Cymbrowitz Caught Spending Campaign Funds On Foreign Travel — Again

Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz has once again dipped into his campaign funds to finance a European excursion, the Observer reports.

Filings with the New York State Campaign Finance Board show Cymbrowitz spent $2,145 in campaign cash to pay for airline tickets to and from Greece last year. He also paid an additional $425 to Cloud Tours — A Greek-American owned travel company in Queens, according to the Observer. The trip included stops in Turkey and the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland. He was joined by Kingston Assemblyman Kevin Cahill on the tour, the Observer reports.

According to Cymbrowitz’s office, a portion of the trip to Poland was financed by the Jewish community of Krakow, while the trip to Turkey was partially paid for the by the Turkish-American Peace Islands Institute.

This is the second time Cymbrowitz has been called out for using campaign money on foreign travel. He drew the ire of good government advocates in 2014 when the Observer revealed he blew $1,300 in re-election funds at a hotel, three restaurants and a gift shop in Barcelona and Germany.

Just as he did in 2014, Cymbrowitz defended the trip by explaining it was meant to connect with overseas Jewish communities and visit Holocaust memorials.

“As the son of Holocaust survivors from Poland, and Assembly representative of one of the largest Jewish constituencies in all of New York State, I am proud of the work that I do to keep the horrors of the Holocaust front and center in our memories and to lend support to Jewish communities around the world, especially in countries where Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism are dangerously on the rise,” Cymbrowitz said in a statement released by his office.

Cymbrowitz also said the trip was Board of Elections “thoroughly vetted and approved” the trip before he committed to it.

The Observer points out that New York’s campaign spending laws are “notoriously lax” and give politicians a lot of wiggle room to connect expenditures to the their elected office. Susan Lerner, executive director of good government group Common Cause/NY, told the Observer that an official investigation might be appropriate and repeated previous calls for elected officials to separate their campaign and officeholder expenses.

“There are always questions when elected officials take long trips to Europe with campaign money,” she reportedly said.

Cymbrowitz touted his journey to Poland on social media, which besides Auschwitz included a stop in Demblin, the birthplace of his family.

“Not a single Jew remains in Demblin today thanks to the Nazis. I met with the Mayor and town historian, and visited the site of the Jewish ghetto and slave labor camp,” Cymbrowitz said in a statement. “These are experiences that relate directly to Holocaust education and the importance of fighting anti-Semitism, which have been central themes throughout my 16 years in the Legislature.”