FBI Launches Investigation Against Cuomo Over Covering COVID-19 Deaths
'18.02.2021'
Lyudmila Balabay
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Federal Attorney's Office in Brooklyn have launched an investigation into the Coronavirus Response Group under Governor Andrew Cuomo's administration. Particular attention is paid to the work of his administration with nursing homes at the beginning of the pandemic. It is reported by ABC News citing two sources familiar with this issue.
The investigation is at an early stage and several witness summons have already been issued.
The FBI and prosecutors declined to comment on the situation.
The scope and full list of questions to be answered by the investigation are not yet fully clear, but sources say that nursing homes are of particular interest to investigators, where the Cuomo administration Allegedly underestimated mortality rates from COVID-19.
Aide Cuomo admitted last week that the administration did not tell state lawmakers about the coronavirus death toll in the nursing home. According to him, this was done out of fear that the administration of President Donald Trump could use this data against the state.
“He would start tweeting that we killed everyone in nursing homes,” Cuomo's chief aide Melissa DeRos said of Trump.
“And we froze because we weren't sure that the numbers we were going to hand over to the Department of Justice or Congress would not be used against us,” DeRosa said.
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Cuomo admitted this week that his administration made mistakes in processing data on deaths in nursing homes, but declined to apologize for this.
Controversy over nursing home deaths plagued Cuomo for months. At the onset of the pandemic, state health officials instructed nursing homes to accept residents recovering from COVID-19 after being discharged from hospital, posing a threat to other residents of these facilities.
The directive was canceled a few weeks later, but Cuomo has been criticized for contributing to the high death rate in nursing homes.
As ForumDaily New York wrote:
- Cuomo faced serious criticism after it was revealed that the death toll from COVID-19 in nursing homes in New York could be twice as high as officials say, because the administration Cuomo declined to say how many of the residents of these houses died from coronavirus in hospitals... This is the conclusion reached by State Attorney General Laetitia James.
- In the State Assembly, even started talking about his impeachment.