Andrew Cuomo To Resign After Investigation Finds He Sexually Harassed Multiple Women

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has announced he will resign from office following a scathing report from the state’s attorney general concluding that the third-term Democrat sexually harassed 11 women, and in one instance, sought to retaliate against one of his accusers who went public with her allegations.

“Wasting energy on distractions is the last thing that state government should be doing, and I cannot be the cause of that,” Cuomo, 63, said in remarks from the capital of Albany on Tuesday.

“I think that, given the circumstances, the best way I can help now is if I step aside and let government get back to governing,” he added.

His Lt. Governor, Kathy Hochul, will be next in line and will be the state’s first female governor.

“This transition must be seamless,” Cuomo said, calling Hochul smart and competent. “She can come up to speed quickly.”

Hochul, who served one term in Congress before being tapped by Cuomo to be his running mate in 2014, said in a statement she agreed with the governor’s decision to step down.

“It is the right thing to do and in the best interest of New Yorkers,” she said. “As someone who has served at all levels of government and is next in the line of succession, I am prepared to lead as New York State’s 57th Governor.”

Cuomo will leave office on August 24

Cuomo’s departure from office, which will take effect in 14 days, represents a remarkable turn of events from just over a year ago, when the governor was seen as a rising star in the Democratic Party for his administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Yet even that performance is now under a cloud of scrutiny, as a separate investigation by the attorney general found that the number of nursing home deaths disclosed by the state was far worse than officials disclosed.

But it was the allegations of harassment that precipitated the once unthinkable prospect of Cuomo’s resignation. The 165-page report released last week followed a months-long investigation into Cuomo’s actions and outlined what New York Attorney General Letitia James called violations of both state and federal law. Prosecutors said their findings substantiated allegations from several women — allegations that included unwanted and nonconsensual touching, groping and kissing and sexual comments.

“This is a sad day for New York because independent investigators have concluded that Governor Cuomo sexually harassed multiple women and, in doing so, broke the law,” James said upon the report’s release. “No man – no matter how powerful – can be allowed to harass women or violate our human rights.”

It’s a stunning fall for Cuomo, a political scion who’s last name is like royalty in New York. His father, Mario, a former three-term governor, is revered in the state. Cuomo’s resignation marks an end to a nearly half-century political dynasty. There has been a Cuomo in statewide or federal office for 40 of the last 46 years.

In his remarks Tuesday, Cuomo repeatedly denied the allegations against him and called the report “false.” The most serious allegations, he said, “had no credible factional basis.”

He then apologized for offending the women who were included in the report and said he took “full responsibility” for his actions.

“I have been too familiar with people. My sense of humor can be insensitive and off-putting. I do hug and kiss people casually, women and men. I have done it all my life,” Cuomo said.

“In my mind, I’ve never crossed the line with anyone but I didn’t realize the extent to which the line has been redrawn.”

Multiple women spoke out publicly against Cuomo

Since February, at least seven women have come forward to recount unwelcome interactions with Cuomo, including several former aides.

Among them is Jessica Bakeman, who said in a New York Magazine essay published in March that the governor touched her inappropriately while she was working as a statehouse reporter several years ago. Bakeman now works at an NPR member station in Florida.

Her account followed claims from an unidentified aide who said Cuomo had groped her at the governor’s mansion late last year. The Times Union of Albany said it spoke with someone who had direct knowledge of her allegation that the governor reached under her shirt and fondled her after she was called to his office to assist with an issue involving his phone.

An attorney for the governor, Beth Garvey, said the state had an obligation to report those allegations and did so when the complainant declined to do it.

Following the Times Union revelation, the speaker of the New York State Assembly, Carl Heastie, authorized the Assembly’s Judiciary Committee to open an impeachment investigation to look into the misconduct allegations against Cuomo.

Another woman, Anna Ruch, shared her story with The New York Times. Ruch told the Times in March that she met Cuomo during a wedding reception in September 2019. Ruch said that Cuomo put his hand on her bare lower back and that after she removed his hand, he then placed both hands on her cheeks and asked if he could kiss her. A friend nearby photographed the interaction, and Ruch shared the photos with the newspaper.

Calls to resign have been growing from within his own party

Following publication of Ruch’s story, U.S. Rep. Kathleen Rice called for Cuomo to quit. She was the first Democrat in New York’s congressional delegation to do so.

In the months since, every member of the state’s congressional delegation has followed suit, including Reps. Jerry Nadler and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. So too did the state’s two senators — Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand.

President Joe Biden also said Cuomo should resign if the investigation confirmed the womens’ allegations.

“I think he’ll probably end up being prosecuted, too,” Biden told ABC News in March.

After the attorney general’s report was released Aug. 3, Biden confirmed that he believed Cuomo should step down. “I think he should resign,” Biden told reporters at the White House.

Ruch’s allegations followed statements in February from two former aides: Lindsey Boylan, a onetime economic adviser to Cuomo, and Charlotte Bennett, who worked as an executive assistant and health policy adviser for the governor.

Boylan described an unwanted kiss and touching from the governor, amid “a culture within his administration where sexual harassment and bullying is so pervasive that it is not only condoned but expected.”

Bennett told The New York Times that the governor had asked her a series of personal questions when she was alone with him in his office, including whether she ever had sex with older men.

Cuomo also faced backlash for nursing home deaths

On top of the harassment accusations, Cuomo was also facing pressure for not publicly disclosing the full number of people who died of COVID-19 in nursing homes in the state.

James issued a report in late January that found Cuomo’s administration undercounted the nursing home deaths by 50% because it didn’t include many residents who became sick with COVID-19, were transferred to a hospital and died there.

A long history in politics

Cuomo has been involved in politics for most of his life. Arguably, politics has been more a part of his life than even his father’s.

He got his start in politics as a volunteer on his father’s campaign for lieutenant governor when he was just 16. In 1982, at 24, he served as his father’s campaign manager for Mario’s first successful run for governor.

When his father was governor, Cuomo then started a nonprofit in the 1980s to help build housing for the homeless, which drew the attention of national political figures.

By the 1990s, Cuomo was serving as secretary of housing and urban development in Bill Clinton’s administration. And he was married to Kerry Kennedy in a marriage dubbed “Cuomolot” by the New York tabloids, a play on Camelot, which the Kennedy family is sometimes called.

Andrew Cuomo returned to New York in 2000 and immediately launched a campaign against Republican Gov. George Pataki, the man who unseated his father and denied Mario Cuomo a fourth term.

The campaign, though, was a bust. He lost in the Democratic primary, and Pataki won reelection. After the loss, his marriage fell apart, too. It was a time he called the low point of his life.

But by 2006, he was back. He ran and won as state attorney general, mapping out his arc to the governorship. He was elected governor in 2010, and was serving his third term, seeking his fourth, at the time of his resignation.

Only one other person had won four terms as New York State governor — Nelson Rockefeller, who went on to serve as Gerald Ford’s vice president in 1974.

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