31 July 2021: Alleged Cuomo Sex Harassment Victim Willing to Take Polygraph

Female aide who accused Andrew Cuomo of groping wants him to take lie-detector test

The attorney for the alleged victim of the most graphic sexual harassment incidents involving Andrew M. Cuomo indicates she is willing to take a polygraph test to verify the truth of her claims.

The female aide who’s accused Gov. Andrew Cuomo of groping her is willing to take a lie-detector test — and has challenged him to take one, too.

The unidentified woman’s lawyer, Brian Premo, told the Albany Times Union on Friday that she had told him “the day we met … that she would take a polygraph test — without hesitation.”

Premo also added that his client wants the governor to submit to a polygraph examination as well, to answer questions about her allegations against him.

The woman was the ninth to come forward to allege sexual harassment on the part of Andrew M. Cuomo, with her case involving both the most recent and the most graphic allegations. She has remained unidentified in media reporting because she remains employed by the state of New York.

The woman is still employed in the Cuomo administration, but Premo said since she disclosed her allegations under condition of anonymity she has been given very few job-related duties in the office.

This report presents a overview of some of her allegations and general comments about how sexual harassment allegations are treated from advocate Erica Vladimer of the Sexual Harassment Working Group.

31 July 2021: NY Dem Party Chair Takes Noncommital View on Cuomo's Political Future

State Democratic Party chair says outcome of probes could determine Cuomo's political future

New York State Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs, who was appointed by Andrew M. Cuomo to the position, takes an oddly noncommittal position on whether Cuomo should run for a fourth term as New York governor.

The chair of the state’s Democratic Party, Jay Jacobs, says the outcome of several investigations into alleged bad behavior by Gov. Andrew Cuomo and his top aides will help determine whether the party can back the governor for a fourth term in office.

“We have to look at what the actual determination is by these various investigations,” Jacobs said to Dan Clark from New York NOW. “And there isn’t just one, there have been multiple investigations.”...

“We have to take a look at them, and obviously we want a candidate that’s viable,” said Jacobs. “And viability is based upon the fact that they can get elected.”

His position can be considered pro-Cuomo to the extent he's deferring to the outcome of multiple investigations before he might boldly take a position. In reality, there is ample evidence to support the party moving forward without Cuomo in a state where the 2-to-1 registration advantage for Democrats among voters strongly favors the election of any Democratic party candidate for governor.

31 July 2021: A Cuomo-Sympathetic View of the Cuomo Scandals

The Andrew Cuomo Scandal Circus Is About to Hit High Gear

This Vanity Fair article doesn't break any news, but does provide some interesting context for this snapshot in time for the Cuomo scandals, which features the author's sympathetic take favoring Andrew M. Cuomo:

New York governor Eliot Spitzer: seven days from sex scandal breaking to resignation. New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman: one day from sex scandal breaking to resignation. New York governor Andrew Cuomo: five months and six days since sex scandal allegations…and still in office.

There are a multitude of differences in the substance and circumstances of the three cases. But the central contrast—that Cuomo remains in his job—is the important one, and all the more remarkable considering that multiple accusations of sexual harassment are hardly the only battle the current governor is fighting: Cuomo is also being investigated for allegedly juggling the number of pandemic nursing home deaths and for having state employees help him write a pandemic “leadership” book for which he will reportedly receive $5.1 million. (He has denied all wrongdoing in all cases.) The combination of crises provoked a glut of high-profile stories detailing Cuomo’s nasty side; his public approval numbers sank from 71% in spring 2020 to 38% in early March 2021.

And here we are at the end of July, with Cuomo still in power. That, all by itself, is a big win for the governor. A key part of his strategy last spring, when he was taking a media and political beating and calls for his resignation were piling up, was to appear to be focusing on his public duties, to play for time, and to allow the scandals’ momentum to fade. Which has worked, in the short run. His daily pandemic press conferences stockpiled public goodwill, and Cuomo’s base—older, more conservative, and more forgiving on workplace issues than New York’s progressive Democratic wing—has largely stuck with him.

Now, though, a turning point looms. State Attorney General Letitia James has been probing the sexual harassment allegations against Cuomo since early March, and last week the governor reportedly sat for a deposition—a clear sign that the investigation is nearing its end. There’s also the fact that Joon Kim and Anne Clark, the outside attorneys hired by James to conduct the probe, are on a contract that ends September 7. Extensions and delays are always possible, of course. But Cuomo’s camp is acting a bit twitchy, a sign that it thinks the end is in sight. When the Times broke the news Cuomo was about to testify, his spokesman, Richard Azzopardi, blasted the report, taking a shot at James’s objectivity and insinuating that James, a fellow Democrat, is gunning to become governor herself: “the continued leaks are more evidence of the transparent political motivation of the attorney general’s review.”

Anyone in Cuomo’s inner circle decrying politics is pretty funny, given that the governor does nothing without calculation. His attempt to paint James’s investigation as politically compromised, however, got an assist from James herself: Kim previously worked as a top deputy to former U.S. attorney Preet Bharara, a longtime Cuomo nemesis. “Joon is very good, and he will follow the facts,” a New York prosecutorial veteran says. “But Tish could have chosen another capable lawyer and deprived Cuomo of this critique. Bringing Joon on board handed him this opening to claim political bias".

The author, Chris Smith, proceeds to quote an anonymous "New York prosecutorial veteran" who faults James for hiring Joon: "... Tish could have chosen another capable lawyer and deprived Cuomo of this critique. Bringing Joon on board handed him this opening to claim political bias." Smith then proceeds to change the topic, failing to offer any evidence to support the claim that Bharara's alleged political bias applies to former employee Joon.

If you've ever worked in a job where your boss had different political opinions than you, you already know how weak that sauce is. Smith's choice to present the claim without any supporting evidence follows the example of Team Cuomo's smear merchants, and indeed, of Andrew M. Cuomo himself.

It's an oddly Cuomo-sympathetic note in a piece that otherwise doesn't offer much new to say other than the presentation of the context of the sexual harassment allegations that brought down the careers of other high ranking New York officials.

31 July 2021: Editorial - Cuomo's Attempt to Smear Investigators

Now even Cuomo himself feels free to attack AG James and investigators probing him

This might be the first time the timeline has scooped the editors of New York Post, who just remarked on Andrew M. Cuomo's direct participation in the escalation of Team Cuomo's attacks on New York's state attorney general and her investigators.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo is apparently feeling so good about the Biden administration’s Department of Justice decision to end its probe of his (mis)handling of COVID-19 in nursing homes that he feels free to personally malign state Attorney General Tish James’ investigation of sexual-harassment claims lodged against him.

And now, even Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie is helping him.

Until recently, Cuomo was content to let his flacks hit James and the independent investigators she hired to conduct the probe of those allegations. But this week, he went on the attack himself, assailing the credibility of former acting Manhattan US Attorney Joon Kim and employment-discrimination lawyer Anne Clark.

“I have concerns as to the independence of the reviewers,” Cuomo said. “Is this all happening in a political system? Yes. That is undeniable.”

Cuomo urged reporters to “look at who the independent reviewers are.” “Go to Google. Google the independent reviewers and tell me what you see.” A classic Cuomo dodge: Accuse others of playing politics and imply bias without really making the charge himself.

The editorial continues with a discussion of the Cuomo administration's other attempted smears of the investigators.

For our part, we don't have any illusions that we're influencing the NYP's editorial coverage of the Cuomo scandals, but we are happy to find we're not alone in our observations!

30 July 2021: Cuomo Victim Calls for Legal Sanctions Against Cuomo Lawyer Judith Mogul

Sex-harass accuser says lawyer who quit on Gov. Cuomo’s team should be ‘disbarred’

Counsel to the Governor Judy Mogul's resignation from the Cuomo administration was announced on 28 July 2021. Late that day, Lindsey Boylan, the first woman to come forward with allegations that Andrew M. Cuomo sexually harassed her called for Judith Mogul to be disbarred and prevented from ever practicing law again.

One of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s sexual-harassment accusers said his outgoing lawyer should be “disbarred” over her key role in the scandal that’s under investigation by the Attorney General’s Office and part of an impeachment probe.

Former Cuomo aide Lindsey Boylan responded to special counsel to the governor Judith Mogul’s resignation in a tweet that trashed her efforts on Cuomo’s behalf and called for the revocation of her law license.

“Judith Mogul has left her work defending and enabling serial sexual harasser and abuser @NYGovCuomo,” Boylan wrote Wednesday night on Twitter.

“Next she should be disbarred.”

Earlier this year, Boylan, 37, published an online essay in which she accused Cuomo, 63, of repeatedly harassing her, leading to a flood of similar allegations from current and former aides.

The article doesn't reference it, but it is possible Mogul may have participated in the decision to leak Boylan's state personnel records to the media as a retaliation by Team Cuomo against her allegations. If so, that role would help explain Boylan's reaction to the announcement of Mogul's resignation.

Less speculatively, Mogul played a significant and direct role in the Cuomo administration's handling of Charlotte Bennett's allegations of sexual harassment by Andrew M. Cuomo, where she recently participated in a deposition about her role in that matter with the New York's attorney general's office's investigators.

Mogul's resignation came shortly after Andrew M. Cuomo was depositioned by the same investigators.

30 July 2021: Team Cuomo's Attempt to Politicize Scandal Probes

Cuomo said AG probe would clear him. Now his aides say it’s political.

This report represents a 'straight news' version of the facts behind Chris Churchill's recent column in which he ridiculed the assertions made by Team Cuomo about the smears they are attempting to land on the attorneys investigating Andrew M. Cuomo's scandals. Here are the introductory paragraphs of the story about Andrew M. Cuomo's attempt to politicize the investigations.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, facing a cascade of misconduct claims earlier this year, dashed off a letter in March directing state Attorney General Tish James to investigate the scandals that were threatening to end his career.

When James is done with her work, Cuomo assured the public, everyone will see he had done nothing wrong. “I ask the people of this state to wait for the facts from the attorney general's report before forming an opinion,” he said at the time, refusing calls to resign.

Nearly five months later, James and the outside attorneys she hired to conduct the work appear close to wrapping up the inquiry after interviewing the governor last weekend. But Cuomo’s top aides no longer seem convinced James will deliver the findings their boss had promised and staked his future on.

In recent days and weeks, the governor’s communications team has sprinkled comments about any investigation-related news with assertions that James — the first Black woman to hold statewide office in New York — is using the probe to launch her own run for governor next year, when Cuomo may seek a fourth term.

“The continued leaks are more evidence of the transparent political motivation of the attorney general’s review,” Rich Azzopardi, Cuomo’s communication director and a senior adviser, said in a statement after news of the governor’s interview emerged in The New York Times.

By Wednesday, the jabs had become so blatant that fellow Democrats had started to cringe, and the head of a separate legislative impeachment investigation sent Cuomo a very public reprimand.

If recent news coverage of Team Cuomo's smear attacks is any indication, the news media isn't falling into line with Cuomo's preferred narrative.

30 July 2021: Cuomo Still Making Up New York COVID Data

The week in whoppers: Cuomo’s deadly leadership, Pelosi’s partisan panel and more

The New York Post's editors featured a new fact check of a claim made by Andrew M. Cuomo as part of a longer editorial. The following excerpt deals just with a statement Cuomo made on Wednesday, 28 June 2021:

Diary of disturbing disinformation and dangerous delusions:

This statement:

“Florida is seeing the greatest increase in COVID cases in the nation. What’s the lesson? Denial does not work. Follow the science, follow the facts. We were aggressive, we showed leadership, and it worked.”

— Gov. Cuomo, July 28

We say: Despite multiple probes into his coverup of nursing-home COVID deaths, the gov still touts his pandemic “leadership” — and continues to falsify “the facts.” A Reuters analysis found COVID cases in Florida increased the week ending Sunday by 60.5 percent — and in New York by 70.1 percent. The Empire State’s death rate per 100,000 people as of Tuesday was 276; the Sunshine State’s, 180. New York’s death rate is second only to New Jersey’s — some “leadership.”

Falsely representing New York's COVID-related figures seems to be a standard operating practice under the Cuomo administration.

29 July 2021: What is Cuomo's Political Defense Strategy?

Political analysts explain Cuomo's political defense strategy amid sex harassment scandal

What's behind Team Cuomo's strategy of accusing all federal and state officials seriously investigating the scandals in which he has been implicated of seeking to run for NY governor?

This report gets into why Cuomo is doing what he is doing to gin up support among his political base:

Governor Cuomo has found himself in the political hotseat, fighting to keep his job amidst an attorney general investigation, a federal probe and an impeachment probe. But like in any big game where the stakes are high, Cuomo has found a strategy to beat down the criticism.

Christopher Mann is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Skidmore College.

“In some ways what he said is ‘Scandal Defense 101’ -- cast doubt on the investigators, cast doubt on what was said,” Mann said.

Mann says the new defense play from Cuomo was seen clearly here in a recent news conference where Cuomo cast doubt on both investigators and reporters asking questions.

According to Mann, the strategy is working:

While the survival strategy may seem clear to political insiders, Mann says to the general public this strategy is actually working to protect Cuomo.

“It’s not a very different bag of tricks than we’ve seen from President Trump or other politicians from both parties when they get in trouble in terms of attacking the messenger,” Mann said.

Bill Hammond of the Albany government watchdog group, the Empire Center for Public Policy explains how the strategy works.

“By accusing the accusers of being biased, it's sort of like working the refs in a basketball game. You are putting them on the defensive and you are distracting from the charges against you,” Hammond said.

Andrew M. Cuomo doesn't have much else at this point, does he?

29 July 2021: All Cuomo Critics Are Running for NY Governor!

Churchill: Everybody wants Andrew Cuomo's job

Albany Times-Union columnist Chris Churchill picks up on a common theme in the various smears Team Cuomo has been issuing over the past several months: everyone who is seriously investigating Andrew M. Cuomo is secretly running for governor!

Twitter warrior Richard Azzopardi, also the governor's communications director, has repeatedly suggested, without evidence, that James is planning a run for governor. Cuomo hit a similar note on Monday, when he emerged from a week of hiding for an announcement about vaccine hesitancy and a swipe at James.

"I have concerns as to the independence of the reviewers," Cuomo said of the AG's investigation, adding: "Is this all happening in a political system? Yes, that is undeniable."

Ignore the nonsense. James has never indicated she's running for governor, and there's nothing to suggest otherwise. And if Cuomo is so concerned about her supposed ambitions and ulterior motives, why did he urge New Yorkers to wait for James' investigation before deciding on his guilt?

"Let’s get the facts," Cuomo said in February as he fought off calls for his resignation. "And that’s what the investigation does and that’s what the attorney general is doing. And that’s what we should all respect."

Did James change? Did her eyes widen when presented with a chance to sink the governor? I don't think so.

What changed is Cuomo's momentary need. Then, the governor needed to buy time. Now, with time purchased, he's singing a new tune. What we're hearing is a survival tactic borne of fear and desperation — and targeting not just James.

Churchill continues by quoting Team Cuomo's claims, all made without their presenting evidence, that NY State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli and former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara are encouraging the investigations so they too can become New York's next governor!

Those observations provide Churchill with a new opportunity to ridicule Team Cuomo:

You've perhaps noticed a pattern. Anyone who is a threat to the governor, or has criticized the governor, or doesn't like the governor, must want the man's job. From the Cuomo perspective, there is no other explanation.

The 56 percent of New Yorkers who tell pollsters they want to vote for somebody other than Cuomo? They're running for governor! The people annoyed by Cuomo's antics or angered by his attempt to hide the full count of nursing home deaths? Running for governor!

For our part, we look forward to Churchill's announcement that he too is running for NY governor!

29 July 2021: Member of Cuomo Legal Team to Resign Post

Cuomo’s Counsel, a Key Figure in Sexual Harassment Inquiry, Will Resign

The timeline has a running joke, based in truth, that Andrew M. Cuomo is desperately seeking better PR people and more legal help. This report confirms that Cuomo is losing one of his state government-employed attorneys, whose name came up prominently in the depositions of at least one of the women who have alleged Governor Cuomo sexually harassed them:

One of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s top lawyers, a central figure in the state attorney general’s investigation of the governor, will resign from her post next week just as the sexual harassment inquiry may be nearing an end.

Judith L. Mogul has served as special counsel to the governor since 2019 and was one of the senior Cuomo aides who handled a sexual harassment complaint lodged by Charlotte Bennett, a former executive assistant to Mr. Cuomo.

Ms. Bennett, 26, accused Mr. Cuomo of making sexual overtures while they were alone in his State Capitol office in June 2020, when she said Mr. Cuomo, 63, asked her whether she was monogamous and if she had sex with older men.

Soon after, Ms. Bennett said she disclosed the interaction with Mr. Cuomo to Jill DesRosiers, his chief of staff at the time, and was transferred to another job on the opposite side of the Capitol building. Later that month, Ms. Bennett said that she provided a lengthy statement about her allegations to Ms. DesRosiers and Ms. Mogul during a two-hour interview.

Ms. Bennett told The New York Times in February that both women had been sympathetic to her concerns, but her lawyers have since raised concerns about how the women handled Ms. Bennett’s allegations.

Mogul becomes the latest in the Cuomo administration's exodus of staffers under its ongoing cloud of scandals.

28 July 2021: Cuomo Getting Fact-Checked in Regular News Coverage

Gov. Cuomo claims he told the truth but fact check shows lack of transparency

Another news media outlet in New York is incorporating fact checking of claims made by Andrew M. Cuomo into their regular reporting:

Governor Andrew Cuomo’s comments put him on the front page of newspapers Tuesday after claiming he told the truth throughout the coronavirus pandemic, but a fact check shows some of Cuomo’s recent comments were not completely accurate.

Governor Cuomo made one comment Monday in response to news the Department of Justice dropped a probe into several states, including New York, that focused on whether residents’ civil rights were violated in government-run nursing homes during the coronavirus pandemic.

“The Department of Justice announced this weekend that they’re not investigating those states, of course this was political hyperbole,” Cuomo said.

The DOJ did drop that probe, but there's something the governor failed to mention during Monday’s news conference. Cuomo is still being investigated by the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Brooklyn, after allegations the governor and his staff covered up the true number of people who died in nursing homes from COVID-19 in New York State.

Bill Hammond from The Empire Center for Public Policy, a government watchdog group based in Albany, explains.

“There is still a federal investigation going on. In fact, I would argue the one in Brooklyn is a much more serious one in regard to the governor's legal jeopardy, so the idea he's been exonerated or cleared by the DOJ is just not the case,” Hammond said.

The report also notes the 11,000 gap between the state's "official" count of COVID deaths and the figures reported by the CDC, which are considered more accurate.

This is the second report we've come across from news media outlet with a left-of-center editorial bias incorporating fact checks of Cuomo's statements in their regular news coverage. We'll soon see if this is just a one-off event driven by Goernor Cuomo's intentionally deceptive statements made on Monday, 27 July 2021 or the beginning of a permanent change in how New York's news organizations cover Governor Cuomo.

28 July 2021: New Jersey's Murphy Administration Under DOJ Probe for COVID Nursing Home Deaths

Feds end probe of nursing home deaths in 3 states, but N.J. remains under investigation

Something unusual and unexpected is happening with the Biden DOJ's civil probe of excess COVID deaths in New Jersey's nursing homes. Unlike its decision to look the other way at excess COVID deaths in state-run nursing homes in New York, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, it is continuing to investigate state run nursing homes for veterans in New Jersey:

In a letter on Friday to Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana, a ranking Republican on the House Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis, officials said they would not proceed with civil investigations in Pennsylvania, Michigan or New York.

But the letter, signed by Deputy Assistant Attorney General Joe Gaeta, said an investigation in New Jersey at the state-operated veterans homes at Paramus and Menlo Park under the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act, or CRIPA, had already begun and would continue.

That investigation was launched in October after the Justice Department requested information regarding the spread of COVID in the three state-operated nursing homes.

The department had raised specific questions over whether the number of deaths in the veterans homes had been understated. There were also concerns over whether states violated federal law by ordering nursing homes to accept residents who had been treated for COVID-19 in a hospital.

“We must ensure they are adequately cared for with dignity and respect and not unnecessarily put at risk,” Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Division Eric Dreiband wrote at the time in sending out the fact-finding letters to the four states.

But rather than provide all the data requested, New Jersey reportedly provided incomplete answers and referred federal investigators to the state’s website, federal officials said. The response sparked an investigation by U.S. Attorney in New Jersey and the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division — not only into whether deaths at Menlo Park and Paramus had not been reported, but also over a “concern that the quality of medical care at these nursing homes has been deficient,” according to a letter sent to the state....

According to internal emails provided under a public records request, the veterans homes were hit with a long list of documents that administrators were asked to produce, including information related to facility inspections, infection control measures, data on reportable events, cost reports and Medicare billing.

The second-to-last paragraph presented in this excerpt indicates the Murphy administration failed to satisfactorily address requests for information from both the Trump DOJ in 2020 and the Biden DOJ in 2021, which has raised red flags of potential misconduct by state officials.

28 July 2021: Cuomo "Chest Thumping" Distraction from Continuing Criminal Probes

Cuomo thumps chest as civil case ends but criminal probe ongoing

If this report is an indication, Andrew M. Cuomo is now being called out for making false or debunked statements in regular news coverage in media outlets with a left-of-center editorial bias, which appears in the fourth paragraph of the following excerpt:

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo trumpeted New York's rate of nursing home coronavirus fatalities on Monday as he praised the U.S. Department of Justice for its decision not to pursue a civil investigation of New York and three other states whose governors had ordered the facilities to briefly accept infected residents who were discharged from hospitals at the height of the pandemic.

Casting the civil investigation as "political hyperbole," Cuomo's remarks come as his top aides have privately remarked that they believe a separate criminal investigation of the administration's nursing home policies and directives will also end with no charges.

"The political environment has gotten so toxic in this country. So toxic, so mean. It was an outrageous allegation," Cuomo said. "New York followed the (U.S. Centers for Disease Control) guidance. CDC is a federal agency that's supposed to know what they're talking about in terms of health. We followed the CDC guidance when it came to how we handled people in nursing homes and when they went to a hospital, when they were brought back to a nursing home."

But that assertion by Cuomo has largely been debunked: The state's order did not include a directive — which the CDC's guidance did — that COVID-19 patients should only be returned to nursing homes last year in facilities that were able to safely care for and segregate those residents from others. The confusion exposed many residents and employees to COVID-19 because numerous nursing facilities interpreted the state's directive as mandating they take in those residents — and at many facilities the residents who were positive were in close proximity to others.

Independent, nonpartisan analysts estimate 1,000 or more excess deaths may have resulted from the Cuomo administration's neglectful failure to follow CDC guidance as described in this excerpt.

The article continues to round up reaction to the Biden-Harris administration's DOJ's decision to drop investigations of excess COVID deaths in states whose governors adopted measures similar to the Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive.

27 July 2021: Cuomo Diversion of Campaign Donations to Pay Personal Legal Bills Drawing Fire

Cuomo scandal prompts NY lawmakers to reconsider campaign finance rules

Should it be legal for New York politicians to divert funds given by political donors to support their election to instead pay their legal expenses when they run afoul of non-election campaign related laws?

This report describes a reform movement that seeks to stop politicians from tapping their campaign's bank accounts to pay for non-campaign related expenses, which points to Andrew M. Cuomo's diversion of campaign funds to provide him with the benefit of paying for lawyers to defend him from sexual harassment allegations:

Some legislators want to change New York’s campaign finance rules after Gov. Andrew Cuomo used $285,000 in political donations to pay lawyers representing him in sexual harassment and misconduct investigations.

New York politicians have used millions of dollars in campaign funds in recent years to pay lawyers defending them against allegations of wrongdoing, according to tallies kept by the New York Public Interest Research Group. The list includes former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, former state Senate leader Dean Skelos, former state Senate leader Joseph Bruno and former New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman.

That kind of campaign spending is allowed under certain conditions but many still find it distasteful.

“It’s completely bizarre and it makes no sense because campaign contributions are supposed to be for campaigns, not for other things,” said John Kaehny, executive director of the ethics watchdog group Reinvent Albany. “Defending yourself in a criminal matter is not the same as running a campaign and it’s fairly obvious.”

As New York's Governor, Andrew M. Cuomo is also drawing cash to pay for his defense attorneys from state taxpayers. We think his recent diversion of campaign funds is intended to keep the legal bill New York taxpayers will be paying below the $2.5 million already contracted for his legal defense for as long as possible. Doing so will keep Cuomo from having to request additional taxpayer funds to pay legal bills that would require New York's State Comptroller to review and make his legal contracts available for public review.

In other words, Cuomo's action to tap money in his election campaign's bank accounts indicates he believes his legal bills will add up to significantly more than $2.5 million. Without reform, under New York's current law, he can take money campaign donors contribute to his election campaigns to pay for the benefit of covering his legal bills without having to withdraw any money from his personal bank accounts. That's quite a fringe benefit for a politician.

27 July 2021: Cuomo Claims He Has Never Lied About COVID-19 in New York

Cuomo claims he always tells ‘the truth’ on COVID-19 — except when he doesn’t

This report covers a number of comments Andrew M. Cuomo made at a coronavirus press briefing on Monday, 26 July 2021. Given the fact-checking involved, here are several extended excerpts from the report:

Gov. Cuomo tried to rewrite history Monday by portraying himself as having never fudged the facts about the COVID-19 pandemic and its devastating, deadly impact on New York....

“I am telling you as I sit here, I have told you the facts on COVID from Day One,” he said.

“Whether they were easy, whether they were hard — I told you the truth.”

The following five excerpts challenge Goveror Cuomo's assertions, presenting Andrew M. Cuomo's comments from the press briefing followed by the reporters' fact checking. Here's the first, which is related to the Biden DOJ's decision to drop its investigation of excess COVID nursing home deaths in nursing homes operated by the state government, which covers just 5% of the total number of nursing homes and other assisted living facilities in New York.

Cuomo’s “truth”: “The Department of Justice dismissed it.”

On Monday, Cuomo said his administration was off the hook for its handling of nursing homes amid the pandemic due to Friday’s revelation that the Department of Justice had decided not to investigate potential violations of the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act.

“It was an outrageous allegation,” Cuomo said.

“And it did a lot of harm and a lot of damage and then went on too long. I mean, this went on for like a year, until finally, the Department of Justice dismissed it.”

The reality:

Friday’s move only covered about 30 government-run nursing homes out of more than 600 senior care facilities across the state and doesn’t appear to have affected a potentially broader investigation into cases of COVID-19 among residents, employees and other staffers at New York’s privately run nursing homes.

That inquiry involves the possibility that “grossly substandard care” was provided to beneficiaries of the federal Medicare and Medicaid programs.

Cuomo and his administration are also the focus of a criminal probe by the FBI and the Brooklyn US Attorney’s Office into their cover-up of the total nursing home death toll from COVID-19 and the governor’s $5.1 million book deal for his pandemic memoir.

The next excerpt covers the COVID death totals reported by the Cuomo administration:

Cuomo’s “truth”: “Our number is actual death.”

Cuomo on Monday defended the state’s lower COVID-19 death toll when compared to the data compiled by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“CDC asks for actual deaths and presumed deaths of COVID,” Cuomo said.

“What does that mean, ‘presumed death?’ That means the nursing home operator or the hospital operator wasn’t really sure…Our number is actual death.”

The reality:

According to the CDC website, “A COVID-19 case is an individual who has been determined to have COVID-19 using a set of criteria known as a case definition. Cases can be classified as suspect, probable, or confirmed. CDC counts include probable and confirmed cases and deaths. Suspect cases and deaths are excluded.”

As of Monday the state Department of Health only acknowledged 43,059 deaths, while the CDC listed 54,946.

The third excerpt covers a the 6 July 2020 report issued by the New York Department of Health that exonerated itself and the Cuomo administration for contributing to the COVID death toll at New York's nursing homes resulting from the administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive:

Cuomo's "truth": "That has no basis in fact."

On July 6, 2020, Cuomo claimed a study by the state Health Department that blamed infected but asymptomatic workers for the spread of the coronavirus in nursing homes had disporved critics who faulted the state mandate for the facilities to accept COVID-19 patients discharged from hospitals.

"That has no basis in fact," he said of the criticism.

"It was pure politics. it was ugly politics. Now the report has the facts, and the facts tell the exact opposite story."

The reality:

A subsequent study released in February by the nonprofit Empire Center for Public Policy, reported exclusively by The Post, tied “several hundred and possibly more than 1,000” fatalities to the since-rescinded March 25, 2020, order.

The analysis also suggested the controversial mandate was “associated with” more than one in six of 5,780 nursing deaths statewide between late March and early May, when Cuomo rescinded it.

Cuomo made no mention of his senior aides doctoring the figures presented by the New York Department of Health in its infamous 6 July 2020 report.

The final excerpt covers Cuomo's claim his administration hid any information from the public or government officials.

Cuomo's "truth": "That has no basis in fact."

On Feb. 15, days after The Post exclusively revealed that top Cuomo aide Melissa DeRosa privately told Democratic lawmakers that his administration stonewalled their requests for complete data on nursing home deaths from COVID-19, Cuomo denied that any numbers had ever been withheld.

“To be clear, all the deaths in the nursing homes and in the hospitals were always fully, publicly and accurately reported,” he said.

“Total death counts were always accurate. Nothing was hidden from anyone.”

The reality:

Weeks earlier, state Attorney General Letitia James released a report that suggested the nursing home death toll may have been more than 50 percent higher than publicly acknowledged because Cuomo’s administration wasn’t including the number of residents who died in hospitals.

The bombshell finding led Health Commissioner Howard Zucker to update the number of nursing home deaths to 12,743, up from 8,711 a day earlier.

It appears Cuomo is determined to present information that has already been determined to be either false or misleading as his version of the truth.

26 July 2021: Bill Hammond on Biden DOJ Dropping Non-Criminal Probe of Cuomo Nursing Home Deaths

Q&A: What the nursing home inquiry's end means

Bill Hammond of the nonpartisan, nonprofit Empire Center for Public Policy addressed several questions in which he explained the significance of Biden DOJ's action to suspend its civil probe of excess COVID deaths in New York's nursing homes during the period the Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive was in effect. In the following excerpt, Hammond's response to the fourth question asked is one that stood out for its potential significance:

Spectrum News 1: To that point, I've heard it's harder to make a criminal investigation than a civil rights case. What does that tell us?

Hammond: I thought it was noteworthy this letter referred to the Civil Rights for Institutionalized Persons Act and not the false claims. That original investigation applied to four states. The False Claims Act was limited to New York. The letter to the Republican members of Congress from the Justice Department only referred to that original investigation that was in all four states. So, there's a possibility in my mind anyway that DOJ is still looking at the False Claims Act piece of this.

I don't feel like that letter is a signal Cuomo is off the hook. If anything the most dangerous investigation to him and his administration is the one coming out of the U.S. Attorney's Office. And that one is still alive, on good authority, is alive. It's not going anywhere.

Since Hammond's comments, media outlets reported the Biden DOJ is continuing its probe of New Jersey Governor Murphy's COVID policies in nursing homes for veterans operated by the state government, aftert the Murphy administration failed to cooperate by providing requested data and information. The Murphy administration adopted an almost identical policy as New York's 25 March 2020 directive.

This entry was retroactively added to the timeline on 28 July 2021.

26 July 2021: Cuomo Directly Seeking to Undermine NY AG Investigations

Cuomo again questions integrity of AG's sexual harassment investigation

Governor Cuomo used the opportunity of his Monday COVID press briefing to directly pursue his strategy of undermining New York State Attorney General Letitia "Tish" James' investigation of several of his scandals:

Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Monday continued to question the integrity of Attorney General Letitia James’ investigation into the numerous sexual harassment allegations that have been lodged against him.

“I have concerns as to the independence of the reviewers,” Cuomo said at a press conference. “That's what I've said. And is this all happening in a political system? Yes, that is undeniable.”

Cuomo authorized the attorney general's investigation on February 28, after the first three women stepped forward to accuse the governor of inappropriate behavior. Numerous other women came forward in the weeks after the investigation was first launched.

And then he kept trying to make it political:

When pressed further on Monday what specific concerns Cuomo has about the independent investigators hired by the AG’s office, Cuomo skirted the question.

“Do a little history. Go to Google,” Cuomo said.

The governor presumably is referring to Kim, one of the top prosecutors appointed to lead the probe. Kim was a part of former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara’s team which investigated Cuomo’s closure of the Moreland Commission. This commission was charged with looking into corruption in state government several years ago.

Cuomo attempted to promote the "legitimacy" of the NY Assembly's impeachment probe, over which Cuomo ally NY Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie has influence:

Cuomo, however, seemed to place more faith in this investigation rather than that of the attorney general.

“The Assembly investigation is broader and has a broader mandate and is independent,” Cuomo said.

On 23 Friday 2021, Heastie drew a rebuke from the lawyer representing one of Cuomo's alleged sexual harassment victims for statements indicating the fix was in on the Assembly's impeachment probe. Heastie has been instrumental in slow-walking the Assembly's probe of Cuomo's scandals, which has raised the question of whether Andrew M. Cuomo has succeeded in putting the fix in on its outcome.

26 July 2021: Editorial - Tips for JCOPE on How to Conduct a Real Investigation

Editorial: Helpful hints for JCOPE

We're featuring this short editorial from the Albany Times-Union in full. They provide a public service in telling New York's official ethics "watchdog" what conducting a real investigation would involve:

It gladdens our hearts to hear that the Joint Commission on Public Ethics is investigating Larry Schwartz, enforcer for Gov. Andrew Cuomo, over loyalty-check phone calls he made to county executives last spring while also serving as the state’s vaccine czar.

How exciting it would be if New York’s nominally independent ethics watchdog made a serious effort to examine the actions of someone that close to the governor. Since JCOPE hasn’t done much of that sort of thing recently — okay, likely ever — may we make a few suggestions?

To start with, maybe interview everyone involved, including Mr. Schwartz? That might work better than the way the state Inspector General “investigated” the 2019 JCOPE leak of confidential voting information — by not interviewing either Mr. Cuomo, who called Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie to complain about how his appointees had voted, or Mr. Heastie. Little wonder the IG said it couldn’t confirm the leak. That’s what happens, of course, when you don’t talk to witnesses.

Even after Mr. Heastie confirmed the leak — acknowledging the governor had called him about the votes — the IG still had no interest in finding out. Reopen the probe? Nope.

We hope JCOPE can muster a bit more curiosity for its Schwartz probe. Maybe if they try to conduct an actual, impartial and thorough investigation, they could stitch together some fragments of credibility and reach a defensible conclusion on whether Mr. Schwartz’s actions were appropriate.

Go on, JCOPE. Surprise us.

The members of JCOPE have not demonstrated they are meaningfully indpendent of either Governor Andrew M. Cuomo or Assembly Sepaker Carl Heastie's influence. We think as long as these two powerful officials do not want JCOPE to reach findings they do not find politically advantageous, JCOPE's members will comply with their wishes.

26 July 2021: Editorial - Team Cuomo's Defense: Lies, Rage and Underhanded Attacks

Team Cuomo continues its underhanded attacks on his investigators

The New York Post's editorial board have weighed in on Team Cuomo's continuing and expanding attacks on the investigators looking into Andrew M. Cuomo's multiple scandals. In doing so, they draw a connection between the governor's loss of a powerful labor union's political support fro non-scandal-related reasons and his team's increase in the volume level of its attempted smears:

How about that: Assembly Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Lavine actually slapped Rich Azzopardi, Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s loyal spokesthug, for bad-mouthing state Attorney General Tish James, who’s overseeing a key investigation into the many sexual-harassment claims against the gov.

Lavine (D-LI) is overseeing the Assembly’s own (incredibly slow-moving) impeachment probe of Cuomo, over the sex stuff as well as the coverup of nursing-home deaths while the gov was negotiating his $5 million book deal. So it was entirely appropriate for him to write Azzopardi to put him officially on notice (again) of potential “severe repercussions.”

Specifically, Lavine moved after Azzopardi tweeted that James “says she may run against the governor” as the spokesman sought to downplay The Post’s report that Transport Workers Union International President John Samuelsen says he’s “over” Cuomo.

The union chief is plainly furious that Cuomo is playing destructive political games with the MTA, which employs so many TWU workers. But Azzopardi tried to pretend it was all about Samuelsen backing James instead: “We also understand he is a political supporter of Tish James and she says she may run against the governor, and he wants more benefits in his contract. Everyone gets that.”

The NYP's editors describe what they see as behind Team Cuomo's attacks:

Back in May, we noted that Cuomo’s main “defense” in all these scandals is nothing but lies and rage. Let the record show that his team is offering one more counteroffensive: underhanded attacks on the investigators.

They don't seem to have much else.

26 July 2021: Team Cuomo's Smear Campaign Aimed at Boosting Public Support

Cuomo said AG probe would clear him. Now his aides say it’s political.

This report focuses on the motivations behind Team Cuomo's decision to ramp up its attempted smears of New York Attorney General Letitia "Tish" James. The following excerpt describes what changed since 19 April 2020, when New York Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli made a criminal referral to the Attorney General's office related to Andrew M. Cuomo's use of state employees and resources to produce his pandemic "leadership" book, from which he stands to collect a personal gain of $5.1 million from its publisher:

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, facing a cascade of misconduct claims earlier this year, dashed off a letter in March directing state Attorney General Tish James to investigate the scandals that were threatening to end his career.

When James is done with her work, Cuomo assured the public, everyone will see he had done nothing wrong. “I ask the people of this state to wait for the facts from the attorney general's report before forming an opinion,” he said at the time, refusing calls to resign.

Nearly five months later, James and the outside attorneys she hired to conduct the work appear close to wrapping up the inquiry after interviewing the governor last weekend. But Cuomo’s top aides no longer seem convinced James will deliver the findings their boss had promised and staked his future on.

In recent days and weeks, the governor’s communications team has sprinkled comments about any investigation-related news with assertions that James — the first Black woman to hold statewide office in New York — is using the probe to launch her own run for governor next year, when Cuomo may seek a fourth term.

Without Andrew M. Cuomo's preferred outcome guaranteed, former prosecutors identify a deliberate political motive for Team Cuomo's attempted smear attacks:

Calling an investigation politically motivated is “par for the course” among political figures, agreed Jennifer Rodgers, a former federal prosecutor in New York and Columbia Law lecturer. The attacks aren’t very likely to cause witnesses with relevant information not to participate, as Lavine suggested, and it’s also not a smart play during multiple high stakes investigations, she said.

But that’s not the point.

“This is obviously geared not towards the people who are going to be making a decision about proceeding on impeachment but towards the public in the hopes that he can escape from this,” she said. “If he wants to run again, he wants the public to buy into this.”

Team Cuomo hasn't limited itself to attacking Tish James. It also attacked former Obama-era U.S. attorney Preet Bharara on 21 July 2021.

Bharara responded on Thursday, 22 July 2021 on his podcast. This report provides a the relevant transcript of his comments:

“Kind of demented if you ask me,” Bharara said during a Thursday episode of his legal news podcast “Stay Tuned with Preet.” Bharara rejected the idea that he will challenge Cuomo in a primary next year and called it a decoy tactic from an administration he knows well. While the words aren’t coming from the governor’s mouth, they have his voice, he added.

“For what it’s worth, based on my experience over a number of years in the state of New York and as U.S. attorney, there is no way on earth that people around Andrew Cuomo — spokespeople, allies, those speaking on the record, off the record — are making any of these statements, including the lies about me, without the direct approval and or direction of Andrew Cuomo himself,” Bharara said. “That you can take to the bank.”

The same can be said of the Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive, which contributed to hundreds and possibly thousands of excess COVID deaths among New York's nursing home residents. Deaths that would not have occurred if not for the directive's issuance.

25 July 2021: CNN's Chris Cuomo Involved in Sexual Misconduct Scandal?

Cuomo accuser Lindsey Boylan slams Chris Cuomo, asks whether he 'also harassed and assaulted' women

This report falls into the interesting sidebar category among Andrew M. Cuomo's multiple scandals. The story involves Lindsay Boylan's remarks on Twitter calling out CNN's Chris Cuomo. Boylan was the first woman to come forward to accuse Andrew M. Cuomo of sexual harassment back in December 2020. CNN's Chris Cuomo is Andrew M. Cuomo's brother, who has often functioned as his brother's Cheerleader-in-Chief at CNN, taking down the news network's journalistic credibility with his extraordinarily biased coverage and his role in advising Governor Cuomo how to handle the news media as it covers his multiple scandals.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo accuser Lindsey Boylan slammed CNN anchor Chris Cuomo Saturday for using "absolutely all his power" to "smear" and "destroy" her and questioned whether it was because he had also harassed and assaulted women....

Boylan, 36, a former aide to Gov. Cuomo, was the first accuser to go public with accusations that he had sexually harassed her. She is also running as a candidate to be borough president of Manhattan in New York City.

Boylan's tweet came shortly after the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division announced it would not launch investigations into nursing homes in New York and other states whose governors forced facilities to admit COVID-19 patients despite their vulnerable populations.

Following Boylan's and other's accusations, in May, Chris Cuomo was forced to address a stunning report from The Washington Post that revealed he participated in strategy sessions with Gov. Cuomo. The "Cuomo Prime Time" host admitted it was a "mistake" to participate in the calls, and offered an apology to his CNN colleagues for putting them in a "bad spot."...

Last year, Cuomo was also heard denying apparent sexual misconduct allegations on a secretly recorded audiotape amid a conversation with former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen.

Here's Boylan's 23 July 2021 tweet calling out CNN's Chris Cuomo:

Precursor: @ChrisCuomo used all his power, absolutely all his power (@cnn 😉), to smear & try to destroy me. (In ways you haven’t heard). Sad.

Curious minds would ask: is it bc he loves his brother or bc he also harassed & assaulted women.

I’m not curious. I already know. pic.twitter.com/Dchm9AliJh

— Lindsey Boylan (@LindseyBoylan) July 24, 2021

At this writing, there's very little information in the news media regarding any particular alleged sexual misconduct incidents involving CNN's Chris Cuomo. The article linked in the report above is to a September 2020 piece that references an internal investigation undertaken by news network ABC when Chris Cuomo was employed there, but doesn't provide much detail on any specific allegations.

Right now, your guess is as good as ours for whether anything comes from Boylan's tweet. We're presenting it as a sidebar item in the timeline because it provides context for Andrew M. Cuomo's larger scandals.

24 July 2021: The Investigation of Andrew M. Cuomo

Debra Katz: New York State Assembly Speaker Is Engaged in a ‘Cover Up’ of Gov. Cuomo Sexual Misconduct Allegations

We're featuring this analysis because it's one of the best we've seen that ties together many of the events we've recently featured independently in the timeline, including providing background in the attorneys engaged in the matter and how the criminal investigation of Andrew Cuomo has evolved the way it has. Here's an excerpt of a portion of the analysis presenting information we haven't seen reported elsewhere:

Notably, James’s efforts to investigate the sexual misconduct allegations against Cuomo only came after several bitter days of back-and-forth between the AG’s and the governor’s office about the form and contours of the investigation. Cuomo wanted the inquiry to be much more informal and stacked with loyalists but James pushed back. Eventually, Cuomo gave in and the AG got what she wanted.

The New York State Assembly is currently conducting its own parallel investigation into the sexual misconduct allegations as part of a broader impeachment probe that includes the Cuomo administration’s documented and admitted withholding of nursing home death data during the COVID-19 pandemic and the improper use of government funds to promote the governor’s book about his leadership during the first few months of the crisis.

The Assembly’s wide-berthed investigation has previously been criticized for lacking focus and for being run by attorneys close to Cuomo ally and New York Court of Appeals Chief Judge Janet DiFiore.

DiFiore owes her current position to the governor. She recently came under fire after it was discovered Cuomo pulled strings to ensure DiFiore’s daughter obtained a seat on the state Supreme Court in the Ninth Judicial District. That move drew criticism from several Democratic Party leaders throughout New York, but the story faded as the nursing home deaths data scandal and sexual harassment allegations took up most of the oxygen.

James herself pointedly rejected a Cuomo proposal to have DiFiore co-investigate her political patron alongside the attorney general. Democratic leaders also dismissed that idea out of hand.

After several months and several million dollars of public money spent on the effort, James now faces the prospect that her office’s work–which is being overseen by former acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Joon H. Kim and employment discrimination attorney Anne L. Clark–might be ignored by state lawmakers.

“We have no comment,” a spokesperson for James’s office told Law&Crime when asked about Heastie’s and Katz’s Friday comments.

Do read the whole thing!

24 July 2021: Assembly Speaker Heastie Draws Rebuke from Lawyer of Alleged Cuomo Sexual Harassment Victim

Comment from Speaker Heastie draws scolding from Cuomo accuser in sexual harassment probe

New York Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie made a number of statements in reponse to questions from media outlets on Friday, 23 July 2021. One in particular drew a rebuke from the attorney representing once of Andrew M. Cuomo's alleged sexual harassment victims:

In the rare gaggle with reporters, the powerful Democrat and leader of the New York Assembly said this about the status of the Assembly's impeachment probe into Cuomo, which focuses on four scandals involving the state's chief executive.

“I’m awaiting the results of the inquiry just like everyone else,” Heastie said.

And Speaker Heastie responded this way when asked whether results of the Attorney General's sexual harassment probe into Cuomo, expected soon, could cause impeachment efforts to ramp up.

“I believe it should be part of the Assembly's review but I don’t know if the report itself alone without the conclusion of the judiciary committee's work should rise to an action,” Heastie said.

That last statement has provided a firestore, because it indicates Heastie will look the other way at credible sexual harassment allegations to benefit Andrew M. Cuomo. Beth Katz, the attorney for Charlotte Bennett, the second woman to come forward to publicly accuse Cuomo of sexual harrassment, quickly issued a rebuke via Twitter:

Debra S. Katz Statement on Recent Statement from New York State Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie pic.twitter.com/h2Uihjj0DR

— Debra Katz (@DebraKatzKMB) July 23, 2021

Here's the main excerpt criticizing Heastie's comment:

“The Assembly Speaker’s comments today are alarming and outrageous. Speaker Heastie has made clear that he will actively obstruct efforts to hold Governor Cuomo responsible even if, as we expect will be the case, the Attorney General’s investigators substantiate the multiple allegations of sexual harassment levied against the Governor by Ms. Bennett and the other complainants. Speaker Heastie’s statement is a betrayal of the duties of his office and demonstrates that his loyalty is to Governor Cuomo, and not to either the rule of law or to the women who have been victimized by the Governor in clear violation of the law.”

At a minimum, Heastie's comment directly conflicts with his demand to have the same deference provided to actual law enforcement agencies for the time to conduct real criminal investigations that could result in a conviction that would not be tossed out on appeal while not holding the same ethical standards of conduct they require.

At worst, it suggests "the fix is in", where he's sending a message to his followers to get on board with a predetermined outcome that favors Governor Cuomo regardless of any findings reported by New York's State Attorney General.

We'll feature additional analysis of Heastie's seemingly predetermined dismissal of sexual harassment allegations involving Governor Cuomo in a separate timeline entry.

24 July 2021: Slow Walking Assembly Speaker Heastie Wants To Keep Slow Walking Impeachment Probe

Heastie defends AG but wouldn’t impeach Gov. Cuomo solely off her probe

New York Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie has been accused of slow-walking the Assembly's impeachment probe of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo. In comments responding to questions from members of the press on Friday, 23 July 2021, he gave further ammunition to critics of his leadership:

"The federal government is doing an inquiry. No one is rushing them," Heastie said during an unrelated event in Schenectady on Friday morning. "The attorney general has said when she's done, she's done. I would ask that people give the Judiciary Committee the same deference they're giving to the federal government and the attorney general."...

"I'm treating the impeachment inquiry the same way we deal with ethics investigations," he said. "The committee makes their decisions and I await their results. The questions and the discussions are more in the hands of Judiciary Committee."

Heastie's comments on Friday appeared to be geared in part to a narrow audience: Democrats in his own conference who are eager to move forward with a potential impeachment of Cuomo, which would be the first such action in more than a century for a sitting New York governor.

"I don't know why everyone is rushing the Assembly," Heastie said. "I think all three should be given the latitude for areas of responsibility."

Heastie would appear to be purposefully conflating the role of New York's legislature with that of actual state and federal law enforcement agencies. At the same time, Heastie has consistently taken actions to limit the ability of the Assembly to conduct narrowly-focused probes that could be completed much faster, ensuring their deliberations would needlessly drag out.

That situation has benefited Heastie's agenda, in which he and other members of his party have exploited the scandal-weakened Cuomo for political gain.

Heastie made additional news in his comments, which we're following up spearately in their own timeline entry.

23 July 2021: Biden DOJ Halts Civil Rights Probe of New York COVID Nursing Homes Deaths

DOJ declines to investigate New York's public nursing facilities

As expected, the Biden-Harris administration's Department of Justice dropped its civil rights probe into excess COVID nursing home deaths in New York. At this writing, only the status of the DOJ's probe of New Jersey's COVID nursing home deaths remains uncertain, but given the free pass now being issued to New York's Cuomo administration, the announcement that case will be dropped should soon follow.

This report confirms the Cuomo administration remains under investigation for violations of other federal statutes with respect to its COVID nursing homes scandals.

Republicans expressed outrage on Friday that the U.S. Department of Justice will not open an investigation into the policies by New York and several other states that spurred nursing homes to take in residents who were being discharged from hospitals but still testing positive for COVID-19.

But the decision by the Justice Department's civil division does not signal an end to an ongoing criminal investigation of Gov, Andrew M. Cuomo's administration by the U.S. Attorney's office in Brooklyn, which is also examining the state's nursing home policies and the number of fatalities in those facilities that had been reported by state officials.

In a letter on Friday to U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, the House's ranking Republican member on the Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis, an attorney with the Justice Department's Legislative Affairs Office said they had declined to open an investigation under Civil Rights statutes related to any public nursing facilities in New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan and New Jersey.

There are, however, only a handful of publicly run nursing homes in New York — a fact that was pointed out when DOJ officials initially sent a letter to New York officials last summer seeking data and information specific to those facilities.

This report also indicates a high likelihood that the Biden administration's DOJ bent over backward to look the other way at excess COVID deaths in states that adopted similar COVID patient admission policies as the Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive:

U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-Schuylerville, issued a statement Friday afternoon calling the civil unit's decision a "gross miscarriage of justice" and noting the New York delegation's request for a broader investigation had been rejected.

“This decision from President Biden’s Department of Justice makes President Biden complicit in the criminal corruption scandal and cover up of deaths of thousands of vulnerable seniors," Stefanik said. “New Yorkers deserve answers and accountability. I was the first member of Congress to call for an investigation into Gov. Cuomo’s corrupt criminal cover-up and I will continue to fight for the families who lost loved ones because of the cruelty and corruption of our governor.

The report continues to observe the Cuomo administration has used the excuse of the federal investigation to deny providing state government data and documents to media outlets seeking to compel the state to provide them under New York's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

In April, Cuomo's office, citing ongoing investigations, rejected a request by the Times Union to make public its correspondence with the Justice Department related to the administration's handling of nursing homes and other long-term care facilities during the coronavirus pandemic.

The correspondence sought by the Times Union was triggered, in part, by an Aug. 26, 2020, letter to Cuomo from the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division that sought a trove of records from the administration regarding the relatively small number of public nursing homes in New York, including "all state-issued guidance, directives, advisories, or executive orders regarding admission of persons to public nursing homes ... as well as the dates each such document was in effect."

The Cuomo administration will likely continue using the excuse of the ongoing federal investigations being conducted by the U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn to avoid complying with the media's FOIA requests to release public information on the correspondence between state government officials and federal government officials.

23 July 2021: U.S. DOJ to Drop Probes of COVID Nursing Home Deaths in PA, MI

The U.S. Department of Justice sent letters out on 22 July 2021 confirming it will not investigate excess COVID deaths among nursing home residents in Pennsylvania and Michigan, despite both states adopting policies similar to New York Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive. Here are the headlines and brief excerpts:

Justice Department says it won’t investigate how Pa. handled nursing homes during pandemic

The Justice Department told Gov. Tom Wolf’s office on Thursday that it has decided not to open an investigation into whether Pennsylvania violated federal law by ordering nursing homes to accept residents who had been treated for COVID-19 in a hospital.

The letter comes 11 months after the agency told the governors of Pennsylvania, Michigan, New Jersey and New York that it wanted information to determine whether orders there “may have resulted in the deaths of thousands of elderly nursing home residents.”

Department of Justice not opening probe of Michigan nursing homes

The U.S. Department of Justice says it's not opening a civil rights investigation into Michigan nursing homes after requesting information from the state last yearamid intense scrutiny during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In August, when former President Donald Trump's administration was still in office, the federal department requested data from Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer as it examined executive orders for nursing homes issued in some states led by Democrats.

The Department of Justice joins Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel in declining to probe the policies on which Republicans have focused attacks. While GOP lawmakers have pressed to uncover more information about how the orders impacted the virus' spread among a vulnerable population, the lack of law enforcement inquiries hinders their efforts.

The termination of the DOJ's civil rights probes in these states may be viewed as a partisan initiative by the Biden administration, which has actively sought to avoid continuing the investigations initiated during the Trump administration. President Biden has appointed a number of officials who oversaw the implementation of these states' policies to federal positions, where continuing the investigations would risk their removal from their appointments because of the ensuing scandals.

The report covering Pennsylvania had two additional bits of information regarding similar DOJ probes in New York and New Jersey:

It was not clear Thursday whether New Jersey or New York received letters.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy’s office did not immediately respond to requests, while Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s spokesperson Richard Azzopardi said he was checking to see if the administration had received such a letter.

At this writing, there is still no indication that the DOJ has delivered similar communications to officials in these states. We'll see what happens, but we think it is likely the newly politicized DOJ will drop its civil rights probes in these states as well, for the same political reasons. We think the DOJ is unlikely to drop its other probes of the Cuomo administration however, since they involve violations of additional federal criminal statutes.

23 July 2021: Cuomo Attorney Accuses NY Assembly Lawmaker of "Threat to Quash Speech"

Cuomo’s lawyer slams lawmaker leading impeachment probe for flagging aide’s tweets

One of Governor Cuomo's attorneys fired back against a letter written by Charles Lavine that criticized recent tweets issued by Cuomo communications director Richard Azzopardi.

As tensions rise in the state Capitol over the Assembly’s impeachment probe of Gov. Cuomo, the governor’s lawyer on Thursday raised “constitutional concerns” about a lawmaker’s admonishment of a Cuomo aide for tweeting criticism of Attorney General Tish James.

Paul Fishman, a lawyer representing Cuomo’s office, penned a letter to Assemblyman Charles Lavine (D-Nassau) on Thursday defending senior Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi.

Azzopardi last week posted a tweet suggesting James’ separate investigation of sex harassment allegations against Cuomo was politically motivated, and lamented leaks about her plans to interview Cuomo.

Lavine, the chair of the Judiciary Committee and the head of the Assembly impeachment probe, on Wednesday responded by warning of “severe repercussions” over the comment.

Fishman said Thursday that Lavine’s criticism of Azzopardi was out of line.

“Punishing executive officials for speaking about important issues of public policy is not merely inappropriate, but is fundamentally inconsistent with the core values of our nation’s founders,” Fishman wrote.

“That would be true even had Mr. Azzopardi been criticizing the Attorney General’s investigation.”

“Your threat to quash speech about an entirely different political matter makes these constitutional concerns all the more acute,” he added.

The following tweet carries the body of Lavine's 21 July 2021 letter, which references the content of an earlier letter sent on 15 March 2021:

Here’s the full letter from Assemblyman Lavine re: public comments on AG James by Gov. Cuomo’s communications director pic.twitter.com/IAQQEwO7dQ

— Nick Reisman (@NickReisman) July 21, 2021

The Cuomo administration cannot say it was not warned how lawmakers would perceive comments disparaging participants in the New York state attorney general's investigations of Andrew M. Cuomo's alleged sexual harassment and other offences, which by definition, would include the state attorney general and lawyers she hired to conduct the investigations.

That Azzopardi's attempted smears of the attorney general and investigators continue to be made without his offering any evidence to support them suggests Cuomo believes the outcome of the investigation will not be in his favor. We think that continuing absence of evidence undermines Cuomo lawyer Fishman's 22 July 2021 letter claiming Azzopardi's comments represent an "important issue of public policy".

All in all, it seems like Team Cuomo is offering up very weak sauce. What seems clear is that because they fear the legal consequences of the investigation's findings being reported, Team Cuomo's tactics are turning to proverbial throwing mud on a wall to see what might stick.

They don't have much else at this point, do they?

Update (24 July 2021): This report on statements made by New York Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie on Friday, 23 July 2021 includes the following information involving another Assemblyman responding to Fishman's letter:

Democratic Assemblyman Phil Steck (D-Colonie) who is on the committee heading the impeachment probe also weighed in on Asm. Lavine’s charges the governor's spokesman made comments to "demean attorney general Tish James".

“The governor is responsible for Rich Azzopardi, he's his spokesman. One of the key principles of the law is there shall be no retaliation and what Chairman Lavine was doing was warning the governor not to cross the line,” Steck said.

22 July 2021: Team Cuomo Member Singled Out for Smear Attacks

NYS lawmaker leading Cuomo impeachment probe troubled by Gov. aide’s comments about Attorney General James

New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo's chief PR flack Richard Azzopardi recent smear attacks on New York's state attorney general and lawyers conducting a criminal investigation of Cuomo's alleged misconduct in office are being rebuked by Assemblyman Charles Lavine, the chairman of the Assembly's judiciary committee overseeing its impeachment investigation of the governor.

The lawmaker leading the impeachment investigation into Gov. Cuomo is “extraordinarily concerned” about comments made by one of the governor’s top aides about Attorney General Letitia James.

Assemblyman Charles Lavine (D-Nassau) penned a letter to Cuomo Wednesday likening remarks made by senior adviser Rich Azzopardi to a “verbal attack” against James as the attorney general heads up an independent probe into allegations of sexual harassment against the governor.

“I am extraordinarily concerned with respect to the Governor’s communications director’s verbal attack against the Attorney General,” Lavine said. “Demeaning the Attorney General in turn demeans the Attorney General’s investigation and at the same time sends an obviously intimidating message to potential witnesses.”...

Lavine specifically pointed to a tweet from last week in which Azzopardi slammed James, saying “she has said she may run against the governor.”

The Long Island lawmaker, chairman of the Assembly Judiciary Committee, wrote that the statements are “difficult to comprehend” since he previously warned the governor that such actions could have a chilling effect on witnesses in his chamber’s impeachment investigation.

And yet, Andrew M. Cuomo has all but given a green light for loyalist Azzopardi to issue such statements, which suggests he places little weight on the Assembly's impeachment investigation led by Lavine.

Meanwhile, Azzopardi essentially "lawyered-up" in responding to media inquiries about Lavine's letter:

When asked for comment about Lavine’s letter, Azzopardi referred to a statement from Cuomo’s acting counsel Beth Garvey.

“There is a clear difference between actionable retaliation and protected speech and it is clear that the Chairman doesn’t understand the difference,” she said. “We will have a formal response forthcoming.”

No word on whether Garvey is responsible for Andrew M. Cuomo's unique interpretation of what constitutes sexual harassment under New York's state law.

In the meantime, we suspect Andrew M. Cuomo's search for better PR people and more legal help is likely to continue.