NEW YORK — A Home subcommittee probing the governmental response to the pandemic will allege former Gov. Andrew Cuomo made false statements to Congress and refer legal prices to the U.S. Division of Justice.
The referral facilities round Cuomo’s statements to the Home Choose Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic about his involvement within the enhancing or reviewing of a controversial July 2020 report on Covid deaths of nursing residence residents.
“Mr. Cuomo offered false statements to the Choose Subcommittee in what seems to be a acutely aware, calculated effort to insulate himself from accountability,” Rep. Brad Wenstrup, the Ohio Republican who chairs the panel, wrote within the 107-page referral to Legal professional Common Merrick Garland. “The Division of Justice ought to contemplate Mr. Cuomo’s prior allegedly wrongful conduct when evaluating whether or not to cost him for the false statements described within the hooked up.”
Cuomo spokesperson Wealthy Azzopardi accused the panel of a “taxpayer-funded farce” and misusing its investigative authority.
He added the committee has “no foundation for this pre-election MAGA train and affirmatively selected to behave unethically with a purpose to assist their masters rating low cost political factors.”
Earlier Wednesday, an legal professional for the ex-governor filed his own criminal referral to the Division of Justice that accused the Home panel of “the misuse of presidency sources and the invasion of state prerogatives.”
The Home panel’s referral comes at a delicate second for Cuomo, who has been contemplating a political comeback.
The previous governor has not dominated out a bid for New York Metropolis mayor as incumbent Democrat Eric Adams is preventing federal corruption prices.
Cuomo resigned from workplace in August 2021 after a report from state Legal professional Common Letitia James decided he sexually harassed 11 ladies. He has denied any wrongdoing.
Polls have proven Cuomo, who retains excessive title recognition, aggressive in a Democratic mayoral major.
However Cuomo’s critics on the left and proper consider his Covid file makes him susceptible with voters.
Cuomo turned a nationwide movie star for his preliminary dealing with of the pandemic and his televised press convention turned appointment viewing for homebound New Yorkers.
His nursing residence insurance policies got here beneath scrutiny after the state Division of Well being issued a March 2020 order that the amenities not flip away Covid-positive sufferers amid considerations hospitals would fill with sick individuals.
As criticism mounted into the spring and summer time of 2020, state well being officers issued a report that tallied nursing residence residents’ fatalities. A separate evaluation by James’ workplace in January 2021 later determined the Cuomo administration considerably undercounted deaths of people that initially turned sick with Covid in nursing properties and died.
Cuomo advised Home investigators in June he didn’t view the July 2020 report.
“I didn’t,” Cuomo mentioned in closed-door testimony in June. “Perhaps it was within the inbox, however I didn’t.”
He later added he did “not recall reviewing” or seeing it.
“It is a joke — the governor mentioned he didn’t recall as a result of he didn’t recall,” Azzopardi mentioned. “The committee lied of their referral simply as they’ve been mendacity to the general public and the press.”
The referral from the subcommittee consists of testimony of former Cuomo advisers who advised investigators he was concerned within the report’s enhancing earlier than it was publicly launched.
And days earlier than the July report was launched, a Cuomo aide emailed: “Governor’s edits are hooked up in your assessment.”
