22 November 2021: NY Assembly Report - Cover-Up of COVID Nursing Home Deaths Confirmed

Read the Assembly's report on Cuomo's alleged abuses of power

This article summarizes the NY Assembly's impeachment probe report's major findings. In the following extended excerpt, we've focused upon Andrew M. Cuomo's attempted cover-up of the full extent of COVID deaths among New York nursing home residents:

The Assembly report also examines whether Cuomo directed his staff to inappropriately withhold or misrepresent information regarding the effects of COVID-19 on nursing home residents in New York, particularly a July 2020 report created by the state Department of Health examining the fallout of a controversial health department guidance that some have blamed for significant deaths in New York nursing homes.

"Evidence obtained during our investigation demonstrates that while the DOH report was released under the auspices of DOH, it was substantially revised by the Executive Chamber and largely intended to combat criticisms regarding former Gov. Cuomo’s directive that nursing homes should readmit residents that had been diagnosed with COVID-19," the report states.

"In preparing the DOH report, members of the Executive Chamber and the (New York) COVID-19 Task Force considered which population of deaths to disclose: deaths of nursing home residents that had occurred within the nursing home facility only, or whether to also disclose deaths that occurred outside the facility, such as after transfer to a hospital. The DOH report ultimately disclosed in-facility deaths only."

The decision to exclude the out-of-facility deaths "resulted in a report that was not fully transparent," the report found.

The U.S. Department of Justice has been examining the suppression of COVID-19 death numbers by Cuomo's administration, as well as the timing of that suppression as Cuomo's book deal loomed.

The federal criminal investigation is focusing on why the administration — under the direction of top members of the governor's task force — had begun "stockpiling" information on people who were presumed to have died of COVID-19 in nursing homes. At one point last year, the number of unreported deaths in that category rose into the hundreds, a person briefed on the investigation said.

The Assembly's investigators have shared information with law enforcement regarding the former administration’s handling of nursing home death data.

According to the report, Cuomo and his counsel were given numerous chances to respond to the allegations, but only issued the following statement:

“Nothing about the conduct by individuals in the Executive Chamber in reporting data was unlawful,” the statement read, while pointing to a written presentation given to the U.S. attorney’s office that made “clear that there was no wrongdoing.”

For two weeks around April to May 2020, certain nursing home deaths were not included in published Department of Health data, including deaths reported by nursing homes after 5 p.m. each day, making the data incomplete.

Executive Chamber employees and health department administrators knew it was a problem. The report details that when an employee told a task force member about the undercounting, the member responded, saying something akin to, “Do you want me to admit that we have been reporting deaths incorrectly?,” according to the report.

In the preparation of a Department of Health report issued in July 2020 to explain the administration's COVID-19 nursing home policies and the reporting of deaths in those facilities, the Assembly's investigation found Cuomo was granted control to review and edit a draft of that report on "multiple occasions." Cuomo used those opportunities to defend his controversial March 2020 directive instructing that nursing homes must accept residents discharged from hospitals even if they were positive for COVID-19.

Health department officials raised concerns that the data contained in drafts of the report couldn’t be verified by their staff. Moreover, health officials worried that the report was not scientific or medical in nature.

Let's remove any doubt. After Cuomo's senior staffers finished their doctoring of what became the DOH's 6 July 2020 report, it was neither scientific nor medical in nature.