New York's next state attorney general can be expected to litigate high-profile cases, from federal lawsuits against the Trump administration to fending off challenges to state laws and regulations from companies and advocacy groups.

Each of the four Democrats running for attorney general has pledged to continue current Attorney General Barbara Underwood's work fighting Trump administration policies they see as inimical to New Yorkers.

Each candidate has also said that a deep knowledge and background of both state and federal litigation matters when running to be the state's next top lawyer.

New York City Public Advocate Letitia James, U.S. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, D-New York, Fordham Law professor Zephyr Teachout and vice president of government affairs for Verizon's tristate region Leecia Eve are all competing to be the Democratic nominee for attorney general in next week's statewide primary.

They were each asked during a forum on Tuesday evening, sponsored by the New York Law Journal and the New York City Bar Association, which case they are most proud to have litigated in court. Here are their answers, which have been edited for clarity.

Sean Patrick Maloney: “There's a woman named Maria Christina that I know well and her dad was deported after living here for 35 years. Her mom got deported not long after. They came here illegally in the 1980s and from what I can tell didn't do anything wrong after that. He worked two jobs, and was so depressed about being thrown out that he suffered a series of health setbacks. He found himself in Mexico with no health insurance, no network of friends and family, and no access to real care and on Feb. 27 he died of a heart attack. I did everything I knew how to get him out of jail so he could spend the last couple weeks with his family and I did that. Basing my appeal on my experience in the White House, I knew how to do that. But I couldn't have stopped it. So, when my husband and I went to his funeral, his daughter Maria thanked us and she said 'Thank you for what you did for my dad.' So I'm going to tell you about a story that I don't feel very good about, which is that I don't feel like I did enough, and ladies and gentlemen I don't think any of us are doing enough and that's why I'm running for attorney general because as attorney general you can go into federal court and seek an injunction against unconstitutional or illegal federal immigration policies. As a congressman you can slow it down, so I think that we need to do more.”

Leecia Eve: “The case that I'm most proud of is the case that I handled with three other young women associates when I was a young associate at Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C. I joined three other women in representing as a plaintiff class all women incarcerated in the District of Columbia prisons against the District of Columbia. The name of the case filed in federal district court in the District of Columbia is Women Prisoners of the District of Columbia v. the District of Columbia. There were four parts of the case, one dealing with environmental care, one dealing with the lack of equal educational opportunities to male prisoners, sexual harassment. We had clients who felt that they had to have sexual intercourse with prison guards to be able to have a guarantee of being able to see their children. I was in charge of the obstetrical and gynecological part of the case. One of my clients had her leg shackled to a hospital bed as she brought a child into this world. This is in the nation's capital, and our country. This conduct was clearly inhumane as well as being unconstitutional so we filed suit, we fought hard—the litigators out there know what I'm talking about—we fought very hard. We won. The case was appealed to the D.C. Circuit, from which Judge [Brett] Kavanaugh now hails, and we won the D.C. Circuit. Then they sought to appeal it to the United States Supreme Court, which denied cert.”

Letitia James: “The case that I'm most proud of is representing a child pro bono who came to this country illegally. His father was murdered in Honduras. His mother abandoned him. I went to court and represented him and was successful in getting an asylum petition granted. He recently graduated from high school. He lives in Brooklyn with his uncle and he just introduced me to his girlfriend who I do not like. I also filed recently an in-friend brief on behalf of a child who was ripped out of the arms of a mother. I'm so happy to say that our petition was granted. The family has been reunited and they've been released from detention. We should not live in a world where children are ripped out of the arms of their [parents] and it was important, it was imperative that I go to court and represent their families. I think I'm the only candidate, or maybe there was another candidate, I've visited a number of detention centers to ensure that they are complying with federal law and it's critically important that we all understand our values and our principles as Americans and that we never, ever allow that to happen again.”

Zephyr Teachout: “Three days after Trump took office, I and a small team of lawyers representing people in the hospitality and restaurant industry sued Donald Trump in the Southern District of New York for violating the foreign and domestic emoluments clauses of the Constitution. He is taking foreign government money from the Chinese government, from a Saudi prince, through his businesses going into his own pocket. That's in direct violation of the Constitution, but these are issues that have never been litigated before. We built this legal strategy. That case is currently on appeal in the Second Circuit. I've taken myself off that case as a candidate, but I continue to advise the attorneys general in D.C. and Maryland and they just recently had a major victory, and in that victory, [U.S. District] Judge [Peter] Messitte cited my work explicitly adopting my theory of the emoluments clause.”

The statewide primary is Thursday, Sept. 13.

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