Langone, Target of Spitzer Suit, Raises Funds for Rival

The New York attorney general, Eliot Spitzer’s challenger for the state’s Democratic gubernatorial nomination received hundreds of thousands of dollars from people with ties to Home Depot Incorporated founder Kenneth Langone, a registered Republican and target of a Spitzer lawsuit.Mr. Langone, a defendant in Mr. Spitzer’s suit over the ousted New York Stock Exchange chairman, Richard Grasso’s retirement pay, supports the Nassau County executive, Thomas Suozzi, for governor. Mr. Suozzi’s campaign received at least $300,000 from Mr. Langone, his wife, Elaine, and two adult sons, and present and former business and charity group associates, Mr. Suozzi’s campaign records on the state Board of Election Web site showed.“I’ve found a substantial number in the business community inside and outside New York who feel that Spitzer as governor wouldn’t be friendly to business,” Mr. Langone said in a January 12 interview. Earlier that day, he had a lunch with 15 business associates, nine of whom promised to help Mr. Suozzi, Mr. Langone said.Mr. Suozzi, 43, in his second term as top official in Nassau, a suburban county of 1.4 million on New York City’s eastern border, needs money for ads to gain name recognition. A Quinnipiac University poll of 1,095 registered voters released January 19 found 73% don’t know enough about Mr. Suozzi to form an opinion. Mr. Spitzer led Mr. Suozzi 72% to 8% in the poll, which had a 3-point margin of error.“Spitzer has a commanding lead, but Suozzi hasn’t started yet,” the poll director, Maurice Carroll, said. “If that Wall Street money comes through, Suozzi has a shot at it because he’s attractive, he’s got a record of accomplishment taming Nassau’s budget deficits, he has a base, and he’s got a message in cleaning up Albany.”Mr. Suozzi, who hasn’t formally declared his candidacy, formed an exploratory committee January 11 and has $5.04 million on hand, compared with $19 million for Mr. Spitzer.Mr. Spitzer, who has won billions of dollars in settlements from investigations of Wall Street companies, mutual funds and insurers, also held 2-1 leads in the poll against the Republican prospects, who include the former Massachusetts governor, William Weld, and the Paychex Incorporated chairman, Thomas Golisano. Governor Pataki, a Republican, isn’t seeking a fourth term.Citizen Action of New York, an activist group that has endorsed Mr. Spitzer, criticized Mr. Suozzi’s acceptance of Langone-linked contributions January 19 as “relying on dirty money from Wall Street insiders.”In response, Mr. Suozzi’s campaign director, Kimberly Devlin, said, “Not one penny came with any strings attached.” Mr. Langone, a resident of Nassau County’s Sands Point, supported Mr. Suozzi in previous local campaigns, she said. Mr. Suozzi refused an interview request.Neither Mr. Langone nor his Washington-based spokesman, Jim Mc-Carthy, would identify the people he successfully solicited for Suozzi contributions. The former Big Board director and his family donated $64,000,according to the campaign finance records.Mr. Langone, 70, hailed Mr. Suozzi’s record in Nassau, which received a combined 11 credit upgrades from three rating companies during his first term. “He is extremely sensitive to the need for economic development and job growth,” Mr. Langone said.He also has said Mr. Spitzer sought “headlines, not justice,” when he named Mr. Langone a defendant in a May 2004 suit over his role heading the stock exchange compensation committee that awarded Mr. Grasso a $187 million retirement package.The attorney general won’t take the case to trial in his remaining 11 months in office, Mr. Langone said in the January 12 interview. “He’s got no evidence.” Today, Mr. Langone cited lack of evidence in a motion asking a New York State Supreme Court justice, Charles Ramos, to throw out the lawsuit.Mr. Spitzer, interviewed January 13, said his office is ready for trial, and the defendants are to blame for delays. “Our case is rock solid,” he said. “We will win.”An examination of campaign records found Mr. Suozzi’s donors include the Home Depot chairman and chief executive officer, Robert Nardelli, who gave $16,200.An original Home Depot shareholder, Walter Buckley, and his wife, Marjorie, contributed $32,000. Home Depot co-founder Bernard Marcus and his wife, Billi, gave $32,000, while Steven Holzman, who Mr. Langone named in 2001 as chief executive of his Invemed Associates LLC, donated $16,000.A hedge-fund manager, Stanley Druckenmiller, and his wife, Fiona, gave $32,000. Mr. McCarthy said Mr. Langone and Mr. Druckenmiller have “a business relationship.”The Druckenmillers contributed $50,000 to Mr. Spitzer in November 2003, the records show. Mr. Druckenmiller declined several requests for comment on why he has since donated to Mr. Suozzi. Mr. Druckenmiller also gave $48,527 to Mr. Weld.Mr. McCarthy said Mr. Langone didn’t solicit another hedge-fund chief, Daniel Loeb of Third Point Management Company LLC, who donated $50,000 to Mr. Suozzi after sending $16,200 to Mr. Spitzer in 2005. Mr. Loeb wouldn’t comment.Some big Suozzi donors have ties to the Robin Hood Foundation, where Mr. Langone is on the board. They are a fund manager and the foundation’s founder, Paul Tudor Jones, and his wife Sonia, who donated $32,000; and the managing partner at Maverick Capital Management LLC and a foundation board member, Lee Ainslie, who gave $16,000.Mr. Langone said Mr. Spitzer’s “threats” against business leaders are helping fund raising for Mr. Suozzi. Mr. Langone’s criticisms ofMr. Spitzer mirror those made in recent months by a former Goldman, Sachs Incorporated chairman, John Whitehead, 84.Mr. Whitehead said that after he wrote a critical op-ed article in the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Spitzer phoned him and said: “I will be coming after you.”Mr. Spitzer, 46, has said he didn’t make threatening remarks to Mr. Whitehead and hasn’t alienated business leaders.“What we have done is restore integrity to the capital markets, the mutual fund world, the insurance markets,” he said.Mr. Spitzer has received $24.8 million in contributions, records show. Donors include financial managers such as the chairman and CEO of Gamco Investors Incorporated, Mario Gabelli, who donated $24,000; the principal and portfolio manager at Entrust Capital Incorporated, Gregg Hymowitz, who gave $50,000, and Apollo Advisors’s Leon Black, who donated $50,000.Mr. Spitzer also got five-figure donations from lobbyists, trial lawyers, and labor unions.

Langone, Target of Spitzer Suit, Raises Funds for Rival

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