The Allegations Against Governor Cuomo

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By: Abigail Richards

Since the start of the pandemic last March, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has been receiving national attention for his daily briefings, and trying to quell the rise of COVID-19 cases in the state of New York. However, since the start of the new year Governor Cuomo has been making national headlines for reported allegations of sexual harassment and inappropriate behavior from former and current state employees. There are now seven woman who have come forward to describe inappropriate behavior portrayed by the Governor and accusations of sexual harassment.

The first accusation to be brought to light was made by a former administration aide, Lindsey Boylan, who previously worked for the Cuomo administration from 2015-2018 has stated that she has been in multiple situations where the Governor has put her in uncomfortable situations. Some instances included him asking her to play a game of strip poker with him. After this accusation was released Charlotte Bennett, a former aide to the Governor, has also released information of her experience with the Governor. Bennett has stated the incident occurred when the Governor was alone with her and asked about her sex life and if she would have sex with someone much older then her. These two graphic accusations were made public a third woman made the statement that the Governor made an unwanted advance towards her at a wedding. After the first three allegations were brought to the public eye Governor Cuomo issued an apology to the women and also stated that he will not be stepping down as Governor anytime soon.

Now four other accusations regarding the same behavior have been made public which leads the number of accusations against Governor Cuomo to seven. Political officials from many different levels of government associated with the state of New York have called for

Governor Cuomo to resign immediately. Kirsten Gillibrand and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, U.S. Senators representing New York have issued a statement that they want the Governor to resign from his position in light of the accusations. Other public members who have also called for the Governor to resign include U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Assemblyman Ron Kim. Governor Cuomo has repeatedly stated that he has no intention to step-down despite the growing number of allegations. This has taken over his praise for dealing with the pandemic and comes just after his involvement with the nursing home scandal in New York.

Earlier this year, it was reported that the Cuomo Administration had underreported the total number of COVID-19 related deaths in New York state nursing homes. His administration would have been investigated by the department of justice if the correct number of deaths had been reported. Fox News senior meteorologist, Janice Dean, has repeatedly called out Governor Cuomo over the nursing home scandal due to her personal connection to this debacle. Dean has lost both of her in-laws during the pandemic while they both died in nursing homes during the pandemic. She was one of the first on-screen personalities to confront Cuomo with the idea of resignation due to the investigation of the under-reported deaths.

With the many evolving scandals that Governor Andrew Cuomo is facing it begs the question of what the future holds for this third-term governor. Having won the race of New York Governor in 2010, 2014, and 2018, it brings up the question on whether Cuomo will decide to run for another re-election campaign again in 2022. The state of New York has a four-year term limit, but an unlimited number of runs a person can make while in office. While these are all still developing stories Governor Cuomo has stated multiple times that he will remain in office despite the growing number of harassment allegations and nursing home scandals.