Cuomo’s mayoral campaign treasurer worked for NY anti-trans effort

Andrew Cuomo’s mayoral campaign treasurer worked for an effort that zeroed in on transgender children last year in an unsuccessful attempt to defeat an anti-discrimination ballot measure — rallying voters with the slogan “Save Girls’ sports.”

Before Cuomo launched his mayoral campaign, treasurer Kristofer Graham oversaw fundraising compliance for the Coalition to Protect Kids, which was dedicated to defeating Proposition One. Known by supporters as the Equal Rights Amendment, the ballot question passed last year, letting New York amend its state constitution to include non-discrimination protections aimed at enshrining abortion rights.

Opponents of the measure sought to turn the proposal into a referendum over whether transgender kids should be allowed to play on the sports teams that match their identities.

“Prop 1 will almost certainly end girls-only sports in this state, and it will significantly impinge on parental authority and religious freedoms,” the Coalition to Protect Kids warned at the time.

As Cuomo seeks to rehabilitate his political legacy, he is reminding voters of his major accomplishments as governor, which include New York’s historic legalization of gay marriage in 2011, four year before the Supreme Court ruled to allow it nationwide. But some civil rights activists and lawmakers are now condemning the former governor for hiring someone they say helped smear the LGBTQ+ community.

“By hiring an anti-trans official for a crucial campaign finance role, Cuomo is signaling that trans rights are negotiable to him,” said Tyler Hack, a trans rights activist and the executive director of the Christopher Street Project. “The only takeaway we can make from that is that it's not an accident.”

Before working for the Coalition to Protect Kids, Graham was the treasurer for a statewide political action committee called “Save our State” that supported former Republican Rep. Lee Zeldin’s candidacy for governor in 2022. Zeldin has also been an opponent of transgender rights, and as a state senator voted against the state’s 2011 marriage equality bill that Cuomo later signed.

Graham’s campaign experience in New York City is fairly limited. He’s never managed funding compliance for a citywide campaign. In 2017, he was the treasurer for Republican Vito Bruno, who ran unsuccessfully against then-Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, and Republican John Quaglione, who lost a City Council race to Justin Brannan. In 2021, he worked for two more City Council candidates, one Democrat and one Republican. Both candidates lost. He is also the treasurer for Democratic City Council member Gale Brewer and Democratic Council candidate Eric Yu.

“They say you're defined by the company you keep, and that's always been true of Andrew Cuomo,” said Manhattan state Sen. Liz Krueger, the sponsor of Proposition One.

Cuomo spokesperson Rich Azzopardi dismissed questions about Graham’s hiring, calling the concerns “peak silly season.”

“He was hired to help with compliance for the city’s Campaign Finance Board, which we all know is not exactly an exercise in simplicity,” Azzopardi said.

He added: “Let’s look at Andrew Cuomo’s record — getting marriage equality passed through a legislature that killed it a short time earlier, legalizing gestational surrogacy, ending conversion therapy, enacting [the Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act], codifying Roe vs. Wade into state law years before the Supreme Court overturned it. I’d put that record up against anyone else’s and it’s part of the reason why New Yorkers know Andrew Cuomo is the candidate with the record and the experience to help save our city in crisis.”

Graham has not yet responded to a request for comment.

Donna Lieberman, the executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said that the Coalition to Protect Kids made a home for anti-trans and anti-abortion activists alike. Campaign finance filings show Carol Crossed, a Rochester-based abortion opponent who is on the board of Feminists Choosing Life, donated more than $300,000 to the group's campaign.

“The Coalition spread misinformation, disinformation and lies about a small and vulnerable population of trans New Yorkers as a tactic designed to distract from what the ERA was all about, which was protecting the right to abortion in New York, and protecting all New Yorkers from government discrimination,” Lieberman said.

Proposition One passed in November with more than 56% the vote statewide, according to the state’s certified election results. The margin was higher in New York City, where nearly 68% of voters supported it.

The Coalition to Protect Kids spent more than $580,000 last year to campaign against the amendment and paid Graham $16,000, according to state campaign finance records. Graham is a certified public accountant and registered Republican who lives in South Massapequa, Long Island.

“If this is the kind of people that Andrew Cuomo wants to enrich and support and give paychecks to, then he's no better than Eric Adams as far as a commitment to the LGBTQ community,” said Allen Roskoff, head of the Jim Owles Liberal Democratic Club, a progressive group that advocates for LGBTQ+ rights.

In 2022, Eric Adams came under fire for bringing three pastors with records of opposing gay marriage and making anti-gay remarks into his administration.

Roskoff, who first met an 18-year-old Cuomo when they worked together on Mario Cuomo’s unsuccessful New York City mayoral campaign, said the former governor needed to distance himself from Graham, someone he characterized as trying to, “destroy our community.”

“There's gonna be a political price to pay,” Roskoff warned.

Update: This story has been updated to add to Graham's list of clients.