Brian Benjamin never wanted a pardon from Trump

Former Lieutenant Gov. Brian Benjamin is officially a free man – and he’s feeling good.

The Southern District of New York formally dropped its corruption case against Benjamin last week following the death of a key witness last year. 

Federal attorneys indicted Benjamin in 2022, just months after Gov. Kathy Hochul tapped him as her lieutenant, and he quickly resigned. Later that year, he got some relief when a judge dismissed the most serious charges against him as they couldn’t show evidence for an explicit quid-pro-quo agreement. Prosecutors tried to appeal the decision and continued with lesser charges related to falsifying documents. 

Real estate developer Gerald Migdol pleaded guilty to making straw donor donations to Benjamin’s campaign for New York City comptroller in exchange for a $50,000 grant and cut a deal with prosecutors to testify against Benjamin. But his unexpected death meant that the prosecution lost a major part of their case against Benjamin. Prosecutors’ decision to drop all charges against Benjamin means that his legal saga has finally come to a close. 

After years of largely keeping a low profile, Benjamin was quick to get out and about again. The day after the charges were dropped, he attended a National Action Network event in Harlem for MLK Day, where he received a warm welcome. And he’s not keeping quiet any more either. City & State caught up with Benjamin to get his thoughts on how he was treated during the case and whether he ever considered seeking a pardon from President Donald Trump. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

How are you feeling now that all the charges have been dropped?

I feel relieved. I would not say I feel vindicated. I feel relieved. I feel grateful. I'm grateful for the fact that I had the resources to fight in court. If you can think about the cost of a motion to dismiss, that's a cost. So I just feel very grateful because I do acknowledge that I had so many things going for me, even though I was in this awful position. There were two people involved here, and one is no longer alive. So there's never going to be a chance for him to say, well, “Brian Benjamin didn't do this and, and you know, there's no evidence of this.” With all that “he said, she said,” people (are) just either going to believe me or not believe me or not care.

How do you feel you’ve been treated during this period? Do you feel like you’ve been left out to dry or that anyone has betrayed you?

I do feel that whenever you're on top, everyone's there. And when you're not, everyone's not. So I didn't have any misconceptions around what I expected. But I do say a number of my Harlem elected official family, they were with me 100% from day one. 

What about the governor? I know you chose to resign, but do you think you were treated fairly by her? Is there any bad blood?

No, there’s no bad blood there. When I resigned, I resigned for the good of the party. I got indicted, literally, two months before the election. So I was very well aware of the implications of what that would mean for her at the top of the ticket, what that would mean for (Rep.) Hakeem Jeffries and efforts in the Congress. I didn't want to be a distraction for that. There's definitely no bad blood.

Do you regret that decision to resign or do you still think it was the right one to make at the time?

At this moment, I still believe it was the right decision to make, and there's a couple reasons for that. Number one, like I said, I didn't want to be a distraction to the party. Number two, given the significance of the charges, I wanted to focus all of my time and effort on fighting them. (And) I'm young. I mean, I'm in my mid-40s, right? I'm not 75 where it’s this or nothing.

In that vein, do you see yourself running for public office again?

I don't rule anything in or out. That's number one. Number two, I do feel like there are opportunities to be helpful and involved in the community. I'm very interested in issues around innocence and the fact that I'm very clear on the fact that I was very privileged to be able to to fight. I believe we have a “guilty until proven innocent” system, not the presumption of innocence. I felt completely attacked and my reputation, and this whole concept of presumption of innocence – it’s not typically true, particularly when it involves elected officials. If you don't have the money to fight for your innocence, (even) if you're innocent, you're gonna have to plead guilty to something, because it's too risky to take the chance. It's a harsh system.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams has drawn parallels between your case and his – at least in how you’ve been treated. What do you make of those parallels? Do you think they’re fair?

First of all, I believe in the presumption of innocence, because I do know how allegations work. And I did read the indictment, and I think there's a number of things that need to get sorted out in a court of law. I've seen indictments that you look at, you go, “Okay, all right, that looks pretty overwhelming.” But then indictments that are kind of like relying on people's opinions (and) another thing is relying on people who are already compromised themselves. I want to reserve judgment. I think that’s the appropriate thing to do if we believe in the presumption of innocence. 

I find it odd that some of my Democratic friends, who claim to be so interested in criminal justice reform and claim to be so interested in Black and brown lives, somehow have a hard time being able to extend that to everybody. I have no clue, or no knowledge of what the mayor did or did not do.

Do you feel comfortable with Adams drawing comparisons?

I don't have any opinions on it. My view is he's doing what he needs to do. For me, I said nothing. I also resigned. It’s a whole different dynamic. Personally, I would have not liked to be in a situation where potentially things I could say could be used against me in a court of law and could impact the jury. That's not my style, but I don't have a problem with it. I think if that's how he wants to communicate, then that's fine.

Former U.S. Attorney Damian Williams recently published an op-ed with us that got people talking about his future. How would you feel if he decided to run for office?

I do believe that everyone has the right to run for public office. I think the voters deserve to have choices. I do think that decisions that were made in his office will be questioned if he chose to do that. And I think that that's very appropriate. 

But I also want to say that Albany was a great experience. I know that there are those who like to criticize legislators and try to throw this whole picture that everyone's corrupt. Nothing could be further from the truth. I just want to make sure that, the same way we don't want to make this claim that all prosecutors are being weaponized or weaponizing the system, I think it's important to also say that a lot of elected officials are out here doing the right thing. And yes, do we have bad apples? We have bad apples, of course, in every field. But I don't like individuals who want to cast this broad brush on any people.

Do you think you were politically persecuted by federal prosecutors?

I believe that there was a view of Albany that enabled blinders, which led to folks missing a lot of key issues. For example, is there even a crime here? Where's the explicit agreement? Start with that. I think there were so many elements. 

For example, why I gave the grant. One of the most important grants that I believe I gave when I was a legislator was this very grant. I was so involved in that nonprofit, so involved in giving out school supplies for kids, so involved in helping to facilitate them being even more active in the community when most individuals don't want to give resources. Most public schools in Harlem don't have million dollar PTA boards where parents can get money and send the kids to colleges and do all these important things. We need outside resources in order to do that. And Friends of Public School Harlem was doing that. For me, I think all of that was missed. And I think it was missed because there was a view, “Oh, they're all corrupt, so there must be something here, so we're gonna just focus on what we want to focus on, but not look at the broader picture.” I think that that's very unfortunate.

There’s speculation that Mayor Adams is vying for a pardon in his own case from President Trump. Would you have accepted a pardon if it was offered to you?

No. For me, I either wanted the Southern District of New York to drop the charges or we go to trial. I personally would not want the perception that I was guilty. 

First of all, Gerry Migdol passed away in February 2024, okay. My condolences to the family, but I wish he hadn’t. His argument was (that) he came to believe, over a period of interviews with the FBI, that there, in his mind, there was an agreement: this was for that. He and I never discussed that. He doesn't allege that he discussed that with me, he doesn't allege that I discussed that with him. I would have liked for that to have been dealt with in open court. Or to have the charges dropped, and then someone to say, “We made a mistake.” So for me, a pardon would basically, effectively, look as if I was guilty. I wouldn't want that.