By: Jared Evan
New York State Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced at a Monday press conference that the reopening of the state will take place as well as loosening of all COVID restrictions. He did, however, make some rather astonishing remarks that are now creating a media buzz and are causing more than a few raised eyebrows, to say the least.
Beginning May 19th, New York, New Jersey and Connecticut will lift most capacity restrictions on businesses, venues and gatherings, Cuomo announced, boasting the states’ vaccinations efforts.
Cuomo, asked about his potential future plans as he battles state and federal probes, told reporters at the press conference, “I did nothing wrong, period, and I am not resigning.”
He took a swipe at the Attorney General Letitia James’s probe into the nursing home deaths, sexual harassment accusations, and the book scandal, by saying” I’m not telling anyone to have faith in anything,’’ when asked about his belief in the investigation process.
A good portion of his Monday briefing was also about New York state’s vaccination efforts. The disgraced governor made more incredible remarks, on this topic.
“There is an attitude that they’ll be fine, why should they take the vaccine?” the governor said at a press briefing, referring to young people.
“My argument is, yeah, maybe you’ll be fine, and by the way, you don’t know that either,’’ the governor said. “Maybe you will get a long-haul syndrome that we’re not really be sure what it is yet but a lingering consequence of COVID.
“Or maybe you’ll go home and kiss your grandmother and wind up killing your grandmother. So show some civic responsibility,’’ Cuomo said.
The NY Post excellently pointed out: his comments come just over a year after the state Health Department’s controversial edict that sent nursing home residents who tested positive for the virus back to the facilities — even though the elderly are among the most vulnerable to COVID-19.
Critics of Cuomo have deemed him “the granny killer” because of the nursing home scandal, which makes the comments appear to be a swipe at detractors and very duplicitous.
Only last week, the governor was asked at another press conference about the nursing home scandal, Fox News pointed out, Cuomo said his administration were never trying to downplay numbers but were taking their time providing statistics to make sure they were accurate as they faced a “political” investigation.
“This was all politics and all a political football that then morphed into an investigation, which made all the lawyers very careful about what the information they put out was,” Cuomo said.
Cuomo blamed former President Donald Trump and his administration for using the pandemic against Democratic governors like him for political purposes and said the Justice Department’s investigation of New York nursing home deaths was a political probe, Fox News reported.
Cuomo also made another startling remark when talking about younger New Yorkers not getting vaccinated, by suggesting High School students, should be all bussed to vaccination centers; alarming parents who believe in medical decisions being left up to families and not the state.
