Gov. Kathy Hochul created at least the appearance of a conflict of interest when her administration approved permits benefiting two recent clients of a large law firm that employs her husband, environmental activists and two New York State lawmakers said this week.
The criticism stemmed from her administration’s announcement on Monday that it would allow the construction of a contentious natural gas pipeline and issue a permit to a Central New York cryptocurrency mine whose operations have been opposed by the activists.
In separate statements over the past few days, the activists and lawmakers — two Democratic members of the State Assembly who are aligned with Zohran Mamdani, the mayor-elect of New York City — said Ms. Hochul should have at least recused herself from the decisions.
They noted that Ms. Hochul’s husband, William Hochul, works as a lawyer for the firm Davis Polk & Wardwell, which has represented the owner of the pipeline company and a private equity firm that has a large stake in the cryptocurrency mine.
One of the lawmakers, Assemblywoman Emily Gallagher of Brooklyn, said that in granting the approvals Ms. Hochul was “trading our futures for her own personal profit.”
A spokesman for the governor’s office vigorously disputed the claims, calling them “ridiculous.”
Mr. Hochul “does not take on any clients with any matters before New York State — period,” said the spokesman, Anthony Hogrebe, who added that Davis Polk was “one of the largest law firms in the world.”
The governor’s office said that Ms. Hochul follows a strict recusal policy to avoid conflicts with her husband’s work. But the decisions in question required no recusal, Mr. Hogrebe said, because Davis Polk did not represent either the pipeline or the crypto miner in their efforts to obtain permits.
“People are welcome to debate policy, but attacking the integrity of the state’s decision-making process without a shred of evidence is irresponsible,” Mr. Hogrebe said.
At Davis Polk, Mr. Hochul “advises clients on complex government and internal investigations, crisis management, communications strategy, risk mitigation and other matters,” according to the firm’s website.
One of the firm’s clients, Tulsa-based Williams Companies, is planning to build a $1 billion underwater gas pipeline off New York City. The pipeline project had previously been rejected three times by New York State regulators over environmental concerns. But on Monday, Ms. Hochul said she would allow it, citing a need to hedge against possible energy shortages.
Another recent client of Davis Polk, Atlas Holdings LLC, was a major investor in the cryptocurrency mining firm, Greenidge Generation, which has faced criticism for using a gas-fired power plant to run computers that mine Bitcoin. Atlas retained Davis Polk from June to August for help with an unrelated matter, the development of a data center in Pennsylvania.
State environmental regulators had been threatening to halt Greenidge’s operations over air pollution concerns but ultimately issued the permit, citing pledges by the company to drastically cut emissions.
Separately, Davis Polk has provided advice on developing investment products to President Trump’s social media company, Trump Media & Technology Group, after it announced a partnership with a digital asset trading platform called Crypto.com. Neither Trump Media nor Crypto.com has any relationship with Greenidge, a spokesman for Atlas said.
An opponent of both the pipeline and the Greenidge operation, Kim Fraczek, said Mr. Hochul’s work for Davis Polk raised questions regardless of whether he had personally worked on behalf of the projects.
“It doesn’t pass the smell test for us,” said Ms. Fraczek, the director of an environmental group called Sane Energy Project. “They’re married, they talk to each other every night, and they would both economically benefit.”
The governor’s ethics disclosures show that Mr. Hochul has earned between $850,000 and $950,000 a year from the firm, but he is not a partner and does not share in its profits.
In a statement, Davis Polk said that it had represented Atlas only on the Pennsylvania matter. The firm said the pipeline owner, Williams, was a “longstanding firm client” but “had no involvement in the pipeline project.”
This week was not the first time Ms. Hochul has faced questions over her husband’s dealings. Before he joined Davis Polk in early 2024, Mr. Hochul was general counsel for the entertainment and stadium concessions giant Delaware North.
The governor, who took office in 2021, said at the time that she would recuse herself from all decisions involving her husband’s employer. But seven months later, she took aim at Delaware North’s biggest competitor in the Buffalo gambling market, the Seneca Nation of Indians, freezing its bank accounts to force the tribe to turn over $564 million in gambling revenue — money that the state had been trying to obtain for four years amid negotiations over a now-lapsed gambling compact.
Jay Root is an investigative reporter for The Times based in Albany, N.Y., covering the people and events influencing — and influenced by — state and local government.
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