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A sizable majority of the Democrats serving in New York’s congressional delegation are calling on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to resign following the latest sexual harassment allegations reported.
The newest allegations say that the Governor groped a female aide last year. Soon after, a wave of statements were released by elected officials in and from New York calling on Cuomo to resign.
Within minutes of each other on Friday morning, Democratic lawmakers released statements calling for the governor to step down, including some senior members like House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, House Oversight Committee Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney, House Small Business Committee Chairwoman Nydia Velázquez and Democratic Congressional Committee Chairman Sean Patrick Maloney.
More than half of the 19 Democrats in the delegation have called for Cuomo’s resignation, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Jamaal Bowman. Most attributed their decisions to both the growing number of harassment allegations as well as the fallout over the state’s handling of COVID-19 deaths in nursing homes.
“The fact that this latest report was so recent is alarming, and it raises concerns about the present safety and well-being of the administration’s staff,” Ocasio-Cortez and Bowman said in a joint statement, referring to the latest allegation reported by The Times Union of Albany that Cuomo groped a female aide late last year when she was summoned to the governor’s mansion to help with a technical issue.
Cuomo, who has denied all of the allegations, pushed back against the calls for his resignation during a press call on Friday.
“Women have a right to come forward and be heard, and I encourage that – fully. But I also want to be clear: There is a question of the truth. I did not do what has been alleged – period,” Cuomo said, denying the latest claim. “There are often many motivations for making an allegation. I’m not going to argue this issue in the press.”
He added, “politicians who don’t know a single fact but yet form a conclusion and an opinion are, in my opinion, reckless and dangerous.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James is currently handling an independent investigation into the claims, while the New York State Assembly opened an impeachment inquiry into the governor this week.
