FBI: Please Investigate Potential Corruption in Religious Freedom Repeal Vote

HELP FIRST FREEDOMS PROTECT YOUR RIGHTS

[NOTE: SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM FOR THE VIDEO TO MATCH TIMESTAMPS AND A DOWNLOADABLE COPY]

July 8, 2019

Kevin Barry, Esq.
President
First Freedoms, Inc.
PO Box 1816
New York, NY  10113

Honorable Christopher Wray
Director
FBI Headquarters
935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20535-0001

Dear Director Wray,

I am the President of First Freedoms, Inc., a non-profit organization dedicated to  advancing and defending the fundamental protections of the US Constitution, state constitutions, various federal and state laws, and religious and other rights enumerated in the First Amendment to the US Constitution. Among those rights is, of course, the right to religious freedom and free exercise. I write to ask you to open an investigation into possible public corruption of a June 13, 2019 vote which occurred in the New York State Assembly Health Committee (the “Committee”). On that date, the Committee voted on a bill to remove the religious exemption to vaccination, which had been law in New York since 1963. The Assembly Members sitting on the Committee voted 13-13. This outcome meant that the bill should not have passed out of Committee, preserving an important religious right for 20 million New Yorkers. However, after significant irregularities described in more detail below, the vote was altered to 14 in favor and 12 against. This unusual vote change allowed the bill to pass out of the Committee and led ultimately to the bill becoming law that same day.

I request that the FBI investigate the questionable circumstances which led to this vote repealing a religious freedom statute in New York State.

There were several irregularities surrounding the June 13th vote. Please see the video link here:  “FBI - PLEASE INVESTIGATE NY STATE’S CORRUPT VOTE TO REPEAL A RELIGIOUS FREEDOM” https://vimeo.com/345081341. This video footage was recorded by observers in the Committee room at the time of the Committee consideration of the bill.

Among the irregularities in this vote:

• At 1:50 on the video, the vote is tallied at 13-13. The bill should have died in the Health Committee at this moment. However, Committee Chairman Richard Gottfried did not announce the 13-13 result. Why did Chairman Gottfried not announce the result of the 13-13 vote? 
  
  
• Among the “NO” votes was freshman Democratic Assemblymember Nadir Sayegh. Instead of announcing the 13-13 outcome, killing the bill, Chairman Gottfried sits silently while Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, the most powerful Democrat in the Assembly, takes steps to alter the outcome of the vote. At 2:02 on the video, after the 13-13 vote takes place, Speaker Heastie summons Asm Sayegh to a private conversation. Immediately following his conversation with the Speaker and apparently relying on something told to him by Heastie, Sayegh changes his vote to “YES,” reviving the bill and ultimately removing a religious right from New Yorkers. What was discussed during Asm Sayegh’s and Speaker Heastie’s conversation?
  
  
• At 3:02 on the video, having just spoken to the Speaker and changing his “NO” vote to a “YES,” Asm Sayegh gives a speech attempting to explain his vote change. In direct contradiction to his “YES” vote, he says “As a student of Constitutional law, I have always protected individual rights and religious rights” and also “parental choice is very important to me”.  Was Asm Sayegh’s speech about respecting religious rights, while changing his vote to take away religious rights, ordinary political doublespeak or something more sinister? [It is important to note that when this bill reached the full Assembly, Asm Sayegh again voted “NO”, further evidencing the dubious nature of his “YES” vote in the Committee.]
  
  
• At 3:40 on the video, Chairman Gottfried immediately announces the manipulated 14-12 vote, allowing the bill to pass out of his Committee. Why did  Gottfried announce the altered 14-12 vote immediately and remain silent after the 13-13 vote? Was Chairman Gottfried promised something for his role in manipulating the vote, and if so, what was he promised and by whom? Were Gottfried’s actions ordinary party politics or something more sinister?
  
  
• At 4:05 of the video, I discuss the Albany Business Review report from June 12th, the day before the June 13th vote, which states that a wholly-owned Merck subsidiary is investing $48 million and claiming to provide 115 new jobs in the Albany area. (1)  What role if any did this June 12th announcement play in the irregular actions taken by multiple elected state officials on June 13th? Was Speaker Heastie at the Committee meeting at the request of Governor Andrew Cuomo to ensure the “right” result? Why did Speaker Heastie also take action to manipulate the 13-13 vote? Was Speaker Heastie acting on his own or at the direction of others? Were Speaker Heastie’s actions to change Asm Sayegh’s vote ordinary pressure on a junior party member or something more sinister?
  
  
• Why was Asm Sayegh selected by Speaker Heastie as the representative to change his vote? Was Speaker Heastie aware that Asm Sayegh’s brother, Dr. Nadem Sayegh, was under federal indictment for conspiracy to sell narcotics (oxycodone) and healthcare fraud, and also under investigation by New York State medical authorities? (2,3) Did anyone involved in this irregular vote believe that Dr. Sayegh might receive a more lenient sentence if Asm Sayegh changed his vote to support the position of the “Democratic Assembly Majority Conference”, which Chairman Gottffried says at 1:13 on the video “wants this bill on the Floor”? On July 5, 2019, the Rockland/Westchester Journal News reported that Dr. Sayegh pled guilty in federal court. (4)
  
  

Twenty million New Yorkers lost a religious right as a result of the highly irregular vote on June 13, 2019. This bill passed all other legislative hurdles and was signed by Governor Cuomo mere hours after the Committee vote, without a single public hearing in either the Assembly or Senate.

Please open an FBI investigation into this irregular vote. At this time, the public does not know why this vote changed from 13-13 to 14-12. It is my hope that the FBI will determine how this happened by interviewing Governor Andrew Cuomo, Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, Assembly Health Committee Chairman Richard Gottfried, Assemblymember Nadir Sayegh, Dr. Nadem Sayegh, and any others who participated in this vote or in Dr. Sayegh’s plea negotiations. Through interviews with these people, and by reviewing relevant communications between those involved, I hope that the FBI can shed light on what led to the changed vote in the Committee on June 13, 2019 that ultimately resulted in the repeal of an important religious right.

The people of New York deserve to know the truth regarding what happened during this highly irregular Committee vote, which resulted in the loss of a religious freedom.

I can be reached at kb151@pm.me should you have further questions.

Sincerely,

Kevin Barry, Esq.
President
First Freedoms, Inc.

CC: 

President Donald J. Trump
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

First Lady Melania Trump
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

Honorable Roger Severino, Director
Office of Civil Rights
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Conscience and Religious Freedom Division
200 Independence Ave., SW
Suite 515F, HHH Building
Washington, D.C. 20201


REFERENCES

1. This Merck subsidiary is expanding in Albany — and hiring

By Liz Young  – Reporter, Albany Business Review, Jun 12, 2019
https://www.bizjournals.com/albany/news/2019/06/12/merck-subsidiary-ilum-hiring-expanding-albany.html

“ILÚM Health Solutions plans to create 115 jobs in the Albany area over the next five years, investing $48 million, The company currently has 14 on staff at its offices at the Bull Moose Club on State Street in downtown Albany … ILÚM is a subsidiary of the pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co. Inc. (NYSE: MRK)....”


2.  United States of America vs. Nadem J. Sayegh (federal indictment)

https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/press-release/file/1100296/download


3.  In the Matter of Nadem Jamil Sayegh, MD (NYS Department of Health)

https://apps.health.ny.gov/pubdoh/professionals/doctors/conduct/factions/FileDownloadAction.action;jsessionid=hWfTGlHwSkDfYWIFuchrtNbskGp3FaQlhowdPQVMii1tbz9-erBo!235999378?finalActionId=12383&fileName=BRD+195964.pdf&fileSeqNum=1


4.  Yonkers doctor accused of selling painkiller prescriptions faces sentencing
Jonathan Bandler, Rockland/Westchester Journal News, July 5, 2019
https://www.lohud.com/story/news/crime/2019/07/05/yonkers-doctor-nadem-sayegh-pleads-guilty-illegally-selling-oxycodone-prescriptions/1656438001/

“A Yonkers doctor who is the brother of a freshman state assemblyman will be sentenced in October for illegally selling oxycodone prescriptions.

Nadem Sayegh, 65, an endocrinologist who had offices in the Bronx and Yonkers, pleaded guilty last month to conspiracy to distribute narcotics and health care fraud. An indictment in October accused Sayegh of writing prescriptions between 2012 and 2017 for more than 50,000 oxycodone pills to an unnamed patient and co-conspirator in exchange for more than $100,000, expensive dinners and whiskey, cruises and a trip to Puerto Rico…”