The House panel investigating the Covid-19 pandemic sent the Justice Department a criminal referral for former New York governor Andrew Cuomo (D) over alleged false statements he made to congress.
The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic sent Attorney General Merrick Garland the criminal referral Wednesday night accusing Cuomo of lying about his role in drafting a July 2020 New York State Department of Health report that deliberately undercounted the nursing home deaths caused by the Cuomo administration’s directive instructing facilities to take in Covid-positive patients.
“Andrew Cuomo repeatedly lied to Congress, and he must be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. Both witness testimony and new documents serve as evidence that the former Governor made false statements to the Select Subcommittee during our COVID-19 nursing home investigation,” said Representative Brad Wenstrup (R., Ohio), chairman of the subcommittee.
“Plain and simple, making false statements to Congress is a federal crime. We look forward to cooperating fully with the Justice Department’s investigation into Andrew Cuomo’s wrongdoings.”
Cuomo told the subcommittee in June that he was not involved with drafting the report and did not discuss peer-reviewing the report. He also said he was not aware of individuals outside the New York Department of Health reviewing the report. The subcommittee concluded that these statements are false based on documents obtained during its investigation and testimony from two witnesses, former advisor Jim Malatras and former executive assistant Farrah Kennedy.
The criminal referral includes an email Kennedy sent in June 2020 informing staff that the “Governor’s edits” were attached and available for review. Kenndy testified that the email indicated Cuomo drafted the report’s language and edited pages three through 16 of a draft version.
“This taxpayer-funded farce is an illegal use of Congress’ investigative authority. The committee counsels Mr Benzine and Mr. Emmer knows there is no basis for this pre-election Maga exercise and affirmatively chose to act unethically in order to help their masters score cheap political points. We look forward to Rep. Stefanik and Malliotakis and the committee counsels having to answer for their conduct before the DoJ,” said Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi.
Azzopardi accused the subcommittee of lying on its referral and pointed to a section of Cuomo’s closed-door testimony where he said he could not recall reviewing or discussing the report. In addition, Cuomo’s attorney wrote a referral to the Justice Department calling for an investigation into purported abuse of power by the subcommittee and collusion with Fox News personality Janice Dean, a prominent critic of the nursing home directive.
The Covid-19 panel previously released evidence that appears to show Cuomo attempted to influence Malatras’s testimony by reaching out to him multiple times after major developments in the subcommittee’s investigation.
Cuomo testified publicly before the subcommittee in September and repeatedly deflected questions on the nursing home directive and subsequent report. Sticking to his guns, Cuomo claimed the nursing home directive fell within public health guidelines and defended the decision not to include out-of-facility death statistics for nursing home patients in the report.
The nursing home scandal and allegations of sexual harassment tanked Cuomo’s political career after he received widespread praise from Democrats throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. But, news reports have suggested that Cuomo is considering a run for New York City mayor to revive his career.