State GOP chair calls for probe vs. Cuo

The head of the state Republican Party called Thursday for a criminal investigation of Gov. Cuomo over allegations that a former top aide kept using his state office in Manhattan while working on Cuomo’s 2014 re-election campaign.

GOP Chairman Ed Cox filed a written complaint with Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance Jr., then held a news conference outside the Manhattan federal courthouse where ex-Cuomo aide Joseph Percoco is being tried on corruption charges.

Cox said state laws “make it very clear that a public officer or a private citizen cannot use a public office to con- duct private business or political activity — and that is clearly, on the basis of sworn testimony and hard evidence presented in the trial in the courthouse behind us, what Joe Percoco did.

“The governor must have known that that office should not have been used by a private citizen to con- duct political activity or personal-business activity as Joe Percoco was doing,” Cox alleged, adding, “Was the governor aiding and abetting” Percoco?

State Democratic Party Executive Director Geoff Berman called the probe demand “yet another blatant attempt to politicize law enforcement from Ed Cox and his merry band of hypocrites.

“The fact is the state GOP lacks any credible candidates, whereas Democrats have a strong slate of statewide office holders running for reelection,” Berman said.

Vance’s office declined to comment.