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A Republican-led House subcommittee on Wednesday referred former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo to the Justice Department after he was accused of mendacity to Congress a few report on his involvement in nursing house deaths through the coronavirus pandemic.
Leader of the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, Rep. Brad Wenstrup, R-Ohio, signed the referral that accuses Cuomo of partaking in a “conscious, calculated effort” to keep away from duty for how nursing house deaths have been accounted for in early 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic started.
The referral letter claims that Cuomo, who held a behind-closed-doors assembly with the subcommittee, didn’t assessment a State Health Department report that blamed him for these deaths, in accordance to a brand new report by the New York Times.
FEDERAL JUDGE DISMISSES NURSING HOME COVID DEATH CASE AGAINST FORMER NEW YORK GOV. ANDREW CUOMO
Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is sworn in to testify earlier than the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic in the Rayburn House Office Building on the U.S. Capitol on Sept. 10, 2024, in Washington, D.C. (Kent Nishimura)
Despite Cuomo reportedly reviewing the experiences from his state’s well being division and writing elements of early drafts in emails, the previous governor says he doesn’t recollect such a factor.
“This taxpayer-funded farce is an illegal use of Congress’s investigative authority,” mentioned Richard Azzopardi, a spokesperson for Cuomo. “The governor said he didn’t recall because he didn’t recall. The committee lied in their referral just as they have been lying to the public and the press.”
This comes as Cuomo has surfaced as a prime title for subsequent yr’s New York City mayoral contest. It’s unclear whether or not present Mayor Eric Adams will run once more as he’s just lately been indicted by a grand jury on 5 counts of bribery and corruption, which incorporates soliciting unlawful international marketing campaign donations.
Cuomo resigned as governor in August 2021 amid sexual harassment allegations, which he nonetheless denies.
The prison referral by the House subcommittee doesn’t carry water in the authorized system and Congress doesn’t have the wherewithal to instruct the Justice Department on what they need to do with it.
There’s additionally no indication if the upcoming election may have any bearing on the subcommittee’s referral — regardless of who good points management of Congress or who wins the presidency.
Former New York Gov. Andrew spoke about his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and controversial nursing house insurance policies whereas Republicans scrutinized his position in the state’s response and alleged undercounting nursing house deaths. (Kent Nishimura)
Cuomo’s memoir, “American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic,” has been underneath scrutiny the previous couple of years and he was ordered to return $5 million on his cost advance for the piece after a state ethics board declared he used state assets to assist pen it.
That’s one thing Cuomo additionally denied and efficiently sued the board for, claiming it was his proper to due course of.
EX-NEW YORK GOV ANDREW CUOMO TO FACE HOUSE GOP COMMITTEE OVER COVID NURSING HOME DEATHS
Cuomo has insisted that info and information concerning COVID deaths through the early phases was unreliable, and that his administration centered on extra dependable numbers that individuals might belief, in accordance to the Times.
In Wenstrup’s letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland, he mentioned Cuomo falsely mentioned “he did not have any discussions about the July 6 report being peer reviewed” and “that he did not know whether the July 6 report was reviewed by persons outside” the State Department of Health.
Rep. Brad Wenstrup, chairman of the COVID-19 choose subcommittee, sought solutions from former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo about his handling of the pandemic behind closed doorways. (Getty Images)
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“Mr. Cuomo provided false statements to the select subcommittee in what appears to be a conscious, calculated effort to insulate himself from accountability,” Wenstrup wrote in the referral letter reviewed by the Times. “The Department of Justice should consider Mr. Cuomo’s prior allegedly wrongful conduct when evaluating whether to charge him for the false statements described.”
Cuomo has accused the subcommittee of misusing authorities assets to “investigate a matter beyond its jurisdiction, apparently in service of a private lawsuit.”
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