Cuomo Advisers Forming Political Team

Key political advisers, after consultation with Gov. Mario M. Cuomo, began to assemble a nationwide team of experts and operatives Wednesday that could be used if the governor decides to enter the Democratic presidential race.

John Marino, New York state Democratic Party chairman, said the effort began after he spoke with Cuomo several days ago.

“The governor started to talk to me about being prepared in general terms,” Marino said in a telephone interview, stressing that Cuomo still had not made up his mind whether to run.

Marino said he was being assisted in the effort to staff a possible campaign by Brad Johnson, the governor’s Washington lobbyist and by Michael DelGuidice, a former top adviser to Cuomo who resigned to become a New York investment banker. During the last several weeks, DelGuidice has been taking soundings in private about Cuomo seeking the White House, sources indicated.

Marino said pressures of the political calendar and recruitment efforts by the announced presidential candidates made it necessary for Cuomo to begin to reach out to potential staff members on a contingency basis.

“We are trying to find out from people who are good and who are good for specific roles,” Marino said. “My feeling is, the governor, if he decides to run, needs to be given as much information as possible. He needs to have fund-raising people in place. He needs to be given choices who will play roles in the campaign.

“What the governor gave me was very broad: ‘Just think about how we should be prepared. Put some things together,’ ” Marino, a close Cuomo political strategist, said.

“That doesn’t mean he is running. He made that very clear to me. My action is on my own. It is a very broad interpretation of what the governor asked for. We are very far behind. That would make us less far behind.”

The effort to sound out staff in states from New York to California to handle such issues as fund raising, liaison with ethnic constituencies and detailed campaign strategy was a clear sign of the intensification of the governor’s more than six-week decision-making process.

A major factor in the decision is whether the governor and legislative leaders can reach broad agreement on solving New York state’s estimated $875-million budget deficit for the remainder of this fiscal year and a projected $2-billion gap next year.

A major deadline facing a potential Cuomo campaign is Dec. 20, the date candidates must file to enter the New Hampshire primary. Cuomo has declined to be pinned down whether he will announce his presidential intentions before that date. But he has indicated that he would prefer to run in New Hampshire if he enters the presidential race.