Lis Smith, a Democratic operative who served as an adviser to Andrew Cuomo as he battled allegations of sexual harassment while governor of New York, revealed that she texted with MSNBC anchor Katy Tur during the scandal — and claimed that the cable news host repeated her “spin” about it on air.
This was according to both the transcript of the remote deposition Smith underwent on July 5 as part of the state investigation into Cuomo’s conduct, and the documents that accompany the transcript, which include copies of emails and texts.
The documents reveal that Smith said in a group chat with Cuomo advisers that she texted with Tur following a Cuomo press conference in March. In three texts to the group, Smith said, “I’m texting w Katy tur,” followed by “Katy is saying my spin live,” and finally, “Like verbatim on cnn.” (Smith made an error in her texts: Tur is an MSNBC anchor and is not on CNN.)
In Smith’s deposition she was asked directly about it.
“Katie was repeating your spin on TV; is that correct?” she was asked according to the transcript.
“Yes,” she answered.
She said that it was “something like, you know, friends of Andrew Cuomo say he did — that he did well, was contrite, you know, something like that.”
Asked whether “that was based on information you were providing to Ms. Tur,” Smith
Video of the segment in question shows that Tur did indeed cite comments from Smith, but in a more skeptical way than indicated by the texts.
During an MSNBC segment on March 3, Tur relayed a conversation she had with someone “close to the family” regarding Cuomo’s conduct:
You know, I’ve just been talking to somebody who is close to the family and I asked, them, you know, given the moment that we have been living in for the past two years, given how everyone has had a reckoning with this Me Too moment, why would somebody like Governor Andrew Cuomo, who is a savvy politician, not have buttoned things up, not have gotten the message to be careful about what he said around his staffers, around others. And the person said, it’s not that he didn’t think the rules didn’t apply to him, it’s just that’s in the Cuomo DNA. They are extraordinarily friendly, I guess, by nature.
Tur let out an audible sigh at the end of her remarks, which you can watch above.
The transcript and texts were released as part of the more than 10,000 documents publicized by the New York Attorney General’s office, which earlier this year released a report alleging Cuomo had sexually harassed current and former state employees. Cuomo resigned following the report’s release.
The documents show that CNN
MSNBC did not reply to Mediaite’s request for comment.