Disgraced former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo says he’ll fight a resolution from the state’s ethics commission that orders him to cough up the millions he made selling his book about “leadership” during the China Virus crisis.
The decision is yet another black eye for the former governor, whom 11 women credibly accused of sexual assault and harassment. The nursing home Virus massacre also drove him from office, a scandal that surfaced again last week.
CNBC reported that brother, CNN talker Chris Cuomo, and Andrew’s top torpedo, Melissa DeRosa, plotted to ruin Fox meteorologist Janice Dean, who attacked the governor for shoving COVID patients into nursing homes. Her husband’s parents died with the disease because of it.
Nut of the story: The Cuomo boys will do just about anything to keep their wealth, power, and prestige.
Give Us the Money
The ethics panel reversed its approval to write the book on two counts.
Cuomo lied about using state resources to write it. As the New York Times disclosed in April, DeRosa and other aides helped mightily with the book. That help broke the law. As well, DeRosa and her underlings “lowballed” nursing home COVID deaths in the book, as the New York Post put it. In other words, they lied.
Thus, the New York State Joint Committee on Public Ethics (JCOPE) ordered Cuomo to pony up $5.1 million in profits from the self-serving hagiography, American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the Covid-19 Pandemic, the Post reported:
JCOPE rescinded its approval after concluding that Cuomo violated pledges not to use state resources or government staffers to prepare the book. He must pay the money to the state by next month.
The resolution, drafted by commissioner David McNamara, a Senate Republican appointee, said Cuomo now “lacked the legal authority to engage in outside activity and receive compensation in regard to the book” since JCOPE rescinded its approval.
“Gov. Cuomo is not legally entitled to retain compensation … for any form of outside activity related to the book,” McNamara said.
The resolution fingers Cuomo for lying about using state resources and the number of nursing-home COVID fatalities, which Cuomo caused when he ordered those homed to accept new residents with the virus.
“Contrary to the representations made on behalf of Gov. Cuomo and not disclosed to the commission, state property, resources and personnel — including staff volunteers — were used in connection with the preparation, writing, editing and publication of the book,” the resolution says, noting that it was full of “serial omissions and misrepresentations … constituting grounds for revocation.”
Cuomo has a month to fork over the moolah, the resolution says:
It is ordered that by no later than 30 days from the date of this resolution, Gov. Cuomo pay over to the attorney general of the State of New York an amount equal to the compensation paid to him for his outside activities related to the book.
Cuomo donated some of the profits to the United Way. He locked the rest into an irrevocable trust for his daughters. Of course, he wants to keep it. We can’t have the Cuomo girls out on the street.
Cuomo’s lawyer said the panel’s decisions are “unconstitutional, exceed its own authority and appear to be driven by political interests rather than the facts and the law.”
Get That Weather Woman
That remains to be seen.
And whatever happens, it doesn’t change Cuomo’s trying to use his brother at CNN as a political button man to discredit Fox’s Dean.
Chris worked with DeRosa to discredit the weather lady, CNBC reported:
Close allies of former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, including his top aide and his former CNN anchor brother, plotted to find ways to discredit Fox News meteorologist and host Janice Dean after she became one of the most vocal critics of the governor’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, according to people familiar with the matter.
One was DeRosa, who tried to depict Dean as a “‘right-wing commentator,” sources told the network. Dean went after Cuomo because her in-laws died of COVID in nursing homes.
Worse still, Cuomo was in the meeting when DeRosa plotted to wreck Dean.
As for little brother Chris, also known as Fredo, he “was encouraged to find information that would focus on Dean’s political leanings.” “It’s unclear” whether he did.
That information comports with text messages between Cuomo and DeRosa. They showed that he sought information about at least one of his brother’s sex-harassment accusers. Those messages, which proved that Cuomo was a key advisor for his big brother, are partly responsible for ending his long career as an embedded Democrat shill at CNN. The network fired Cuomo on December 5 after another sex-harassment allegation surfaced.
But back to the Cuomos’ bibliophilia.
Andrew’s publisher, Crown, stopped selling American Crisis after execs learned he hoodwinked them.
After CNN fired Chris, Harper Collins dumped his opus, Deep Denial. It was supposed to tell Americans about their “strength and character,” and offered a “a road map of the work needed to make our ideals match reality.”
