Cuomo top aide reportedly admits nursing home coverup; Stefanik calls for prosecution
- par Amanda Heroux
- dans Science
- — Fév 13, 2021
The former president was tweeting about Cuomo and other Democratic governors' handling of the nursing homes, a transcript of the call released by the governor's office shows.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki dodged Friday when asked about a report that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, had withheld information regarding Covid-19 fatalities in nursing homes during the pandemic.
"We were comprehensive and transparent in our responses to the DOJ, and then had to immediately focus our resources on the second wave and vaccine rollout", the statement continues. "Because then we were in a position where we weren't sure if what we were going to give to the Department of Justice, or what we give to you guys [state lawmakers], what we start saying was going to be used against us, while we weren't sure if there was going to be an investigation".
The comments came about two weeks after New York Attorney General Letitia James published a report saying the true death toll of nursing home residents between March and August previous year may be twice as high as the 6,400 officially reported.
Politico reported that Republican lawmakers in the state are now calling on Cuomo to resign.
Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y., wants a Justice Department probe.
James had, for months, been examining discrepancies between the number of deaths being reported by the state's Department of Health, and the number of deaths reported by the homes themselves.
"This bombshell admission of a coverup and the remarks by the Secretary to the Governor indicating intent to obstruct any federal investigation is a stunning and criminal abuse of power".
If this information that's been reported is accurate, then Governor Cuomo has totally lost the trust of the people he represents and has violated his oath of office.
9000 nursing home patients died before Cuomo reversed his decision on May 10, 2020. Andrew Cuomo is unfit for office.
"Instead of apologizing or providing answer to the thousands of NY families who lost loved ones, the governor's administration made apologies to politicians behind closed doors for the "political inconvenience" this scandal has caused them", Ortt said.
"Basically, we froze", DeRosa told lawmakers on that call. During the coronavirus pandemic, we have seen the executive misrepresent and not present important, factual and real-time information and a refusal to distribute complete, accurate and needed data. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: we must remove the politics and assess the state's COVID-19 policies so we can effectively combat this pandemic and help ensure a tragedy like this never occurs again. Alessandra Biaggi, Jabari Brisport, Samra Brouk, Jeremy Cooney, Andrew Gounardes, Robert Jackson, John Liu, John Mannion, Rachel May, Elijah Reichlin-Melnick, Gustavo Rivera, Julia Salazar, James Sanders and James Skoufis. "There needs to be full accountability for what happened".
But one thing you won't find in his now bargain priced book is what the Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa recently told other New York Democrats, which recently emerged in a report.
"We explained that the Trump administration was in the midst of a politically motivated effort to blame democratic states for COVID deaths and that we were cooperating with Federal document productions and that was the priority and now that it is over we can address the state legislature".
