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      Cuomo suffers major blow as top New York Democrats say governor must go

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      Andrew Cuomo suffered a major blow on Sunday in his attempt to stay as governor of New York in the face of allegations of sexual harassment and workplace bullying and a scandal over nursing home deaths under Covid. The majority leader of the senate and the speaker of the assembly, two of the most powerful Democrats in the state, said it was time for Cuomo to go.“We need to govern without daily distraction,” the majority leader, Andrea Stewart-Cousins, said. “For the good of the state, Governor Cuomo must resign.”Assembly speaker Carl Heastie backed Cousins, calling the allegations “disturbing” and saying Cuomo should “seriously consider whether he can effectively meet the needs of the people of New York”.Five women have accused Cuomo of sexual harassment, accusations he denies. On Saturday the Washington Post published new claims of bullying. One former aide claiming Cuomo ran “a systemic, intentional, hostile, toxic workplace environment”.Other lawmakers have called for Cuomo to quit over allegations that his administration misled the public about coronavirus fatalities in nursing homes.Cuomo told reporters earlier on Sunday he would not resign because he was elected by people not politicians and the system depended on due process.The premise of resigning because of allegations is actually anti-democratic“I’m not going to resign because of allegations,” the governor said. “The premise of resigning because of allegations is actually anti-democratic.”Prominent national Democrats including the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, who is from New York, and the governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, expressed support for the women who allege harassment and for an investigation run by the state attorney general, Letitita James.But Cousins went further.“Every day there is another account that is drawing away from the business of government,” she said. “We have allegations about sexual harassment, a toxic work environment, the loss of credibility surrounding the Covid-19 nursing home data and questions about the construction of a major infrastructure project.“New York is still in the midst of this pandemic and is still facing the societal health and economic impacts of it. We need to govern without daily distraction for the good of the state, Governor Cuomo must resign.”Speaking to CNN, Whitmer, who has discussed her own experience of sexual assault, said she had “the same gut-wrenching reaction that a lot of women in America did” when she heard one of five women who say Cuomo sexually harassed them describe her alleged experiences.But like other senior Democrats, Whitmer stopped short of saying Cuomo should resign, despite comparisons to recent cases in which powerful men, among them the former Minnesota senator Al Franken, were swiftly forced to step down.“I think the allegations here are very serious,” she said, “and I do think that an impartial thorough independent investigation is merited and appropriate. And if [the allegations are] accurate and true, I think we have to take action.”Last year, Whitmer was one of many prominent Democrats to back Joe Biden when he denied an accusation, telling CNN: “Just because you’re a survivor doesn’t mean that every claim is equal. It means we give them the ability to make their case. And then to make a judgment that is informed.”This week, former Cuomo aide Charlotte Bennett told CBS how she says Cuomo behaved.“I thought, ‘He’s trying to sleep with me,’” she said. “‘The governor is trying to sleep with me and I’m deeply uncomfortable. And I have to get out of this room as soon as possible.’”Whitmer was asked how she felt while watching Bennett’s interview.“I think that there are a lot of American women who have felt how she felt,” she said. “And I think that’s something that resonates and why we need to take this seriously, and why there needs to be a full investigation, and whatever is appropriate in terms of accountability should follow.“I wouldn’t help anyone for me to prejudge where this is headed, but I had the same gut-wrenching reaction that I’m sure a lot of women in America did.”Lindsey Boylan, a former Cuomo adviser, has said the governor made inappropriate comments, kissed her on the lips and suggested a game of strip poker on a plane.Anna Ruch, who did not work for Cuomo, has described him putting his hands on her face and asking if he could kiss her when they met at a wedding.Ana Liss told the Wall Street Journal that when she was a policy aide, Cuomo called her “sweetheart”, kissed her hand and asked personal questions, including whether she had a boyfriend. She said he sometimes greeted her with a hug and kisses on both cheeks.Rich Azzopardi, a spokesman for Cuomo, told the Journal: “Reporters and photographers have covered the governor for 14 years watching him kiss men and women and posing for pictures. At the public open-house mansion reception, there are hundreds of people, and he poses for hundreds of pictures. That’s what people in politics do.”The Washington Post, meanwhile, published a claim by Karen Hinton, a press aide to Cuomo when he was US housing secretary under Bill Clinton. She told the Post he “summoned her to his dimly lit hotel room and embraced her after a work event in 2000”.Peter Ajemian, Cuomo’s director of communications, told the paper: “This did not happen. Karen Hinton is a known antagonist of the governor’s who is attempting to take advantage of this moment to score cheap points with made-up allegations from 21 years ago.”Of the accusations of bullying, Ajemian said: “The governor is direct with employees if their work is sub-par because the people of New York deserve nothing short of excellence.”Earlier this week, Cuomo denied touching anyone inappropriately. But he also apologised for behaving in a way he said he now realised upset women.“I understand sensitivities have changed,” Cuomo said. “Behavior has changed. I get it and I’m going to learn from it.” More

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      Donald Trump set to visit New York for first time since leaving White House

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      Donald Trump could arrive in New York City for his first visit since leaving the White House as soon as Sunday night, according to multiple reports.
      The former president was born in Queens and rose to fame in Manhattan but changed his primary residence to Florida in 2019 and has been at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach since leaving Washington on 20 January.
      After reports of a New York visit proliferated on Saturday, local station WABC-TV reported that police were preparing to increase security around Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in midtown Manhattan. The New York police department did not comment.
      Trump’s New York home was the subject of protests and a heavy police presence from the start of his run for the White House in summer 2015 through to the end of his term in office in the acrid aftermath of the 6 January Capitol attack.
      In July 2020, amid national protests for racial justice and policing reform, city authorities painted the words “Black Lives Matter” on the street outside Trump Tower. Mayor Bill de Blasio claimed to have “liberated” that stretch of Fifth Avenue. The mural was repeatedly vandalised.
      Trump was impeached for a second time for inciting the Capitol insurrection, in which five people died, as part of his claim that his defeat by Joe Biden was the result of electoral fraud, a lie repeatedly thrown out of court. He was acquitted, when only seven Republican senators voted to convict.
      He retains a grip on Republican politics, regularly topping polls of potential presidential nominees for 2024 but this week reportedly demanding the party stop fundraising using his name.
      On Saturday the New York Daily News quoted former Trump lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen referring to a gold statue which made a splash at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Florida last week, when he said: “The human Donald must … be put on display for the multitude of NYC followers.”
      In truth Trump remains a divisive figure in New York, a Democratic city, amid two investigations which have added to his considerable legal jeopardy since losing the protections of office. Manhattan district attorney Cyrus Vance Jr and state attorney general Letitia James are both looking into Trump’s financial affairs.

      Cohen is under house arrest in the city, completing a sentence for offences including paying hush money to two women who claimed affairs with Trump, claims Trump denied though he admitted knowing of the payments.
      Cohen has spoken to Vance. The Daily News said Trump’s visit would not be in connection with that investigation, which received a huge boost last month when the supreme court declined to block access to Trump’s tax returns and financial records.
      Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner have also relocated to Florida since the end of their time in power, with Ivanka thought likely to mount a run for US Senate in the southern state.
      Trump’s own future in Florida has been called into question. Though he owns the Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, a 1993 agreement says he cannot live there permanently. Last month the former president won favourable comments from the town attorney, in a hearing involving residents who want to hold Trump to that deal. A decision is due in April. More

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      The New York attorney general holding Trump and Cuomo accountable

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      The two men were born a decade apart in Queens, New York, one the heir to a real estate fortune and the other to a political dynasty. Donald Trump went on to be president, and Andrew Cuomo became governor, like his father.Over the course of their long and controversial careers, both men have seemed untouchable. But thanks to the recent work of one lifelong public servant, who was born into a big family in Brooklyn without legacy money or power, each man is suddenly facing a moment of unaccustomed accountability.The state attorney general, Letitia James, the first woman of color ever to hold statewide elected office in New York, blasted a hole in the fable of Cuomo’s pandemic leadership with a report in January showing the state was under-reporting deaths in nursing homes by as much as half.A quick succession of sexual harassment claims against Cuomo in the ensuing weeks has knocked him from his political perch and left open the question of whether he will withdraw his 2022 re-election bid – or even resign before his current third term ends.Trump might be in even greater peril. Since 2019, James’s office has been conducting an investigation of business practices inside the Trump Organization and family. Trump has fought fiercely in court, but month after month, James has succeeded in unearthing financial records that appear to be adding up to a giant legal hazard for the former president, analysts say.“He should be very concerned,” said George Albro, co-chair of the New York Progressive Action Network who has known James going back to when he was a union officer in New York City and she was a public defender. “She’s going to take this to its logical conclusion.”The Trump case and the Cuomo nursing home scandal have generated a torrent of national attention for James, with people outside New York politics wondering how a single state officer could make such big legal waves.People who know her from her time as public advocate in New York City – when she was the first woman of color to be elected citywide – and her time as a city council member before that nod in recognition: that’s Tish.As state attorney general, James has aggressively pursued a full catalogue of progressive causes.She sued the police department over brutality against people of color, blocked unlawful evictions during the pandemic, won a major sexual harassment settlement for women in the construction industry, filed an amicus brief before the supreme court opposing a rushed census, and sued to dissolve the National Rifle Association.She also sued Amazon for allegedly failing to protect workers, sued Facebook as an alleged monopoly and investigated Google on similar grounds. She has asked federal regulators to clamp down on toxins in baby food and called for student debt relief.I see the law both as a shield and as a sword“I see the law both as a shield and as a sword,” she said in a public discussion last year about Black leadership. “And so I wake up every day with a fire in my belly, and I march into the office – well, I actually march into my kitchen – and the question is, what can I do today to make a difference in the life of somebody? Who can I sue?”James has acknowledged past critics who thought that she filed too many lawsuits without making enough stick. But she argues that “the law should be a tool for social change” – and with the pressure she has exerted on Trump causing visible stress among family members, the impact of her efforts is plain and the public mood is enthusiastically with her.That kind of momentum has led to speculation about what might be next for the political pioneer with impeccable grassroots credentials who maintains a huge store of goodwill in New York City as well as a disarming, down-to-earth approach on and off the campaign trail.“Everyone still calls me Tish,” she told Melva M Miller, chief executive officer of the census watchdog Association for a Better New York, in a public forum last year. “I still have to do my laundry later – I’m still Tish. I have to go to the grocery store – I’m still Tish.”James, 62, one of eight children, went to Brooklyn public school, graduated from the City University of New York’s Lehmann college and earned a law degree at Howard University, the historically Black university in Washington DC.Her earliest memory of the legal system, she has said, was seeing a court officer verbally abuse her mother at a hearing for a brother.“When I looked around the courtroom, all the defendants and all the family members looked like me, but everyone in a position of power did not, and there was something really unbalanced about that and unfair about that,” James told Miller.Before her election to the New York city council in 2003, James worked as a public defender, as counsel to the speaker of the state assembly and as an assistant attorney general for Brooklyn, where she targeted predatory lenders, advocated for working families and brought the first case against the New York City police department for so-called stop-and-frisk abuses.She lost a primary race to join the city council, but was able to resume her bid when the incumbent was shot and killed inside city hall. In her 10 years on the council, she emerged as an advocate for police reform and for better public housing.She also showed a fearlessness about taking on powerful political figures, helping to lead the charge against an effort by the then mayor, Michael Bloomberg, to change city rules and seize a third term in power (a fight Bloomberg won).She told us that she would be independent of the governor and I think she’s proven thatSome political allies wondered, however, whether James’s posture of antagonism towards the powerful would apply to Cuomo, who cleared the path for her political future by endorsing her to be attorney general.As a candidate under Cuomo’s protection, James insisted she was “unbossed and unbought” by the governor. The results of her bombshell investigation of how the Cuomo administration failed to report Covid-19 nursing home deaths shows she meant those words, said Albro.“She told us that she would be independent of the governor and I think she’s proven that,” he said.Her battle against Trump has the potential to elevate James’s profile – and prospects – even further, encouraging open speculation about whether she might even succeed the governor whose alleged misconduct she helped expose. Before he was elected governor, Cuomo was state attorney general – the very job James now holds.“I think she wants to be governor, I think that’s clear, and she’d be a formidable candidate,” said Albro.“I think she’d be a formidable candidate because she is very well liked and known in the city and that’s a big chunk of the vote.” More

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      Andrew Cuomo was never a hero. Karma is coming for him, with a vengeance | Ross Barkan

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      For so long, television was good to Andrew Cuomo.The most famous governor in America charmed millions of viewers with his televised briefings in the earliest months of the coronavirus pandemic, reciting bare facts from his homely PowerPoints. Journalists, pundits and cable television hosts swooned – he was primetime material, the winner of an actual Emmy award, the Queens-bred foil to the frothing Queens native in the White House.In this narrative, Cuomo was every bit the heroic protagonist – his myth only becoming more inflated as tens of thousands died of coronavirus in his own state, the mass carnage a result, in part, of his poor decision-making. The mythic Cuomo never made sense to those who had covered the pandemic closely and investigated the shadowy workings of the government he controlled, but that didn’t seem to matter. The biggest media companies in America had their plot lines to write; inconvenient facts, like immunity shields and hidden nursing home death counts and early comparisons to the flu, were left on the cutting-room floor.Now Cuomo returns to the center of the media universe. This time, he has been accused of sexual harassment by three different women. This time, he is facing an FBI investigation into how he handled the state’s nursing homes, where the true coronavirus death toll was allegedly intentionally masked for months. This time, a state legislator who went public with unhinged threats Cuomo made against him can become famous himself.Cuomo is on the front page of every New York City newspaper, a headliner of the nightly newscasts, and a constant subject of debate and intrigue on CNN and MSNBC. Corporate media abhors a vacuum. If Donald Trump was still president of the United States, Cuomo could count on the idiocy and scandal in the White House to distract from whatever came out of New York.That’s how he became a star in the first place. Trump’s federal response to the pandemic was so plainly inept and horrendous, any questions about failure on the local level could always be deflected, especially by eager, Cuomo-worshiping Democrats. One salacious, incendiary or perplexing Trump tweet could seize a headline and give cover to all of those, like Cuomo, who were failing out of view.Those days are long gone. Joe Biden, a conventional Democrat, is president now. He does not like to tweet. He does not feud with the media, celebrities, Democrats or even most Republicans. He has his own serious shortcomings, but they are not the stuff that the de facto showrunners at cable TV stations are hunting for. Media executives like Jeff Zucker saw a great story in Trump – they admitted as much themselves – and carried his early campaign rallies on live television, an unprecedented decision that helped pave the way for his ascent in 2016.The Cuomo scandals are perfect for cable TV because they are both legitimate and compellingNow what? CPAC excluded, Trump has left the stage, his Twitter account deleted, his rantings confined to occasional Fox appearances. The major media companies need new scandal to occupy their viewers, to seize their imaginations and keep them coming back for more.Cuomo is dying by the sword he once lived by. The Cuomo scandals are perfect for cable TV because they are both legitimate and compelling. There is a natural narrative arc, a rising and falling action; these media companies helped create a myth, and now they will tear it down. The myth, in any sane world, would never have existed in the first place. But that’s where we are.Many politicians in New York are now calling for Cuomo to resign. Once so commanding, the governor now hides, refusing to appear on TV or talk to the press. His schedule is emptied out. He is hoping this all blows over.But that’s not quite how the modern media work. If there is a void to fill, it will be filled, and the distractions of Trump are no longer there to bail Cuomo out. Sexual harassment allegations can drive news cycles for weeks. Given Cuomo’s behavioral history, there could very well be more to come.This is the fate a television character as abhorrent as Cuomo deserves. He is huddled somewhere in Albany, pining for a comeback arc. But cancellation is just as likely.Ross Barkan is a writer based in New York City and the author of the forthcoming book The Prince: Andrew Cuomo, Coronavirus, and the Fall of New York More

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      Andrew Cuomo says he will not quit over sexual harassment allegations

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      Andrew Cuomo said on Wednesday he would not resign as New York governor following the emergence of sexual harassment allegations.Cuomo, who achieved national and global prominence because of his direct briefings last year on the Covid-19 pandemic, spoke at his first public appearance since three women accused him of misconduct, including inappropriate remarks and unwanted touching.The Democratic governor apologized and said he had “learned an important lesson” on his behaviour around women.“I now understand that I acted in a way that made people feel uncomfortable,” he said. “It was unintentional and I truly and deeply apologize for it.”Cuomo said he would “fully cooperate” with an inquiry into the accusations, which is being overseen by the state attorney general, Letitia James. The attorney general, also a Democrat, is in the process of choosing a law firm to conduct the investigation. The firm would present its findings in a public report.When the third-term governor was asked about calls for his resignation, Cuomo said: “I wasn’t elected by politicians. I was elected by the people of the state of New York. I’m not going to resign.”Cuomo discussed their claims during a press conference that otherwise concentrated on New York’s coronavirus response. Before this briefing, Cuomo last spoke with journalists during a 22 February conference call. His last on-camera briefing was on 19 February.Shortly after his remarks, one of his accusers questioned his effort to apologize.“How can New Yorkers trust you @NYGovCuomo to lead our state if you ‘don’t know’ when you’ve been inappropriate with your own staff?” said former aide Lindsey Boylan on Twitter.How can New Yorkers trust you @NYGovCuomo to lead our state if you “don’t know” when you’ve been inappropriate with your own staff?— Lindsey Boylan (@LindseyBoylan) March 3, 2021
      Boylan has claimed that Cuomo made comments about her appearance and kissed her without consent after a meeting. Boylan also alleged that Cuomo once suggested that they play a game of strip poker while onboard a New York state-owned airplane. Cuomo has denied these claims.The governor’s apology and comments on Wednesday were also criticized by an attorney for a second aide who has made allegations, Charlotte Bennett. Bennett has alleged Cuomo asked her about her sex life and whether she would consider a relationship with an older man. Bennett, 25, reportedly said she thought Cuomo was testing her interest in a possible affair.Debra Katz, the attorney who represents Bennett, said Cuomo’s press conference was “full of falsehoods and inaccurate information”. Katz maintained Cuomo’s claim that he didn’t realize he had made women uncomfortable was duplicitous, as Bennett had notified both her supervisor about Cuomo’s alleged behavior and one of his attorneys.“We are confident that they made him aware of her complaint and we fully expect that the attorney general’s investigation will demonstrate that Cuomo administration officials failed to act on Ms Bennett’s serious allegations or to ensure that corrective measures were taken, in violation of their legal requirements,” Katz remarked.The third accuser, Anna Ruch, was a guest at a wedding Cuomo officiated. In an interview with the New York Times, Ruch said that Cuomo placed his hands on her face, and asked if he could kiss her, moments after they met during a September 2019 wedding. More

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      What allegations does Andrew Cuomo face and could they bring him down?

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      In a year, the New York governor, Andrew Cuomo, has gone from revered national voice of reason on the Covid-19 pandemic and potential presidential material, to facing demands for his resignation and even calls for his impeachment.He faces a federal inquiry into his administration’s alleged undercount of coronavirus nursing home deaths, accusations of bullying and, most recently, an external investigation led by New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, following sexual harassment allegations by two women.After a decade in power, has the 63-year-old former US housing secretary and son of the former New York governor Mario Cuomo, reached the end of the lineWhat are the allegations?The governor was first accused of sexual harassment by former aide Lindsey Boylan in December, and she gave further details last week. In a Medium post she claimed he subjected her to an unwanted kiss and made comments about her appearance, allegations which Cuomo has denied.On Saturday, a second former aide, Charlotte Bennett, 25, also accused the governor of sexual harassment. She alleged in the New York Times that Cuomo asked her about her sex life, including whether she had ever had sex with older men, and made comments that she interpreted as assessing her interest in an affair. Cuomo has said he wanted to mentor her.On Sunday, he released a statement in which he acknowledged that “some of the things I have said have been misinterpreted as an unwanted flirtation. To the extent anyone felt that way, I am truly sorry about that.”Separately, also last month, his administration was forced to revise its figures for nursing home deaths after it was revealed they were severely undercounted by thousands. He was also accused of threatening to “destroy” the Democratic assemblyman Ron Kim over the scandal, which a Cuomo adviser has denied.How have politicians reacted?In Washington, the White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, has said Joe Biden supports an independent review and the US House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, has called the sexual harassment allegations “credible”.Closer to home, the Republican state senate minority leader, Robert Ortt, has called for him to resign, as have the Democratic state senator Alessandra Biaggi and congressman Kim. New York’s US senators, Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, and congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez all called for an independent investigation.What consequences has Cuomo faced so far?There is a federal inquiry into the nursing home deaths.Following the sexual harassment allegations, James said on Monday that she had received a formal referral from the executive chamber which gave her the authority to “move forward with an independent investigation into allegations of sexual harassment claims made against Governor Cuomo”. She said the investigation’s findings would be made public in a report.Cuomo’s approval rating dropped last week, but remained relatively high.Could Cuomo resign or be forced from office?Kim told the Guardian on Monday that many legislators were “urging him to step down”. Whether or not Cuomo does will perhaps depend on what the investigation finds. His longtime rival Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York suggested on Monday that if the allegations are found to be true, he should step down.Cuomo is up for re-election next year. He has previously said he intends to run again in 2022, but conversations are reportedly taking place among Democrats about who could challenge him.The governor has also faced some calls for impeachment. Eric Lane, professor of public law and public service at Hofstra University and a former counsel to New York state Democrats, said if the investigation found evidence of criminal behaviour he could face impeachment. But if his behaviour was found to be inappropriate but not criminal then it would be down to the legislature to decide.“I doubt if that turns out to be true that he could get re-elected. I don’t know about it as an impeachment issue,” he said, adding that the allegation over the call to Kim is also a “very serious allegation”.Is there any precedent for impeaching a New York governor?The only time a New York governor was impeached and removed from office was William Sulzer in 1913.Under the state’s constitution, the assembly would have to vote by a simple majority to impeach and then it would go to trial in the state senate, where a two-thirds majority would be needed to convict, but it does not lay out a standard for impeachment.If removed from office, the governor would be replaced by the lieutenant governor, a post currently held by Kathy Hochul.On the prospect of impeachment, the Republican state senator George Borelli told Pix 11: “I think it’s unlikely. But I think it’s possible.” More

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      Second ex-aide accuses Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment

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      A second woman has come forward to accuse New York governor Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment in a move that has prompted the under-fire Democrat to launch an independent investigation into the allegations.Charlotte Bennett, who was an executive assistant and health policy adviser in the Cuomo administration until November, told The New York Times that he had harassed her last spring, during the height of New York’s fight against the coronavirus – which Cuomo led and which at the time gave him an international reputation for good leadership.Bennett told the paper Cuomo had asked her a series of inappropriate questions about her personal life, including age differences in romantic relationships, which she believed were sexual overtures. “I understood that the governor wanted to sleep with me, and felt horribly uncomfortable and scared,” Bennett told the paper.The news comes after New York City’s mayor and Cuomo’s political rival, Bill de Blasio, on Thursday called for an independent investigation into allegations against Cuomo made by another former aide, Lindsey Boylan. In an essay published on Medium, Boylan described numerous incidents with Cuomo, including an unsolicited kiss in his Manhattan office.Cuomo has denied Boylan’s allegations. In a statement in response to the latest accusations from Bennett, Cuomo said he had “never made advances toward Ms Bennett, nor did I ever intend to act in any way that was inappropriate.” He added that he had requested an independent review of her accusations and that Bennett had “every right to speak out”.“I believe the best way to get to the truth is through a full and thorough outside review,” Cuomo said. Former federal judge Barbara Jones will lead the investigation.Bennett told the Times that she had informed Cuomo’s chief of staff, Jill DesRosiers, about a particularly disturbing interaction with the governor less than a week after it occurred. She said she was transferred to another job on the opposite side of the Capitol. At the end of June she also gave a statement to a special counsel for Cuomo.The governor’s special counsel, Beth Garvey, acknowledged that the complaint had been made and that Bennett had been transferred as a result to a position in which she had already been interested.Garvey said in a statement that Bennett’s allegations “did not include a claim of physical contact or inappropriate sexual conduct” and Bennett “was consulted regarding the resolution, and expressed satisfaction and appreciation for the way in which it was handled”.“The determination reached based on the information Ms Bennett provided was that no further action was required which was consistent with Ms Bennett’s wishes,” Garvey said.Bennett told the newspaper she decided not to push for any further action by the administration. She said she liked her new job and “wanted to move on”.Cuomo asked people to wait for the findings of Jones’ review “so that they know the facts before making any judgements”. Some top New York Democrats, however, said any investigation should be placed out of the control of the governor’s office, including the selection of the investigator.“The accused CANNOT appoint the investigator. PERIOD,” tweeted congresswoman Kathleen Rice, a Long Island Democrat. “The continued allegations are deeply disturbing and concerning. The behavior described has no place in the workplace. A truly independent investigation must begin immediately.”Senate majority leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and assembly speaker Carl Heastie, both Democrats, called for an independent investigator. Asked if Jones’ review is “truly independent,” Mike Murphy, a spokesperson for Stewart-Cousins, a Democrat, said, “No it is not, and it should be done by the attorney general’s office.”State Senate minority leader Rob Ortt, a Republican, said state attorney general Letitia James should appoint a special prosecutor.“The review suggested by someone handpicked by the governor himself, is an outrageous, completely unacceptable idea. We need a truly independent investigation,” Ortt said in a statement.Cuomo’s personal conduct is coming under a harsh spotlight at the same time as his once-vaunted record in battling Covid-19 in New York. Cuomo is now facing an investigation by the FBI and federal prosecutors, and his own party wants to take away the emergency powers they granted him during the pandemic.The attention springs from Cuomo’s actions around the treatment of elderly people in care homes in New York. He created a new provision shielding hospital and nursing home executives from potential liability for decisions that might lead to people’s deaths from Covid, despite taking millions of dollars from the Greater New York Hospital Association and its associated executives and lobbying firms – the healthcare industry group that claims to have “drafted” the immunity clause.Two days after creating the immunity provision, Cuomo also directed nursing homes to accept patients back from hospital who were infected or might be infected with coronavirus – a move that has caused widespread controversy and allegations that it may have worsened the impact of the pandemic among elderly people. More

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      New York mayor calls for investigation after woman accuses Cuomo of sexual harassment

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      New York City’s mayor, Bill de Blasio, has called for an independent investigation into the New York governor, Andrew Cuomo, a day after a former aide accused the governor of sexual harassment.In an essay published in Medium on Wednesday, former aide Lindsey Boylan described several problematic episodes with Cuomo, including an unsolicited kiss in his Manhattan office, an invitation to play strip poker on a government airplane, and an internal email from another aide indicating that the governor considered her a “better looking sister” of a rumored former girlfriend.The governor’s press office responded to the “strip poker” element of Boylan’s allegations on Wednesday with flight records. “Ms Boylan’s claims of inappropriate behavior are quite simply false,” a statement read.In remarks on Thursday, De Blasio, who has a contentious relationship with the governor, issued a call for an investigation into Cuomo’s behavior. “These allegations are really disturbing … This kind of behavior, if it’s true, is just unacceptable. We’ve got to get the truth about this,” he said.Boylan’s allegations come as the governor, who was for much of last year hailed as a hero for his handling of the pandemic, also faces a federal investigation into claims his administration deliberately undercounted the number Covid-related deaths in New York nursing homes.Cuomo, who is facing calls for his resignation, is also in a showdown with angry state legislators from his own Democratic party who are looking to strip him of emergency powers they granted him during the pandemic.Boylan, who is running for Manhattan borough president, went public with allegations of alleged sexual harassment in a series of remarks on Twitter in December but did not provide details.But on Wednesday, she offered details, including describing an incident in 2018 when she said that she and the governor were alone in his Manhattan office. “As I got up to leave and walk toward an open door, he stepped in front of me and kissed me on the lips. I was in shock, but I kept walking,” Boylan wrote.In an earlier incident, in 2016, Boylan wrote that she was emailed by Stephanie Benton, director of the governor’s offices, who suggested she look up images of Lisa Shields – his rumored former girlfriend – because “we could be sisters” and “I was “the better looking sister”.The governor, Boylan added, “began calling me ‘Lisa’ in front of colleagues. It was degrading.” Boylan also wrote that she had complained to friends that Cuomo “would go out of his way to touch me on my lower back, arms and legs”.In her essay, Boylan said: “Governor Andrew Cuomo has created a culture within his administration where sexual harassment and bullying is so pervasive that it is not only condoned but expected.”“His inappropriate behavior toward women,” she continued, “was an affirmation that he liked you, that you must be doing something right. He used intimidation to silence his critics. And if you dared to speak up, you would face consequences.” More