Lawmakers in Corruption Cases Say It’s Just How Business Is Done. Legal strategy rattles many in Albany who worry about how their work is being depicted

The Wall Street Journal reports:

Cozy relationships with lobbyists. Favors from government officials. Lucrative arrangements with outside businesses.

That is the life of New York state lawmakers, as it has been painted in federal corruption cases this year against several of them—and that’s coming from the defense attorneys.

What prosecutors call corruption is just the everyday business of lawmaking in Albany, defense attorneys have argued, a legal strategy that is rattling many at the Capitol who say it paints an ugly picture of their work.

The argument was crystallized in an April dismissal motion filed by lawyers for Assemblyman Sheldon Silver, saying the conduct alleged by Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara amounted to “not actual federal crimes but rather longstanding features of New York state government that the U.S. Attorney finds distasteful.”

Mr. Silver, a Manhattan Democrat who stepped down as Assembly speaker, was arrested in January and is facing seven charges, including extortion, wire and mail fraud. He has pleaded not guilty.

In July, former Sen. Tom Libous, a Binghamton Republican, was convicted of lying to federal agents who were investigating his alleged efforts to secure his son a job at a law firm and his push for a lobbying firm’s help paying his son’s salary.

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