Top Senate Republicans want ethics probe of Cuomo COVID tests
ALBANY — The top Republican in the state Senate filed a formal complaint against Gov. Cuomo, calling on the ethics committee tasked with keeping an eye on Albany to probe reports that the governor prioritized COVID-19 tests for his friends and family.
Senate Minority Leader Robert Ortt (R-Erie County) slammed Cuomo over allegations that the embattled governor used state Health Department officials to administer tests to his mother, brother and other VIPs and enlisted State Police to rush the samples to a state-run lab in Albany.
“I write to file a formal complaint against Governor Andrew M. Cuomo regarding what appears to be a very clear, straightforward violation of the public officer’s Code of Ethics,” Ortt wrote in a letter to the Joint Commission on Public Ethics.
On Thursday, Attorney General Letitia James, one of Cuomo’s fellow Democrats, issued a statement urging JCOPE to investigate the alleged preferential testing.
James’ office is already overseeing an outside investigation into sexual harassment allegations made against the governor by several former and current staffers who say Cuomo made inappropriate comments or came on to them.
The Assembly’s ongoing impeachment investigation into the governor will also examine whether Cuomo unlawfully used his office to provide relatives and associates with special access to hard-to-find coronavirus tests as the pandemic began last spring, lawmakers said this week. The impeachment probe is primarily focused on the harassment claims and allegations that the governor’s office intentionally underreported COVID deaths at nursing homes
The governor has denied any wrongdoing.
But Cuomo’s problems compounded this week when the Albany Times Union first reported that the governor, once a national star thanks to his daily televised pandemic updates, first reported that the 63-year-old elected official ordered high-ranking state health officials to test his brother, CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, as well as his elderly mother and one of his sisters at a time when COVID supplies were scarce.
Ortt points out that the preferential treatment could violate state laws that bar officials from using state resources to benefit another individual, including a family member.
“It does not take a stretch of the imagination to see a clear connection between Gov. Cuomo using his official position as the head of state government and the unwarranted privileges provided to his own family members and close associates,” the lawmaker wrote. “Obviously, while these actions would be egregious during normal times, they are particularly unconscionable because they occurred early on during the pandemic, at a time when testing was in short supply and high demand.”
JCOPE spokesman Walter McClure said he can’t comment on “anything that is or might be an investigative matter.”
Amid the snowballing scandals, Cuomo has stood his ground and is refusing to step down despite calls for his resignation coming from both sides of the aisle.
The governor, who is also declining to address new allegations of harassment after insinuating some of his accusers may have political motivations, slammed critics calling on him to vacate his post with a week to go until the budget deadline and vaccination efforts ramping up.
“(T)hey were just wrong,” he said during a press briefing on Wednesday. “And look, they don’t even understand the nature of the job, right? The nature of the job of being governor is there are always multiple situations to deal with.”
