Over the past few months, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s COVID-19 press briefing heroics have been fading into the past, and he is currently amidst multiple scandals.
On February 27, 2021, one of Cuomo’s former executive assistants, Charlotte Bennett, accused him of sexual harassment. Bennett also pointed to a tweet from Lindsey Boylan, a former Cuomo aide, who accused the Governor of sexual harassment in 2017 and 2018. Neither harassment has been confirmed, and Cuomo denied both incidents. One Skidmore student told me that “I certainly don’t care for him and have a negative view of him, especially in light of the recent harassment allegation against him.”
On March 2, a third sexual harassment allegation emerged. Anna Ruch, who worked on both President Obama and President Biden’s campaigns, explained that she was sexually harassed by Cuomo at a wedding in 2019. Hours after Ruch revealed her story, a journalist asked Cuomo if he was taking any steps to make women feel more comfortable in his workplace. Cuomo responded by arguing that sexual harassment is a problem in journalism too. He added, "When you say, 'It's state government,' you do a disservice to women, with all due respect, even though you're a woman. It's not government. It's society."
With three accusations and his defensive response, Governor Cuomo is facing intense criticism from the public and politicians alike. Unfortunately, these allegations coincide with another scandal: the COVID-19 data cover-up in nursing homes.
Since late March 2020, controversy over Governor Cuomo’s COVID-19 nursing home regulations has been swirling around New York. On March 25, Governor Cuomo announced that nursing home residents could not be kept out of facilities, even if they tested positive for COVID-19. He changed the policy on May 10, but both lawmakers and citizens question how Governor Cuomo’s initial decision may have impacted case numbers. In just six weeks, 310 New York nursing homes accommodated over 6,300 hospital patients.
These concerns came to a head on January 28, 2021, when Attorney General James released a report outlining the data that New York provided for the Department of Health (DOH). The report reveals that in a sample of approximately 10% of New York’s nursing homes (62), the discrepancies between Facility Deaths Reported to the New York Office of the Attorney General (OAG) and the Total Deaths Publicized by DOH was -55.74%. For example, as of February 11, there were almost 15,000 cases in long-term care residences, as opposed to the 8,500 cases previously reported.
Cuomo initially referred to criticism of his actions as “political attacks,” but now takes full responsibility for his mistakes, recognizing that his administration’s actions were indefensible. The Governor explained that his administration attempted to withhold information from the Department of Justice (DOJ) to avoid queries regarding the high case numbers. Another student told me that “it’s just disappointing…apologizing is good, but he still did it,” and it was “a huge mistake on his part.”
After news broke of his shocking cover-up, most New York residents were disappointed with Governor Cuomo. According to a Marist Poll from February 17, 2021, 27% of New Yorkers think that Cuomo “has done nothing wrong,” 42% say he “has done something unethical, but not illegal,” and 19% believe that he “has done something illegal.”
The governor’s COVID-19 response approval rating has fallen from July 2020’s 72% to the current 54%.
On Thursday, February 25, New York state Health Commissioner Dr. Howard Zucker spoke at a legislative budget hearing focusing on healthcare. Lawmakers requested a full report of the death count for the hearing, and Dr. Zucker responded that there was no undercount. However, Cuomo and Zucker are now under federal investigation. For his defense, Zucker referenced a report from the Department of Health that suggested that COVID-19 spread in long-term facilities, such as nursing homes, from COVID-19 positive healthcare workers. This information was released in July 2020. Zucker acknowledged that the Cuomo administration should have communicated nursing home case data to the DOJ sooner, but he was eager to put the incident behind them. His dismissive and unapologetic attitude angered lawmakers from both political parties.
Cuomo and his administration will need urgent and compelling damage control, as the governor plans to run for his fourth term in office in 2022. With the next election at stake, some people want to take away his emergency powers. Worse, Governor Cuomo allegedly threatened to fire a democratic assemblyman if he revealed the governor’s nursing home cover-up. A Skidmore student commented that she does not “think people in New York state should be voting for him again.”
Cuomo now has three independent investigations: one for his lies about COVID numbers and two more for the separate sexual harassment allegations. It is likely that the Governor will face another investigation for the third harassment allegation. While his approval rating skyrocketed last spring, Cuomo is now in a perilous political position.