18 April 2025: NY Taxpayers to Pay $450K Settlement to Cuomo Sexual Harassment Accuser

NY taxpayers on the hook for $450K as Cuomo sexual harassment accuser settles with the state — just months ahead of mayoral primary

Charlotte Bennett, the second woman to allege former New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo sexually harassed her while he was New York's Governor, will receive a cash settlement from the state government because of it. Here's an excerpt from the report.

A former state employee who accused Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment clinched a $450,000 settlement — with taxpayers set to foot the massive bill as the former governor makes a comeback bid for New York City mayor.

Charlotte Bennett, who served as an assistant to Cuomo when he was governor, officially ended a long-running lawsuit Friday against the Empire State.

She is slated to receive $100,000 personally with another $350,000 earmarked for her lawyers and legal costs — all of which will be shelled out by the state.

To date, New York taxpayers have paid nearly $60 million to defend Cuomo for his role in multiple scandals like the sexual harassment allegations that ultimately forced him to resign in disgrace. The article details some of the other legal expenses the state has paid as a legal perk:

Other suits filed over the sexual harassment claims include one from a state trooper who accused Cuomo of touching her inappropriately. That legal battle has cost the state $8.6 million so far, according to Comptroller Tom DiNapoli’s office.

Another $11.7 million has been spent on state investigations, including into Cuomo’s handling of the COVID pandemic and his notorious $5 million pandemic book deal, as well as to cover the cost of defending him in impeachment proceedings.

Former executive assistant Brittany Commisso, who accused Cuomo of groping her, also has a case against the ex-gov still pending in state court.

On 26 January 2025, federal investigators determined Cuomo retaliated against the women he allegedly sexually harassed during his tenure in office.

This entry was added to the timeline on 22 April 2025.

2 March 2025: Cuomo Claims He Saved NYC from COVID

Andrew Cuomo says he saved NYC during COVID — and can save it as mayor — in first appearance since campaign launch

Andrew M. Cuomo made a rather bold claim as part of his brand new New York City mayoral election campaign. Here's an excerpt from this article covering the story:

Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo made his first appearance since throwing his hat into the ring in the Big Apple mayor’s race – telling supporters he saved the city during the pandemic and he can now save it from its current woes....

Cuomo, 67, was introduced by his daughters as he spoke at a carpenter’s union headquarters on Manhattan’s West Side.

“COVID, my friends, was the greatest threat faced in a generation,” the former governor said. “It was life and death, it was as serious as it gets and it was as scary as it gets. And New York, we had it first and we had it worst and we were on our own, and no one knew what to do? But what did we do? We came together, we stood tall, we stood strong and we faced the challenge head on.

“Everyone did their part,” he said. “And we kept this place, we kept this place running and we saved lives and we led the nation. So can we handle this challenge? You’re damned right we can.”

Cuomo failed to mention his deadly 25 March 2020 directive and the role it had in contributing to excess COVID deaths at New York's nursing homes. The directive forced nursing homes to admit patients known to be infected with the highly contagious coronavirus, which was especially dangerous and often fatal to elderly, sick individuals like those who rely upon nursing homes.

Exit question: What is the position of the carpenter's union on Cuomo's deadly directive?

2 March 2025: Families of Cuomo's Nursing Home Victims Opposing Cuomo's NYC Mayoral Run

Family of Cuomo’s COVID nursing home victims blast ‘disqualified’ gov’s quest for more power

Andrew M. Cuomo, who resigned in disgrace from New York's governor's mansion rather than face impeachment in New York's state legislature, announced on 1 March 2025 that he would run for election to become New York City's next mayor.

Cuomo's announcement triggered an immediate negative reaction among the surviving families of victims of Cuomo's deadly 25 March 2020 directive, which forced nursing homes to accept patients known to have COVID infections during the worst phase of 2020's coronavirus pandemic.

Family members of COVID-19 nursing home victims vowed to fight former Gov. Cuomo’s mayoral candidacy “every step of the way” — saying his handling of the pandemic “disqualified” him from mounting a political comeback.

“When you fail the most vulnerable who need the most help and are counting on the leadership to be top notch, he already disqualified himself from this race,” Vivian Rivera-Zayas, whose mother, Ana, died after contracting COVID-19 at a Long Island nursing home, told The Post.

“We’re going to continue to fight him every step of the way, hoping that he will not be elected our mayor.”

The article captures the reaction of another prominent anti-Cuomo advocate whose family was directly impacted by Cuomo's deadly policy decision:

Peter Arbeeny, who believes his father, Norman, contracted the virus at a Brooklyn nursing home in March 2020 and died the following month, ripped Cuomo’s callous attitude.

“His most famous term was, ‘Who cares where they died?'” said Arbeeny, 58, referring to Cuomo’s gripe at a 2021 press conference after a state attorney general’s report found he downplayed the number of nursing home residents killed by the bug. Cuomo repeated the question during a House committee hearing last year.

At this point, we'll interject to note that Cuomo and senior members of his administration clearly cared where they died, otherwise they would not have deliberately omitted the deaths of nursing home residents who were infected in their nursing homes but were transferred to other medical facilities where they subsequently died from the state's official count of COVID nursing home fatalities, which is a point that Cuomo made during testimony under oath before a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee in September 2024. The cover-up of the full extent of COVID nursing home deaths is one of the major parts of Cuomo's COVID nursing home deaths scandals.

The Arbeeny family's wrongful death lawsuit against the state of New York was dismissed on 30 September 2024. After commenting about several other civil court lawsuits that were dismissed, Cuomo's spokesperson Richard Azzopardi gave comments about the Arbeeny family's case that were reported in this article:

Azzopardi also noted that Arbeeny filed a lawsuit against the state that was dismissed, but “the facts that came out of that clearly show” his father’s nursing home did not admit any COVID-positive patients until three weeks after he had been discharged.

Azzpardi's comment represents a clear admission that patients known to be infected with COVID were deliberately placed in the nursing home where the Arbeeny's father had lived, where their infections could have been spread and infected other nursing home residents. Under Andrew M. Cuomo's deadly 25 March 2020 directive, the nursing home would be blocked from refusing to admit infected patients with the highly infectious condition that was known to be especially fatal to the sick and elderly.

This article was published on 1 March 2025, we're catching up to it today.

1 March 2025: Andrew Cuomo Announces Run for New York City Mayor

Andrew Cuomo announces run for New York City mayor

After months with little to no new developments in his nursing home deaths scandals and few in Cuomo's sexual harassment scandals that led him to resign in disgrace as New York's state governor, Andrew M. Cuomo has announced he will run for mayor of New York City.

Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who resigned amid numerous sexual harassment allegations in 2021, is running for New York City mayor.

The former governor made the announcement Saturday in a video on X, ending weeks of speculation.

The article mostly focuses on the sexual harassment scandals, but does mention Cuomo's nursing home deaths scandals:

In addition to the harassment scandal, Cuomo also came under scrutiny for allegations his administration concealed damaging information about nursing home deaths during the pandemic.

Cuomo was grilled on allegedly underreporting COVID-19 deaths in nursing homes during a GOP-led House committee hearing in September 2024. Cuomo largely stood by his decision-making during the pandemic -- including a March 2020 directive to readmit COVID-19 patients back into nursing homes -- and blamed the outsized death toll on what he described as then-President Donald Trump's lack of leadership.

"Every night, we got a census from the nursing homes, total nursing home deaths, total hospital deaths," Cuomo said during the combative hearing. "The numbers were less than certain, and they were highly problematic, because you were calling up a nursing home and basically asking them to do a forensic audit in the middle of a pandemic."

Cuomo also testified that he never directed his staff to report the number of nursing home-related fatalities as lower than they actually were.

"No, we said these are the numbers without the out-of-facility death numbers, which we will add when they're accurate," Cuomo said in the hearing.

The earliest reference we find in the timeline to Cuomo's claim the number of reported nursing home deaths omitted out-of-facility deaths because they were not accurate is on 26 April 2021, when Cuomo blamed "politics" for his and his administration's stonewalling of reporting complete nursing home death data.

Cuomo and his administration had a strong incentive to underreport COVID nursing home deathsbecause of his deadly 25 March 2020 directive. Cuomo's claims his administration only reported accurate deaths failed to pass contemporary fact checks.

26 January 2025: Federal Prosecutors Find Cuomo Sexually Harassed 13 Women, Engaged in Retaliation

Andrew Cuomo sexually harassed at least 13 female employees, retaliated against ex-staff: Feds

The state of New York has entered a settlement agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice after federal investigators determined the resigned-in-disgrace former New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo sexually harassed at least 13 women while governor and engaged in retaliation against several.

Federal prosecutors are backing the New York attorney general’s findings that former Gov. Andrew Cuomo sexually harassed several women and created a hostile work environment in the governor’s office.

In a settlement agreement between the feds and Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office announced Friday, the US Attorney’s Office slammed Cuomo for sexually harassing and later retaliating against former employees, even though the former governor continues to deny the allegations.

“Former Governor Cuomo subjected at least thirteen female employees of New York State, including Executive Chamber employees, to a sexually hostile work environment. Governor Cuomo repeatedly subjected these female employees to unwelcome, non-consensual sexual contact; ogling; unwelcome sexual comments; gender-based nicknames; comments on their physical appearances; and/or preferential treatment based on their physical appearances,” the report reads.

The settlement agreement was the result of federal prosecutors’ own investigation into the former governor, which was carried out separately from probes initiated by Attorney General Letitia James and the state Assembly Judiciary Committee.

The findings reported in the settlement will likely provide a basis for the state government to settle several lawsuits filed by Cuomo's alleged victims, who now have much stronger cases against Cuomo for his conduct in office.

This entry was added to the timeline on 22 April 2025.