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New York mayor demands inquiry into Cuomo sexual harassment claims
NEW YORK, Feb 26, 2021 (BSS/AFP) – New York City’s mayor on Thursday joined
a growing chorus of politicians calling for an investigation into sexual
harassment allegations made against Governor Andrew Cuomo.
Lindsey Boylan, a former aide to Cuomo, accused the governor of sexually
harassing her when she worked for his administration from 2015 to 2018 in a
blog post published Wednesday.
She says Cuomo kissed her on the mouth without consent, suggested they
played strip poker during a flight and went “out of his way to touch me on my
lower back, arms and legs.”
Cuomo’s office said in a statement that Boylan’s “claims of inappropriate
behavior are quite simply false.”
When Boylan first accused Cuomo of sexual harassment, without providing
details, in a tweet in December, the 63-year-old Democratic governor said it
was “just not true.”
“We need a full and independent investigation,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio,
a Democrat and long-time rival of the governor.
“This is a very serious charge. We have got to know the truth,” de Blasio
told reporters.
Tina Tchen, president of the Time’s Up Foundation that campaigns against
sexual harassment, said the Cuomo administration “should conduct a full and
independent investigation into these claims immediately.”
Cuomo became a national star last spring with his straight-talking yet
empathetic coronavirus briefings that contrasted sharply with then-president
Donald Trump’s dismissive approach to the pandemic.
But the harassment allegations come as he faces a growing storm over his
handling of the coronavirus in nursing homes in his state.
New York federal prosecutors have opened a preliminary investigation into
whether his administration deliberately concealed the number of deaths in
care homes.
His government was forced to revise the number of fatalities up from 8,500
to 15,000, after New York’s state attorney general Letitia James said the
administration had underestimated the toll by several thousand.
Cuomo is also facing accusations that he is a bully, after state lawmaker
Ron Kim said the governor vowed to “destroy” him for attacking him on nursing
homes.
Cuomo has been governor of New York for ten years. His third-term is due to
end in 2022.
He is considered a moderate and frequently clashes with left-wing members
of the Democratic Party.
BSS/AFP/GMR/0922 hrs