He was at the pinnacle of power and righteousness.
In 2007 he signed into law legislation to prevent human trafficking and to suppress the demand for prostitution. The punishment for patronizing prostitution was increased from 3 months in jail and a $500 fine, to one year and $1,000. It was the country’s toughest anti-prostitution law.
Less than a year later, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer resigned in disgrace after being caught with a prostitute who was four years younger than his own daughter.
He got some lucrative TV jobs and earned over $4 million a year. Then in 2013 Spitzer ran for comptroller of New York. One of his opponents was an owner of a prostitution business. She told the New York Post she spent four months in Rikers Island prison and returned penniless, homeless and forced to take offender classes with pedophiles and perverts.
What happened to the prostitute-using governor who had signed the law that convicted her? Nothing. He did choose to resign from office, but he went home to his wife and family in their Fifth Avenue apartment. He was never fingerprinted, mug shot, or charged with a crime.
Jake Tapper of CNN confronted him about it, saying, “I think a lot of people might think, look, you’re somebody with money, you’re somebody with power, and this is a perfect example of how people like you don’t end up doing the time the way the average person does.” Spitzer simply said it was the prosecutor’s decision, and added he was proud he had signed the anti-human trafficking law. “Even though you violated it?” Tapper asked. “That’s correct,” Spitzer replied. “There’s no question the law deserves to be there.”
Spitzer lost the comptroller race. Then newspapers revealed he had a new young mistress and his wife, who had stood by him through it all, divorced him. And right now [May 2016] he is being investigated by the police for allegedly assaulting a woman in the Plaza Hotel.
Sometimes disgrace isn’t enough…
========================
Sources for illustration:
“Tough questions for Eliot Spitzer on hypocrisy of never being charged with breaking the law he signed,” by Jack Tapper, CNN, 18 July 2013; < http://thelead.blogs.cnn.com/2013/07/18/eliot-spitzer-wants-redemption-but-is-he-guilty-of-hypocrisy/ >
Former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer wants voters to think of his as a redemption story.
The disgraced politician stunned New Yorkers by announcing his run for city comptroller last week, and now he’s shocking skeptics by rocketing to the lead in that race.
It is quite the turnaround for a man who took an incredibly public walk of shame in 2008, when it was revealed that Spitzer had frequented prostitutes. His name had surfaced in court documents as “Client 9” at a high-priced prostitution service. In one incident, the governor hired a 22-year-old call girl named Ashley Dupre for a meetup at Washington’s exclusive Mayflower Hotel.
Spitzer’s response was textbook: an apology with a silent wife by his side, resignation and a pledge to focus on his family.
“I will continue to make my case and hope that the public extends its votes,” Spitzer said in an interview with CNN’s “The Lead with Jake Tapper.” “I have always respected the public’s verdict. It is amazing. Juries, the electorate, we tend basically to get it right.”
What Spitzer did five years ago was incredibly reckless and, more important, very illegal. Under a law Spitzer himself signed, paying for sex is a class E felony.
He told CNN he has not broken that law since 2008.
But Spitzer once called prostitution modern-day slavery, and many people took offense to the fact that he never faced charges for soliciting prostitutes.
Kristin Davis, the New York madam Spitzer patronized, told the New York Daily News, “I spent five months at Riker’s Island from which I returned penniless, homeless, and forced to take sex offender classes for five months with pedophiles and perverts while he returned to his wife in his Fifth Avenue high rise without ever being fingerprinted, mug shot, remanded or charged with a crime under the very law he signed.” Davis is also running for NYC comptroller.
“The decision was made based upon the standards set by the Department of Justice and made by the U.S. Attorney’s Office. They looked at the evidence, and they dealt with me the way they dealt with everyone else in my situation,” Spitzer said.
When Spitzer went after Wall Street titans, he painted himself as fighting for the little guy. A lot of people might think, he is somebody with money and power, and his case was a perfect example of how people like Spitzer don’t end up doing the time the way the average person does.
“I’m not going to either quibble or debate what the appropriateness was. I did the one thing that I knew that was appropriate, which was to resign at the moment,” Spitzer said.
“Those who looked at it, this case, made the determination; they obviously did not bring charges, nor did they with anybody else similarly situated,” he said. “That was their judgment, not mine.”
As comptroller, Spitzer would be the chief financial officer of New York City.
Spitzer told MSNBC that his business partners would be compromised if he released his full tax returns. Spitzer has released some partial tax returns showing that he made more than $4 million last year. But voters deserve to know about any potential conflicts of interest.
“They know about all the conflicts. And in fact, I filed a complete document with the conflict of interest board. It tells exactly what I own in every instance as per required. I filed and made public my tax returns,” Spitzer said.
“I revealed not only what I earned (but) how much I paid: I paid 49% of my income in taxes last year,” he said.
The New York Times reports that Spitzer and his wife still live in separate apartments. The former governor has slapped down any rumors of divorce and says wife Silda is supportive of his run for office. Asked whether she would be by his side come Election Night, Spitzer said yes.
“I expect, yes, she will be – the family will be out there. She signed a petition, gathered petitions,” Spitzer said, adding that his daughters also gathered petitions on his behalf. “But I also have said our private lives are our private lives.”
After Spitzer resigned from office in 2008, he made a quick move toward rehabilitation via the cable airwaves, here on CNN and then on Current TV.
His path back to the limelight draws comparisons to other politicians felled by scandal, like Appalachian Trail enthusiast and former South Carolina Gov., now congressman, Mark Sanford and New York mayoral hopeful and fellow firebrand Anthony Weiner.
Like Weiner, Spitzer has been deluged by media attention, and he’s using that spotlight to highlight his record battling Wall Street interests as governor. Before taking the governor’s office, Spitzer was known as an aggressive attorney general.
Local polls show that approach may be working. The latest survey out this week shows Spitzer leading Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer by 15 points.
“In terms of redemption and forgiveness, yes, the public is forgiving. That is a remarkably affirmative quality in the American public. Now, whether that forgiveness will extend to me is an open question,” Spitzer said.
Spitzer will get his answer in a few short months. The Democratic primary is set for September 10.
________
CNN’s Edward Meagher contributed to this report.
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“Weiner made a dumb mistake, but Spitzer’s a hypocrite who doesn’t deserve 2nd chance,” by Denis Hamill, New York Daily News , 8 July 2013, < http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/spitzer-hypocrite-article-1.1393181 >.
Hypocrite.
Eliot Spitzer is a hypocrite.
We now have two men running for the city’s top two jobs who have been tainted by sex scandals.
But what differentiates Anthony Weiner from Eliot Spitzer is that Weiner made a dumb mistake texting suggestive photos of himself to women he never met. But Spitzer acted with calculated hypocrisy when he arranged for sex with prostitutes — dialing from a state cell phone with the same executive hand he used to sign into law, um, stiffer prostitution laws.
And then the former top law enforcement officer in the state of New York walked scott-free as his madam Kristin Davis sat on Rikers Island for four horrific months under Spitzer’s new law.
That’s obscene. That’s hypocrisy.
I’ve said here numerous time that I think prostitution should be legal.
So I have no moral problem with Spitzer paying a consenting adult sex worker handsomer than he’ll ever be for her services.
Far from being exploited, that hooker named Ashley Dupre went on to write an “advice” column for a daily newspaper, did high-priced photo spreads and now hustles racy lingerie.
Weiner broke no laws. Spitzer, former New York State attorney general and serving as governor of New York, flagrantly broke the spirit of his own strict new law raising the crime of prostitution from a Class A misdemeanor to a Class E felony.
That makes Eliot Spitzer a hypocrite.
Even in New York, the world capital of second chances, few forgive a hypocrite.
Hypocrite is derived from the Greek “hypokrites,” which means “actor.” Which is all Spitzer is in this race, a bored rich actor with no moral core who wants to return to the intoxicating stage of public power.
What’s so weird about Spitzer’s announcement on Sunday that he would run for New York City controller is that Kristin Davis has been the Libertarian Party candidate for the same office since April.
“He announced his candidacy on my birthday,” Davis told me on Monday. “A wonderful birthday gift. I can’t wait to get Eliot Spitzer on the debate stage. But my guess is that he will use his vast money he used to pay high-priced prostitutes to challenge every single one of my signatures to try to knock me off the ballot.”
What would be her first question of candidate Spitzer?
“I’ll ask his position on prostitution,” says Davis. “And if he thinks johns should be arrested and charged just like madams and prostitutes. If he thought it was fair that he was never charged as a john under his new felony law but that I spent four months in Rikers Island from which I returned penniless, homeless, and forced to take sex offender classes for five months with pedophiles and perverts while he returned to his wife in his 5th Ave. high rise without ever being fingerprinted, mug shot, remanded, or charged with a crime under the very law he signed.”
Davis said she’d also ask Spitzer what he’s done for the city of New York since he left office besides writing a book to rehabilitate his image and signing a $1 million CNN deal. “He admits he’s running for controller because Weiner has showed that voters in this city can forgive,” she says.
Weiner’s biggest offense was lying at first about sending the texts to save his marriage and his career.
That’s was bad, but voters have started to forgive as he rises in the polls.
The danger to Weiner now is that Spitzer’s presence in the race once again ups the “ick” factor.
Just as people were getting past Weiner’s sex scandal and concentrating on the issue of the decline of middle-class life in New York – of which Spitzer knows nothing — Spitzer returns the election focus to a Plato’s Retreat orgy of sensational headlines.
====================
“Spitzer’s Hypocrisy: Worse Than You Think – The disgraced New York governor’s anti-prostitution moralizing extended beyond U.S. borders.” Paul Karl Lukacs, 11 March 2008; < http://reason.com/archives/2008/03/11/spitzers-hypocrisy-worse-than >.
Many publications (reason included) are feasting this week on the all-but-cooked political carcass of New York’s law-and-order governor, Eliot Spitzer. The crusading former attorney general was brought low by the New York Times’ revelation yesterday afternoon that federal wiretaps caught him allegedly arranging an assignation with an overpriced prostitute last month at a Washington hotel. (When news of the underlying federal investigation broke last week, The Smoking Gun website posted screen grabs of the service’s web page, including photos of alleged talent and a price list that ran up to $3,100 an hour.)
If the allegations are true (and Spitzer’s statement that he “acted in a way that violates my obligation to my family” certainly sounds like an admission), the governor’s hypocrisy — and his belief that there is one set of laws for the little people and another set for Great Men like himself — is obvious. As attorney general and leader of the state’s organized crime task force, Spitzer spearheaded the prosecution of two alleged prostitution rings, according to the Times.
But Spitzer’s moralistic crusade against paid sex (by non-Spitzers, at least) wasn’t confined to New York or even the United States of America. As far as Spitzer is concerned, he has the right to prevent people from exchanging cash for cuddles anywhere in the world.
Big Apple Oriental Tours was a Queens-based travel agency with an angle: it marketed vacations for men to destinations such as Angeles City, Philippines, a jurisdiction in which adult prostitution is nominally illegal but is condoned and regulated by the government because of the money it brings in. The militant feminist group Equality Now had been agitating for prosecution of Big Apple Oriental Tours since at least 1996, but had never found a prosecutor willing to take the case. (Big Apple Oriental Tours has never been linked to child prostitution, which would be another matter entirely.)
In 2003, attorney general Spitzer, with one eye on the feminist vote and the other on the governor’s mansion, commenced a campaign of legal harassment against the tour company, obtaining a civil injunction prohibiting the company from advertising, which effectively put it out of business, according to owner Norman Barabash.
Spitzer then brought criminal proceedings against Barabash and co-owner Douglas Allen that continue to this day. The first indictment was dismissed because prosecutors improperly relied upon a hearsay tape recording. The second indictment was dismissed because the facts alleged did not constitute a felony, leaving only a misdemeanor charge of promoting prostitution in the fourth degree, a crime so penny-ante it applies to doormen or bouncers. The third indictment was dismissed on jurisdictional grounds, according to Barabash, and is currently before the appellate court. After all that harassment, there’s been no trial.
While Spitzer’s crusade may seem overzealous and, based on what we now know, disturbingly Freudian, his attempt to apply domestic laws to conduct outside the country isn’t that far outside the current legal mainstream. The mother of all extraterritorial laws, the 1977 U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, makes it illegal for U.S. citizens to bribe a foreign official, regardless of where the bribery took place.
Libertarians are understandably of two minds about L’Affaire Spitzer. On the one hand, a dedicated public servant will probably lose his job, and may be indicted, due to consensual liaisons and payments that should be a private matter completely outside the ambit of Justice Department wiretaps. On the other hand, Spitzer’s been hoisted by the moralistic petard that he can regulate any and all sexual behavior with which he disagrees, wherever it occurs. As Barabash said Monday, “It couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.”
====================
“Eliot Spitzer accused of being ‘a hypocrite’,” by Philip Sherwell in New York, 16 March 2008, The Telegraph; < http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1581872/Eliot-Spitzer-accused-of-being-a-hypocrite.html >.
A New York accountant who has spent five years fighting sex trade charges brought by Eliot Spitzer has slammed the disgraced New York governor as “a hypocrite, a phony and a fraud” after he was brought down for patronising a $1,000-an-hour prostitute.
Norman Barabash told The Telegraph that he was “dumbfounded” when he heard on his car radio last week that Mr Spitzer, who made his name as a crusading state attorney general, was embroiled in a prostitution ring scandal. Feminist groups which had urged Mr Spitzer to prosecute the Big Apple Oriental Tours agency co-run by Mr Barabash, 62, were just as shocked at the demise of their perceived ally, who officially steps down on Monday.
“It is painfully ironic that Governor Spitzer, who was one of the strongest political voices against the commercial sexual exploitation of women, not only in New York but across the nation, may have been himself involved in buying a woman for prostitution,” said Taina Bien-Aime, executive director of Equality Now.
Mr Spitzer, who was tipped as a future Democratic presidential candidate, signed the country’s toughest anti-prostitution state law early in his gubernatorial term last year, increasing sentences for men who used the services of escort agencies. He had received national prominence for prosecuting Mr Barabash and his partner Doug Allen, for allegedly promoting prostitution overseas by organising tours for single men to a Philippine city with a thriving red-light district. They deny the charges.
“We always felt the prosecution was undertaken for political purposes to curry favour with feminist organisations,” said Mr Barabash. “But now we found out that he was frequenting prostitutes at the same time, it clearly smacks of hypocrisy too.”
The case has dragged on for nearly five years through the New York courts after it was initially dismissed, and then reduced from a felony charge to a less serious misdemeanour offence when the two men were re-indicted.
“I have suffered stress and anxiety and sustained heavy costs fighting this case,” said Mr Barabash.
“It’s too early to break out the champagne as it’s still continuing, but I confess that the last few days have brought me a certain amount of pleasure.”
At one stage his lawyer Daniel Hochheiser submitted advertisements listing New York escort agencies that were not being prosecuted to argue that his client was being unfairly targeted. It has since been widely reported that Mr Spitzer was using such services at the time.
In another twist, Mr Spitzer wrote in a submission in 2006: “No matter where the prostitution activity may be contemplated, New York surely has an interest in protecting its citizens from sexually transmitted infections from those who travel abroad to engage in sex with prostitutes and then return to New York.”
But an affidavit released last week revealed that Mr Spitzer may have wanted to engage in unsafe sexual practices.
But one of America’s leading legal defence experts contended that Mr Spitzer had been unfairly singled out for attention by FBI agents. Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard academic who helped successfully defend Claus von Bulow and OJ Simpson against accusations of attempted murder and murder, argued that the federal government had no business probing financial transactions which were an apparent effort by Mr Spitzer to hide his actions from his wife.
“But the authorities didn’t close the investigation. They expanded it because they had caught a big fish in the wide net they had cast,” he wrote in the Wall Street Journal. In the 47-page FBI affidavit, greater detail, including embarrassing transcripts, was provided for “Client 9”, who was revealed to be Mr Spitzer, than the other eight Emperor’s Club clients covered by the complaint. Mr Spitzer reportedly became ensnared in the investigation after an initial probe by tax authorities into suspicious financial activities by an alleged shell company for the Emperor’s Club.
But there was also fevered speculation that powerful enemies he made on Wall Street during his prosecutions of prominent financial outlets may have been using private detectives to monitor his activities.
One man and three women accused of running the Emperor’s Club have been charged. So-called “johns” (customers) rarely face prosecution for buying sex, but investigators are looking into whether Mr Spitzer used any state or campaign funds for the encounter in a Washington hotel room or whether he broke laws by arranging for a prostitute to cross state boundaries or seeking to disguise the financial transactions.
Mr Spitzer, 48, has not been seen publicly since resigning on Wednesday, his wife Silda, 50, by his side. They have three teenage daughters, the oldest just four years younger than Ashley Alexander Dupre, the 22-year-old prostitute. Ms Dupre, an aspiring singer whom the governor knew as “Kristen”, has been in hiding since the controversy erupted and is believed to be holed up in her $4,000-a-month Manhattan apartment.
But she seems certain to cash in on her sudden notoriety. Larry Flynt, legendary publisher of Hustler magazine, said that he would pay her $1 million to pose naked for its pages. and Penthouse said it was also considering an offer for a nude cover shot. And two songs she has posted on a music-sharing website were selling at 98 cents each (its highest price), already earning her more than $500,000 according to some industry estimates.
A music video showing her acting as the girlfriend of rapper Mysterious was also circulating widely.
====================
“Jake Tapper Lays Into Spitzer Over Hypocrisy Of Never Being Charged With Breaking Law He Signed,” by Noah Rothman, 18 July 2013; < http://www.mediaite.com/tv/jake-tapper-lays-into-spitzer-over-hypocrisy-of-never-being-charged-with-breaking-law-he-signed/ >.
Former New York governor, television host, and current candidate for comptroller of New York City, Eliot Spitzer, joined CNN host Jake Tapper for an in-depth interview on Thursday. Tapper grilled Spitzer over why he believes that his crime, soliciting the services of a prostitute, was never prosecuted whereas others who abetted his crime were charged and convicted. Spitzer said that, even though he violated it, he was proud to sign an anti-human trafficking law while he served as governor.
Tapper observed that, when Spitzer served as attorney general of New York, he called prostitution “modern day slavery.” He noted that some have taken offense to the fact that Spitzer never faced charges for his violation of the law.
One of his opponents in the race for NYC comptroller, the former “Manhattan Madam” Kristin Davis, who provided Spitzer with prostitutes, recently slammed Spitzer’s hypocrisy in a quote to the New York Post.
I spent four months in Rikers Island from which I returned penniless, homeless, and forced to take sex offender classes for five months with pedophiles and perverts, while [Spitzer] returned to his wife in his 5th Ave. high rise without ever being fingerprinted, mug shot, remanded, or charged with a crime under the every law he signed.
“What do you say to her?” Tapper asked.
“Well, the decision was made based upon the standards set by the Department of Justice and made by the U.S. attorney’s office,” Spitzer replied. “They looked at the office and dealt with me the way they dealt with everyone else in my situation.”
“You really think that?” Tapper shot back. “I think a lot of people might think, look, you’re somebody with money, you’re somebody with power, and this is a perfect example of how people like you don’t end up doing the time the way the average person does.”
Spitzer said he refused to “quibble” over the decision not to charge Spitzer with a crime. “That was their judgment, not mine,” he said.
He added that he is proud of his office’s decision to sign an anti-human trafficking law while in office.
“Even though you violated it?” Tapper asked.
“That’s correct,” Spitzer replied. “There’s no question that law deserves to be there.”
===============
< http://prostitution.procon.org/view.background-resource.php?resourceID=753 >
Prostitution Laws of New York
Former Governor of New York Eliot Spitzer on June 6, 2007 signed into law legislation to prevent human trafficking and to suppress the demand for prostitution. New York’s punishment for patronizing prostitutes changed from a Class B misdemeanor (3 months jail/$500 fine) to a Class A (1 year jail/$1,000 fine) misdemeanor. The new law also clarified the statute Promoting Prostitution in the Third Degree, listed as a class D felony, to include those who run prostitution tourism businesses. A Class B felony was created for those involved in sex trafficking. [Note: Governor Spitzer announced his resignation on Mar. 12, 2008 over confirmed reports of his having patronized a prostitute.]