New York Lieutenant Governor Brian Benjamin resigned after being arrested on bribery costs on Tuesday.

Benjamin, who beforehand served as a state senator from Harlem, was arrested Tuesday morning on costs of bribery, trustworthy companies wire fraud and falsification of data. Governor Kathy Hochul introduced later Tuesday night that she had accepted his resignation.

"I've accepted Brian Benjamin's resignation efficient instantly. Whereas the authorized course of performs out, it's clear to each of us that he can not proceed to function Lieutenant Governor. New Yorkers deserve absolute confidence of their authorities, and I'll proceed working day-after-day to ship for them," Hochul wrote.

Benjamin's resignation comes solely seven months after being named lieutenant governor following Hochul's ascent to the governorship—after former Governor Andrew Cuomo's resignation as a consequence of sexual harassment allegations.

Brian Benjamin resigns following arrest
New York Lieutenant Governor Brian Benjamin, above in August 2021, resigned hours after being arrested on bribery costs.Michael M. Santiago/Getty Photographs

In an indictment unsealed Tuesday, Benjamin was accused of taking part in a scheme from 2019 to 2021 to obtain marketing campaign contributions from an actual property developer in alternate for his settlement to make use of his energy as a state senator to get a state-funded grant for a nonprofit managed by the developer.

He allegedly falsified marketing campaign donor kinds, misled regulators and supplied false info in vetting kinds whereas he was being thought of for the place.

Regardless of his resignation, he's nonetheless prone to stay on the poll in the course of the Democratic major, the Related Press reported. New York regulation leaves little room for him to be faraway from the poll—a technique could be for him to maneuver out of the state. He might additionally run for a down poll workplace.

A number of politicians in New York, together with Hochul's marketing campaign opponents, condemned Benjamin on Tuesday.

"Hochul has fostered a tradition of continued corruption with months of fundraising from pay to play insiders and other people doing enterprise with the state, and secretive funds offers that resulted within the billion greenback Payments stadium and little else," wrote Tom Suozzi, a Democratic congressman from Lengthy Island who's difficult Hochul within the governor's race.

Consultant Elise Stefanik, a Republican who represents northern New York, known as for his resignation, writing on Twitter: "New Yorkers deserve FULL accountability for Lt. Gov. Benjamin's crimes and for Kathy Hochul's corrupt complicity."

Benjamin's resignation got here after greater than a 12 months of turmoil for the New York governor's workplace. Cuomo resigned final August following a number of harassment allegations, in addition to different scandals, elevating Hochul to the workplace. In 2008, Governor Eliot Spitzer resigned amid an investigation.

Hochul promised an period of "open, moral governing that New Yorkers will belief" in her first speech as governor.

Replace 4/12/22, 5:57 p.m. ET: This story has been up to date with further info and background.