20 January 2022: Transcripts - Cuomo Was Desperate for Better PR People

We keep saying it, because it's true. Andrew M. Cuomo is desperately seeking better PR people and more legal help. The following excerpt from this report confirms that truth:

After then-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s offer of $100,000 a month didn’t convince PR exec Maggie Moran to handle crisis communications when sexual harassment allegations emerged last year, the disgraced pol’s office tried “Italian guilt” as a lure.

It didn’t work either.

The revelation is included in a transcript of a July 2021 deposition during which Moran, a Cuomo ally who served as campaign manager for his 2018 re-election bid, answered questions from lawyers with the New York Attorney General’s Office, which was at the time investigating accusations of improper behavior by Cuomo. New York Attorney General Letitia James released the 232-page document on Thursday as part of the final tranche of official materials related to the probe.

The report also provides a window into the disturbing morality of PR people:

Moran, who was then a managing partner at high-powered PR agency Kivvit, testified during the deposition that “Cuomo world” had asked her and Kivvit to help prop up the governor’s rapidly declining image. While Cuomo was fending off the sexual harassment claims, he was simultaneously being investigated by state authorities for allegedly undercounting COVID-19 deaths in New York nursing homes by as much as 50 percent.

“The nursing home [issue], to me, was a different deal,” Moran said in her testimony. “You know, [Cuomo aide] Melissa [DeRosa] said one word out of context, they probably disclosed the numbers, nobody had a playbook during the pandemic, that felt, to me, like something that was worthwhile to work on.”

But the harassment allegations, Moran continued, “I just didn't really want any part of.” She said she decided not to help with the nursing home probe “once the allegations started.”

PR person Maggie Moran now works hard to improve the image of the cannabis industry.