:05:36.040 --> 0:05:38.240 when his mother was doing time, and he and his 0:05:38.320 --> 0:05:41.160 brother were there, and so it was really it was 0:05:41.200 --> 0:05:43.400 a great lesson for me to see how the system 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:47.280 operates for the poor and the uneducated. And before going 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:48.920 to a place like Harvard Law School, I think it's 0:05:48.920 --> 0:05:51.039 good to have a little dose to that. You know, 0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:54.640 your father, it was a big lawyer, corporate lawyer, and 0:05:54.720 --> 0:05:58.200 he defended a lot of corporations, whether they do good 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:01.240 or bad, to influence the you have now. Yeah, But 0:06:01.320 --> 0:06:04.400 then you know, time went on and I got older 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:08.240 and got you know, I got more appreciation for the 0:06:08.279 --> 0:06:11.440 older generation and what they had done. And he had 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:15.520 the sense to step out of the shark lawyer scene 0:06:16.080 --> 0:06:18.200 with still a lot of years to live. And the 0:06:18.480 --> 0:06:20.360 last twenty years of his life are really the best 0:06:20.360 --> 0:06:23.320 because he just did the public interests work he wanted 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:25.440 w n y c. And was on the board of 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:30.360 Nayral Opera. And so for him to have, having grown 0:06:30.400 --> 0:06:32.080 up the way he did, to live to see his 0:06:32.080 --> 0:06:34.160 son become the Attorney General in New York State, it 0:06:34.279 --> 0:06:36.400 was quite a leap in life. So when you ran 0:06:36.480 --> 0:06:40.240 for the state Senate, uh, that was your first race. 0:06:41.040 --> 0:06:44.480 And I remember you reading or you had described me 0:06:44.560 --> 0:06:47.279 when I first ran into you back in those days, um, 0:06:47.320 --> 0:06:49.599 and you were in office, that it was it was 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:54.880 a strangely Jerrymander district. Correct, Well, it got stranger after 0:06:54.920 --> 0:07:00.560 I was elected after one term in the Senate. Uh. 0:07:00.640 --> 0:07:02.360 I think I was regarded as such a pain in 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:05.159 the neck that the leaders of the Senate redrew me 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:09.200 into a sixty per Latino district anchored in Washington Heights, 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:11.400 knowing that I had studied Chinese and college not Spanish. 0:07:11.440 --> 0:07:14.840 So I've learned how to speak Spanish and had just 0:07:14.880 --> 0:07:19.080 a tremendously rich experience with the do you do good 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:23.000 at Bloomber Bloomberg Spanish? I don't have. I don't have. 0:07:23.160 --> 0:07:26.280 He Spanish is not bad. His accent is challenging, but 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:29.920 Mike does be pretty good Spanish. Um. But you know, 0:07:29.920 --> 0:07:32.200 I learned Dominican Spanish, and I bonded with a lot 0:07:32.200 --> 0:07:33.880 of the people in that community. Started going to the 0:07:33.880 --> 0:07:38.480 Dominican Republic. Had all sorts of interesting collateral consequences. I 0:07:38.520 --> 0:07:43.200 discovered this lost Jewish community and found the archives of it. 0:07:43.200 --> 0:07:47.720 We're sitting in some storeroom down in the northern part 0:07:47.720 --> 0:07:50.920 of the Dominican Republic. Because and I learned this history 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:54.360 that I had never known that. In seven um at 0:07:54.360 --> 0:07:56.679 the Big Avian Conference when they were talking about Jews 0:07:56.680 --> 0:07:58.560 trying to get out of Europe, the one country that 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:00.600 said we'll take all of the ones, all the Jews 0:08:00.640 --> 0:08:02.520 can get here was the Dominican Republican. That was a 0:08:02.560 --> 0:08:05.680 history that really had been lost. So we raised the 0:08:05.680 --> 0:08:08.160 money to bring send the archives from the Museum of 0:08:08.240 --> 0:08:11.640 Jewish Heritage down there and had a great exhibition. And 0:08:11.680 --> 0:08:14.360 then someone wrote a musical Cults Suo, which is the 0:08:14.400 --> 0:08:16.680 name of the community, with half Jewish kids and half 0:08:16.680 --> 0:08:21.320 Dominican kids performing. So a lot of great experiences in 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:24.000 my due district and with that community to this day. 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:27.880 You know, I consider myself at Dominicano Autotivo. You know, 0:08:27.960 --> 0:08:30.760 you're a New Yorker who lived several different places during 0:08:30.800 --> 0:08:32.960 the course of your college years, but you're a New 0:08:33.040 --> 0:08:35.880 Yorker born and bred, and I'm wondering what it was 0:08:35.960 --> 0:08:38.720 like for you to go when you arrived at Albany 0:08:38.760 --> 0:08:42.040 to go to work. Well, I had, I had. After 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:43.880 I got out of law school, I I clerked, and 0:08:43.880 --> 0:08:46.240 then I went into private practice and was an associate 0:08:46.280 --> 0:08:48.800 and a partner in and a big law firm. So 0:08:49.000 --> 0:08:53.319 I had, you know, I went up there with that experience, 0:08:53.520 --> 0:08:56.640 and Albany was not a place that ran by any 0:08:56.679 --> 0:09:00.520 normal rules of business, and it was always rated by 0:09:00.600 --> 0:09:04.640 the Brennan Center and other uh, others who studied it 0:09:04.640 --> 0:09:07.800 in good government groups. Uh, you know, terrible in terms 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:11.760 of transparency, terrible letters of democracy. Really, it was a 0:09:11.800 --> 0:09:14.720 fundament issure. It was a fundamentally anti democratic place when 0:09:14.720 --> 0:09:17.720 I first got there. It has, it has improved quite 0:09:17.720 --> 0:09:19.199 a bit, but it's still got a long way to 0:09:19.240 --> 0:09:21.840 go in my my view. But it was what holds 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:24.200 it back from really growing in the right direction. I 0:09:24.240 --> 0:09:27.040 think that, you know, I think that there has been 0:09:27.240 --> 0:09:30.800 a a long term attachment to the status quo. People 0:09:30.920 --> 0:09:34.320 resist change, and I think this year's election presents an 0:09:34.360 --> 0:09:38.480 opportunity for some really fundamental change. We've already had the 0:09:38.480 --> 0:09:42.840 whole series of senior senators, State senators announcing they're going 0:09:42.880 --> 0:09:45.160 to retire. I think you're going to see new leadership 0:09:45.240 --> 0:09:47.800 there in a lot of quite a few new people elected, 0:09:48.160 --> 0:09:50.760 and I think that's going to provide the impetus for change. 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:54.960 When I got there, it was remarkable because the leaders 0:09:54.960 --> 0:09:57.720 controlled everything. I mean, it was really this the majority 0:09:57.760 --> 0:10:01.440 leader of the State Senate. UH controlled whether you had 0:10:01.520 --> 0:10:03.440 a big suite of offices in the top floor of 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:05.800 the legislative office building or you were in a basement. 0:10:06.320 --> 0:10:11.120 And what they controlled at dictatorial control over what bills 0:10:11.160 --> 0:10:13.320 come to the floor. So groups would come up and say, 0:10:13.360 --> 0:10:15.520 will you support this bill, will you know, check the 0:10:15.559 --> 0:10:19.959 boxes on our checklist for environmental concerns or healthcare concerns 0:10:20.120 --> 0:10:23.280 or gun control. And it didn't really make that. I 0:10:23.320 --> 0:10:25.800 realized after a while, didn't make any difference. I was 0:10:25.840 --> 0:10:28.080 debating bills, trying to change people's minds, and then I 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:30.160 realized after a few months, no bill ever comes to 0:10:30.200 --> 0:10:32.679 the floor and loses it was all It was all 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:35.000 staged in the back room. Yeah, it felt like, you know, 0:10:35.040 --> 0:10:37.080 I was in one of those phony governments in the 0:10:37.120 --> 0:10:40.200 Eastern European Block where you pretend you're the parliament, but 0:10:40.240 --> 0:10:43.319 the polit bureau is making the decisions behind the scenes. 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:44.679 That's what all many was like when I got there. 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:46.680 The State Senate term is how long is it four years? 0:10:46.720 --> 0:10:48.640 Two years? The State Senate term is two years, and 0:10:48.679 --> 0:10:50.319 the Assembly term as two years too. I thought it 0:10:50.360 --> 0:10:51.880 was too sorry, I thought it was two and four, 0:10:52.800 --> 0:10:54.920 uh not two and six like the federal So it's 0:10:54.960 --> 0:10:56.640 a two year term for the and you served how 0:10:56.640 --> 0:10:59.520 many terms? I was there from night and then I 0:10:59.600 --> 0:11:04.000 ran we got elected ninety so from uh my last term, 0:11:04.760 --> 0:11:06.200 and then I ran for a G. You were you were? 0:11:06.240 --> 0:11:08.120 You were in the state Senate when you're refrag what's 0:11:08.160 --> 0:11:10.600 the political chess board looked like them? When you're going 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:12.320 to run for a G? Who was a G and 0:11:12.520 --> 0:11:14.560 was leaving? And why Cuomo was the a G? And 0:11:14.600 --> 0:11:19.120 he was leaving because of the bizarre circumstances of Elliot 0:11:19.120 --> 0:11:23.959 Spitzer becoming governor with overwhelming popularity and not lasting very long, 0:11:24.000 --> 0:11:26.960 and then David Patterson lasting a little bit longer. But 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:30.280 I had certainly not expected the Attorney General's office to 0:11:30.280 --> 0:11:34.440 be open in but it opened up, and uh, well, 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:38.000 what did you say to yourself? Well, I had I 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:40.280 had a seat in the Senate. The Democrats were in 0:11:40.320 --> 0:11:42.480 the majority of that term and would end being in 0:11:42.520 --> 0:11:45.600 the Senate, and the majority is a nice secure gig. 0:11:45.960 --> 0:11:48.440 But I at that point I really had. You know, 0:11:48.480 --> 0:11:51.120 I've been through everything in the Senate. I'd run the 0:11:51.120 --> 0:11:54.000 Senate Campaign Committee. I've been the floor leader for the Democrats, 0:11:54.080 --> 0:11:57.640 which was fun. Because we never got the bills till 0:11:57.640 --> 0:11:59.760 like an hour before session, so it was like doing improv. 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:02.400 Was just you know, debating bills with while I was 0:12:02.480 --> 0:12:05.800 learning about the laws. More so than any other bodies, 0:12:05.920 --> 0:12:09.760 legislative bodies are very much about seniority and about people 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:12.720 developing relationships. A system. It's a system. It is a 0:12:12.760 --> 0:12:16.640 system and a lot and people get Uh. Most people 0:12:16.679 --> 0:12:18.960 want to fit in in the environment where you know 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:22.320 they are at work. And people wanted to fit in, 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:24.280 and you got a lot of I gotta When I was, 0:12:24.960 --> 0:12:28.040 I said, come from you know, the private sector, and 0:12:28.080 --> 0:12:31.319 I it was less patient with the old ways than 0:12:31.440 --> 0:12:33.120 a lot of people. A lot of folks said, no, 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:35.480 you gotta try and get along. You gotta gotta get 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:37.440 along and settled down and that kind of thing. And 0:12:37.440 --> 0:12:40.880 it just wasn't me. So uh, I was ready to 0:12:40.920 --> 0:12:43.000 try something different and it was given up a very 0:12:43.920 --> 0:12:46.960 nice safe gig to take a shot at something. And 0:12:47.000 --> 0:12:50.200 they were and my first campaign was in retrospect, a 0:12:50.320 --> 0:12:53.600 terrific campaign. And people, how does that process begin? Meaning 0:12:53.800 --> 0:12:55.560 like who do you call on the phone? Who do 0:12:55.559 --> 0:12:57.600 you contact and say I want to run for a 0:12:57.720 --> 0:13:01.120 g Well, how do you launch that process you contact who. 0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:03.520 There wasn't a very strong sense of the state party 0:13:04.160 --> 0:13:06.400 managing things at that point in history. There were a 0:13:06.400 --> 0:13:10.040 bunch of people who stepped up to run open seat, surprise, 0:13:10.120 --> 0:13:13.040 open seat, and it was it was it was really 0:13:13.120 --> 0:13:15.640 a primary and the primary was a good campaign. We 0:13:15.679 --> 0:13:19.400 had smart lawyers. Uh we had lots of debates. So 0:13:19.480 --> 0:13:21.480 not somebody you call because New York State is so 0:13:21.520 --> 0:13:24.520 insular that way. Now there really there really wasn't as 0:13:25.160 --> 0:13:26.680 a boss at that point in time. Well, I would 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:28.679 talk to people, and you know, I had relationships with 0:13:28.840 --> 0:13:31.000 folks who influence you to make that decision. Well, a 0:13:31.000 --> 0:13:33.680 lot of the different progressive groups that I had worked 0:13:33.720 --> 0:13:36.520 with over the years. UM I had been on the 0:13:36.520 --> 0:13:40.200 board of Citizen Action in New York and Citizen Action 0:13:40.320 --> 0:13:44.200 and there that whole network constituency influence. Sure and I 0:13:44.240 --> 0:13:47.120 had and I had strong relationships with folks in the 0:13:47.120 --> 0:13:51.840 pro choice movement, LGBT equality movement, and uh I talked 0:13:51.880 --> 0:13:54.240 to people about the potential for the Attorney General's office 0:13:54.240 --> 0:13:57.360 and what I could do. I had done a lot 0:13:57.480 --> 0:14:00.920 of legal work. I had when uh I was back 0:14:01.000 --> 0:14:03.800 in private practice. Sometimes like to say, the money making 0:14:03.800 --> 0:14:05.520 face of my career ended when they made me the 0:14:05.520 --> 0:14:07.840 pro bono partner of the law firm and I started. 0:14:08.040 --> 0:14:10.120 I realized how much more I like public interest work. 0:14:10.360 --> 0:14:13.160 So I've been the lawyer for niperg Straphangers campaign I 0:14:13.160 --> 0:14:16.880 had done. Uh, you know, I've been around in this 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:19.840 sort of network of progressive activists and I had a 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:22.760 basic support there. Yeah, and and I got a lot 0:14:22.760 --> 0:14:25.880 of encouragement and my colleagues and some of my colleagues 0:14:25.880 --> 0:14:28.520 in the Senate stepped up and really were very supportive, 0:14:28.920 --> 0:14:31.960 and that gave me the ability to make connections in 0:14:32.000 --> 0:14:35.520 other parts of the state. So it's uh. The campaign 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:38.240 was launched and it was wild. But I must say, 0:14:38.320 --> 0:14:41.520 who was your competitor? Uh, well, Kathleen Rice, who's now 0:14:41.520 --> 0:14:44.080 in Congress with the district attorney in Nasa County at 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:48.000 the time, Richard Brodsky, an assembly member run ran a 0:14:48.080 --> 0:14:52.320 couple of good lawyers in private practice, And compared to 0:14:52.360 --> 0:14:55.720 every other campaign I've been in, it was certainly the 0:14:55.760 --> 0:14:58.960 most stimulating and challenging. The debates were great. People would 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:01.840 remember say, you know, and the last time we debated, 0:15:01.880 --> 0:15:04.360 you said this about the Securities Fraud Act. And then 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:08.200 people would continue the conversations. So it was terrific that 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:10.440 I won. I won the primary, and then the general 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:14.960 election reverted to more typical American politics, which we didn't 0:15:14.960 --> 0:15:17.440 have much in the way of debates, and the Republican 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:20.600 Republican opponent and who was the most Dan Donovan now 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:23.080 congressman sort of attorney general. Did you want to be 0:15:23.120 --> 0:15:25.800 compared to your predecessors? Yeah, The New York City Train 0:15:25.880 --> 0:15:29.360 General's Office is and has been for years before I 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:32.040 even got there. You know, one of the most extraordinary 0:15:32.080 --> 0:15:34.720 public law firms in the country, and really going back 0:15:34.760 --> 0:15:37.640 to Louis Leftwitz and Bob Abrams it it really emerged 0:15:37.680 --> 0:15:42.840 as a pre eminent advocate for consumers, for protecting the 0:15:42.840 --> 0:15:46.320 most vulnerable among us, and an impressive tradition up through 0:15:46.360 --> 0:15:49.200 Spitzer and Cuomo and and you know, making law and 0:15:49.240 --> 0:15:52.320 showing leadership. So I took over an office that had 0:15:52.360 --> 0:15:54.800 a good tradition. And but what was someone doing that 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:56.800 you wanted that you didn't think they should be doing it? 0:15:56.840 --> 0:15:58.600 What were they not doing they should be doing? What 0:15:58.640 --> 0:16:01.360 were the sins of oe and comission? How did you 0:16:01.360 --> 0:16:04.840 want to change the office? Well, I mean, I having 0:16:05.120 --> 0:16:09.400 spent more time than my predecessors in private practice. I 0:16:09.440 --> 0:16:12.720 really wanted to use the lessons I had from the 0:16:12.720 --> 0:16:15.080 private sector. I wanted to have the best public law 0:16:15.120 --> 0:16:16.720 firm in the country. I wanted to make sure that 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:20.880 we had we improved training, that we tore down the 0:16:20.920 --> 0:16:27.720 silos between different bureaus and established a really productive, aggressive, 0:16:27.760 --> 0:16:31.240 but collegial atmosphere. And it's just been an amazing experience 0:16:31.240 --> 0:16:35.680 building it up because you know, this great funny conversation 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:38.880 with with Andrew, who's going to become governor, and said, well, 0:16:38.920 --> 0:16:41.960 I'm not gonna take everybody from here, because you know, 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:45.440 I Elliott brought all these prosecutors and thought prosecutors could 0:16:45.480 --> 0:16:47.160 run everything. And then he got to Albany and realized 0:16:47.200 --> 0:16:49.040 there was nobody there and a lot of the agency. 0:16:49.120 --> 0:16:51.080 So he came back and took a lot more people. 0:16:51.400 --> 0:16:54.080 And at first that was a problem because we, you know, 0:16:54.120 --> 0:16:56.880 we had to staff up quickly. It's really remarkable in 0:16:57.200 --> 0:16:59.560 the government the United States. You get elected in November, 0:17:00.080 --> 0:17:03.880 then you have six weeks including Thanksgiving and Christmas, to 0:17:04.000 --> 0:17:05.960 hire all these people you've never met, and then you 0:17:06.119 --> 0:17:09.960 entrust your career to them. Former New York Attorney General 0:17:10.160 --> 0:17:14.640 Eric Schneiderman. Coming up, we talk about hashtag me too 0:17:15.080 --> 0:17:19.320 and New York state politics. With his resignation, new York 0:17:19.359 --> 0:17:24.880 loses a Democratic Party leader. Schneiderman understood before most members 0:17:24.880 --> 0:17:28.360 of his party the importance of state politics and its 0:17:28.400 --> 0:17:35.560 relationship to federal politics. This is Alec Baldwin and you're 0:17:35.600 --> 0:17:39.680 listening to Here's the thing now. More from my conversation 0:17:39.920 --> 0:17:44.400 last Thursday with former New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. 0:17:45.040 --> 0:17:48.399 Do you think that the friction between Cuomo and do 0:17:48.480 --> 0:17:51.879 Blasio is hurting either the state government or particularly the 0:17:51.880 --> 0:17:55.159 city government. I don't know how much it's it's hurting. 0:17:55.200 --> 0:17:58.960 I think that, you know, I try to work with everybody, 0:17:59.000 --> 0:18:01.000 and you know, I think it's more productive to try 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.600 and get along and find common ground, and uh so, 0:18:04.840 --> 0:18:07.520 you know, I encourage I encourage everyone to do that. 0:18:07.760 --> 0:18:10.479 You don't think it's hurt in the city, you know it, 0:18:10.480 --> 0:18:13.399 It maybe in some let's put it. Let's put it 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:16.040 this way. I think it would probably be better for 0:18:16.119 --> 0:18:18.840 everyone to try and work together and find whatever common 0:18:18.840 --> 0:18:21.200 ground we can, because quite honestly, we're in a moment 0:18:21.200 --> 0:18:24.359 of history where the biggest challenge we face from the 0:18:24.359 --> 0:18:27.720 federal government and so um, you know, it's a good 0:18:27.720 --> 0:18:33.600 time to be putting aside other more parochial issues. And 0:18:33.840 --> 0:18:37.879 there are people banding together remarkably. Uh, some folks who 0:18:37.960 --> 0:18:39.919 might disagree on a lot of things, but understand the 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:42.960 level of threat we're under to our constitutional structure and 0:18:42.960 --> 0:18:47.040 the rule of law. And we have I'm very proud 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:50.679 of the work that we've done assembling a coalition to 0:18:50.720 --> 0:18:53.359 really form the core of the legal resistance to bad 0:18:53.400 --> 0:18:56.960 public policies that spew out of Washington. Once the update 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:59.320 on the estate on the writing off your state income taxes, 0:18:59.359 --> 0:19:02.320 what's the update on Well, we've we've they've passed some 0:19:02.440 --> 0:19:05.600 laws in all many to create some workarounds. They will 0:19:05.640 --> 0:19:09.720 be challenged and we'll we'll see where they will be 0:19:09.760 --> 0:19:12.400 will or they'll be challenged by some you know, taxpayer 0:19:12.400 --> 0:19:16.200 group or something, and I'll defend defending them in court. Uh. Look, 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:21.840 that's the The tax bill was a dagger in the 0:19:21.840 --> 0:19:24.800 back of New York State and other states, states and 0:19:24.840 --> 0:19:27.800 other states, and we have to deal with it. Yeah. Look, 0:19:27.800 --> 0:19:31.480 it's it's it's an important thing to understand the context 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:35.560 we're in. We're in a historical moment where their efforts 0:19:35.640 --> 0:19:40.320 underway to undermine a lot of the basic components in 0:19:40.359 --> 0:19:44.159 my view of our constitutional structure, and this is a 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:48.160 test of our the federalist constitutional fabric we have. State 0:19:48.200 --> 0:19:52.600 and local governments have tremendous power reserved to them under 0:19:52.840 --> 0:19:55.520 our constitutional system. And this is a time when you're 0:19:55.520 --> 0:19:58.400 seeing it's an ear of what I call progressive federalism, 0:19:58.440 --> 0:20:01.720 where you're seeing states eyes up. And in my view, 0:20:01.800 --> 0:20:04.920 the coalition of state attorneys general that I'm a part 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:08.040 of is more of more of an effective check on 0:20:08.480 --> 0:20:11.840 access as the administration than the Democrats in Congress. They 0:20:11.880 --> 0:20:13.520 try to do what they can, but they're in the minority. 0:20:13.560 --> 0:20:16.320 I hope they'll be in the majority. But over the 0:20:16.400 --> 0:20:19.760 last year and a half, my office and other attorneys 0:20:19.760 --> 0:20:23.560 general's office is really emerged as a bulwark of our 0:20:23.560 --> 0:20:27.440 constitutional structure against bad public policies that spew out of 0:20:27.480 --> 0:20:30.399 Washington like to breede from some toxic volcano. Is it 0:20:30.520 --> 0:20:32.480 time in your mind having lived in New York and 0:20:32.480 --> 0:20:34.359 you're in New York, but you worked in Albany for 0:20:34.400 --> 0:20:36.480 the state to give back control of the city to 0:20:36.560 --> 0:20:39.639 the city. By and large, the city runs itself. But 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:42.040 it's important to understand, and this is really important to 0:20:42.080 --> 0:20:45.240 understanding the Trump era for everyone to get the basic 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:47.760 unit of the United States of America is and has 0:20:47.800 --> 0:20:50.680 always been the state. The states created the federal government, 0:20:50.800 --> 0:20:54.680 States create local governments. Every state in the Union has 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:59.600 ultimate power over local governments and that is something that 0:20:59.680 --> 0:21:01.560 can of it has figured out a long time ago 0:21:01.800 --> 0:21:05.560 and invested a tremendous amount in taking over state governments. 0:21:05.720 --> 0:21:09.560 As of the election, Republicans control thirty four of the 0:21:09.600 --> 0:21:13.720 fifty governorships, sixty nine and the nine nine state legislative chambers, 0:21:13.800 --> 0:21:16.960