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| Credit: TNS/Brendan McDermid |
Former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Tuesday began testifying before a Republican-led congressional panel investigating his administration’s handling of nursing home deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Cuomo, speaking to reporters before the start of his closed-door interview, accused GOP lawmakers of politicizing the pandemic issue, noting that other Republican governors implemented similar policies and have not been asked to testify.
“Today is an opportunity to get the truth and the facts out, and I welcome that opportunity,” Cuomo said outside the Thomas P. O’Neill Jr. Federal Building where attorneys for the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic were set to question him.
Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-Staten Island), the only New Yorker on the subcommittee, told reporters Tuesday the panel’s goal was to get answers about Cuomo’s March 2020 directive that told nursing homes they could not deny nursing home beds to COVID-19 positive patients.
“New Yorkers want to know what led up to the decision to mandate nursing homes take COVID positive patients, it never made sense,” Malliotakis said.
Cuomo has argued he was following federal guidance. In an opening statement to the subcommittee that was provided to reporters, Cuomo argued the administration of former President Donald Trump was slow to develop and distribute adequate testing materials that could have helped stop the spread of the virus in nursing homes. --->READ MORE HERE
A defiant former Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Tuesday blamed everyone but himself for New York’s deadly COVID nursing-home debacle while being grilled by lawmakers on Capitol Hill, GOP pols said.
“I don’t see a lot of remorse. He is deflecting,” said Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa), who is one of several doctors serving on the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic as it investigates the former governor’s conduct at the closed-door hearing.
Cuomo allegedly refused to shake the hand of House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik of New York at one point but was otherwise very cordial, sources and lawmakers said — and when asked by The Post how he was feeling heading into the session, replied, “Cool dude, loose mood, always.”
Republican lawmakers exiting the questioning said Cuomo was still trying to frame the congressional inquiry as political and did not provide any noteworthy new context to the panel, instead keeping to what he wrote in his related book, a gushing story of his administration’s response to the horrific crisis.
“New York was not collecting or analyzing any nursing home data, and then it was a rush to have the deaths done retroactively, which was tremendous pressure on the nursing homes at the same point in time, that they’re trying to care for people and continuing to admit people,” Miller-Meeks, who served from 2011 to 2014 as director of Iowa’s Department of Public Health, told reporters.
“There needs to be accountability.”
Rep. Marc Molinaro (R-NY), Cuomo’s 2018 gubernatorial challenger, said, “He’s keeping to what you’ve read about in his published book.
“There is no variation from that as of yet,” Molinaro told reporters in reference to Cuomo’s $5 million book deal.
But Molinaro, the former Dutchess County executive, said Cuomo was pleasant, noting that it was likely the first time they’ve spoken since the ex-governor called him to express his condolences after Molinaro’s father died from COVID-19 in 2020. --->READ MORE HEREFollow links below to relevant/related stories and resources:
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