Former New York Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he would focus his attention on fighting the Trump administration and spend “eight years in Washington” if he wins his election for mayor of New York City.
In a piece published by POLITICO on Tuesday, Cuomo, 67, revealed his strategy to use the mayoral office to push back against Trump’s policies and campaign for Democrats to retake the House. Cuomo, who resigned from his position as governor over allegations that he sexually harassed numerous women, is being investigated by the Department of Justice for allegedly lying to Congress over a report that covered up the number of COVID deaths at nursing homes during the pandemic.
Asked how he would “handle working with the president while potentially under criminal investigation,” Cuomo replied, “I would spend eight years in Washington — go to that U.S. Conference of Mayors, go to the National Governors Association. [Trump’s] cutting Medicaid. Medicaid is not a blue-city, blue-state situation. That is in every state. That is a lot of red Congressional districts. And he could lose the House on cutting Medicaid if you organized it and got it moving.”
“You’re going to have to be a spokesperson, advocate, organizer,” he added. “This is what Medicaid means in Mississippi, this is what Medicaid means in Texas. … And you organize that, they don’t have a lot of Congressional seats left to lose.”
Trump, whose second term in office will end in less than four years, has promised that Republicans are “not touching anything” when it comes to Medicaid benefits, adding, “All I want is one thing. Three words. We don’t want any waste, fraud or abuse. Very simple — waste, fraud, abuse.”
Cuomo has also faced scrutiny over an order he issued as governor in 2020 requiring New York nursing homes to accept patients even if they tested positive for COVID. In the interview with POLITICO, Cuomo described the DOJ investigation as “laughable” and “purely political nonsense.”
According to House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY), there is “overwhelming evidence” that Cuomo knew about an audit that undercounted COVID nursing home deaths in New York by 46%. A report from New York Attorney General Letitia James also found that Cuomo’s nursing home policy “requiring nursing homes to take in patients from hospitals who had COVID-19 and were stable enough to be discharged had likely contributed to the loss of life,” according to ProPublica.
Cuomo initially claimed that he was not involved in the report that undercounted COVID nursing home deaths, but now he says that he doesn’t recall reviewing the report, according to POLITICO.
“My thing is, I don’t recall. There’s no incorrect statement in, I don’t recall,” he said.
The former New York governor is currently leading in the polls to replace incumbent NYC Mayor Eric Adams, a registered Democrat running as an independent this election cycle, but Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani is receiving surging support and cutting Cuomo’s lead in the Democratic primary, according to a PIX11/Emerson College poll released last week.
In the poll, Cuomo stands at 54.4% to Mamdani’s 45.6%, a massive swing from late March when Cuomo was ahead 38% to 10%.