New York’s Democratic lawmakers did not believe Governor Andrew Cuomo’s explanation on Monday of why he refused for months to release a true account of nursing home residents who died of coronavirus.
Congressman Ron Kim (D-Queens), whose uncle died of COVID-19, said bluntly, “All of this is BS” and a cover-up.
“They could have given us the information in May and June last year. They chose not to, ”said Kim, hearing that Cuomo was blaming the DOJ investigation for delays in releasing the accurate count of coronavirus deaths from nursing home residents.
Cuomo cited an exclusive story of August 26, 2020 in The Post that broke the Justice Department’s inquiry into his administration’s policy on admission to nursing homes and the reduced death count, claiming that Albany lawmakers should know about the investigation based on that report.
Kim said lawmakers could have passed laws to restrict liability and liability in nursing homes to save lives if they had the information beforehand.
Kim also said that Cuomo’s comments on Monday did not match what aide Melissa DeRosa told him and other lawmakers during a private meeting last week, when he said that former President Donald Trump turned the issue into a “political football” and claimed it as an excuse to retain data from the nursing home. The Post first reported on its explosive comments after obtaining an audio recording of the meeting.
“And basically, we froze,” said DeRosa.
“She talked about the potential that information would be used as a weapon against them. DeRosa needs to be responsible for what she said, ”insisted Kim.
“She implicated us all in the cover-up.”
On Friday, DeRosa issued a statement, mirroring what the governor said on Monday that the government was dealing with federal pollsters before releasing more detailed data from nursing homes to state lawmakers and public data.
Meanwhile, state senator Alessandra Biaggi (D-Bronx) challenged Cuomo’s claim that her team informed lawmakers that it would delay the release of fatalities data in nursing homes because of the federal investigation.
“No, @NYGovCuomo, you didn’t tell ‘the whole’ Senate or Assembly that there was a DOJ investigation, as the reason why you didn’t disclose the numbers of the nursing home,” Biaggi said in a tweet.
“I found out about a DOJ investigation with the rest of New York residents in the @nypost story on Thursday night,” she said.
State Senator Julia Salazar (D-Brooklyn) said Cuomo was lying.
“If the governor had actually informed the legislature months ago that his office was withholding the data they had on total deaths in nursing homes, there would be no need for them to have a connection with a group of lawmakers last week to inform them them the first time, ” she tweeted.
“The governor can claim (as he did) that he withheld the data because they thought it would be used against them by the DOJ (!). But to claim that they informed the legislature is a lie over a lie. If he had been honest in the first place, he may have had a cycle of bad news. But now?”
State Sen. John Liu (D-Queens) also said that the federal investigation was not an excuse for “months and months of delay” in “cheating” or “withholding information that the public deserves to know”.
He said he would support legislation that restricts the governor’s emergency powers because of Cuomo’s hesitation on the issue of the nursing home.
“The status quo cannot remain. Some of the governor’s emergency powers must be revoked, ”Liu told Fox News.
“For months and months, we have been asking for this information from the executive branch, the governor’s office. It was information that our constituents demanded from the state government. “
Liu said he was particularly disturbed by the blunt report by State Attorney General Letitia James on asylums released last month, which concluded that the Cuomo Health Department decreased the death toll of residents in COVID by 50 percent over exclude people who died in hospitals.
Hours after the report, the Cuomo team began to confess, releasing more accurate data that increased the death count in COVID-19 nursing homes by almost 4,000.
Senate Republican minority leader Robert Ortt said Republicans had never been notified by Cuomo’s office about the DOJ investigation and the request for time to release data from the nursing home.
“People want the truth and the only way it can be provided is through investigations by the Department of Justice and the Attorney General,” said Ortt.
A state judge on February 3 ruled that Cuomo illegally withheld data from the Empire Center for Public Policy COVID-19 nursing home and ordered its release. The watchdog group filed a legal request for the information and was blocked for six months before the judge ordered the government to start releasing it.
Bill Hammond of the Empire Center said Cuomo was hiding before the DOJ investigation to do a true accounting of deaths in nursing homes.
“Cuomo and his government were struggling with the release of the data before and after the DOJ investigation. It is not plausible that they would not be able to cooperate with the DOJ and provide information to lawmakers and the public, ”he said.