DEM CRIES: CUO GOTTA GO!
Kim calls for impeachment – and party bloc wants gov censured
Gov. Cuomo should be impeached over the nursing home scandal, Assemblyman Ron Kim said Monday, as 11 elected members of New York state’s Democratic Party moved to censure the governor.
The Democrat-on-Democrat broadsides come amid the continuing fallout over top Cuomo aide Melissa DeRosa’s admission that state officials intentionally withheld the true coronavirus death toll among nursing home residents, as exposed earlier this month by The Post.
“It is time to be brave, to hold him accountable, to investigate his cover-up of nursing home information,” Kim wrote in an opinion piece published Monday by Newsweek.
“It is time to undo the bad policies that led to unnecessary deaths. And it is time to start the impeachment process,” continued Kim, whose uncle’s death in a nursing home is tied to the pandemic.
Kim, who represents Queens, was among the Democratic lawmakers to participate in the Feb. 10 call in which DeRosa acknowledged the coverup.
The call, Kim wrote, “implicated all of us in the governor’s cover-up. It would be the first of multiple attempts to do so.”
The second such attempt came the next day, when an enraged Cuomo called Kim at home to demand his help in mitigating the political damage — and threatening to “destroy” him if he refused, Kim has alleged.
“On a private phone call, the governor berated me, threatened my career, and demanded that I issue a fabricated statement,” Kim wrote. “He wanted me to deny what I heard on the call . . . . This, too, was an attempt to rope me into his scheme.”
Cuomo has denied threatening Kim.
But Kim characterized the moves as part of a “long pattern of abusive tactics” by the governor to deflect political damage by insulating himself with scapegoats and by bullying those who refuse to go along.
“I call this Cuomo’s Predatory Inclusion Syndrome. And I won’t be party to it,” wrote Kim. “I witnessed a crime, and on top of that, 15,000 nursing home residents died under his watch.
“Restoring faith in government for those families is my top and only priority, not the governor’s PR image.”
Also calling for a formal probe on Monday was Mayor de Blasio.
“I have not spoken to [Cuomo]. No, I do not accept his explanation,” Hizzoner said. “There needs to be a full investigation . . . We need to get the whole truth and make sure nothing like this ever happens ever again.”
Federal investigators have launched a probe into the scandal.
Asked Monday if he or his administration had received subpoenas over the inquiry, Cuomo responded without using the word, noting that they have fielded “requests” for information from the Department of Justice since last year. “We have complied with the inquiry and we will continue to,” he said.
Meanwhile Monday, 11 elected officials of the state Democratic Party submitted a resolution to formally censure Cuomo who, as governor, is the party’s de facto leader.
“Actions have consequences,” said Emilia Decaudin, State Committee Member and Queens County Democratic District Leader from the 37th Assembly District.
“The continued wrong doing of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo must be repudiated, or else we are no better than the Republicans who fail to hold their own leaders accountable,