From Democrat&Chronicle.com:

The state’s Democratic Rural Conference is expected to interview just about every Democratic candidate for statewide office in advance of its convention at month’s end. But so far there’s one glaring exception: state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, the party’s presumptive nominee for governor.

Cuomo has yet to announce his plans to run for governor, despite criticism from his political opponents over his silence on the campaign trail. And he has yet to agree to sit down with the rural conference.

But Cuomo’s announcement to run for governor is expected in the days before the Democratic Rural Conference on April 30 and May 1 in Niagara Falls. The conference is considered a bellwether for Democratic candidates because the group of upstate party leaders will conduct a straw poll on whom it will endorse for this year’s races.

And Cuomo in the past has been well received by the group. He won its endorsement in 2002 in his first run for governor, which ended unsuccessfully when he pulled out of the race days before the primary against frontrunner H. Carl McCall.

Read the Rest…