HANDSY ANDY
Look of fear as Cuomo ‘gave unwanted kiss’: third accuser
Creepy Cuomo moves in for the chill at a 2019 wedding where Anna Ruch — now the governor’s third accuser — says he gave her an unsolicited kiss on the cheek.
“I was so confused and shocked and embarrassed,” Ruch, who had only just been introduced to Cuomo, told The New York Times yesterday.
A third woman came forward on Monday to accuse Gov. Cuomo of inappropriate sexual behavior during a wedding reception in 2019.
Anna Ruch, 33, told The New York Times that the now-63-year-old governor made unwanted advances toward her and planted an unsolicited kiss on her cheek at the event in Manhattan.
“He said, ‘Can I kiss you?’ ” Ruch recalled. “I was so confused and shocked and embarrassed.”
The allegation comes after two former state staffers accused Cuomo of sexual harassment on the job — including one who claimed the governor kissed her without warning at his Manhattan office, which he has denied.
Unlike the other two women, Ruch has never been employed by the governor or the state, according to the Times.
A former member of the Obama administration and the 2020 Biden campaign, Ruch said she met Cuomo at the crowded New York City wedding reception in September 2019.
Within moments of being introduced, Ruch claims the governor put his hand on the small of her back, which was exposed in an open-back dress.
“I promptly removed his hand with my hand, which I would have thought was a clear enough indicator that I was not wanting him to touch me,” she told the Times.
But the governor apparently didn’t get the hint.
He allegedly noted that Ruch seemed “aggressive” — and then placed his hands on her cheeks and asked if he could kiss her, loudly enough for a friend of Ruch’s to hear, according to the report.
“I turned my head away and didn’t have words in that moment,” Ruch said.
Ruch said she was so shocked, she had to ask her pal whether the gov’s lips had actually touched her face. She was told that he kissed her cheek.
The friend captured the creepy encounter in a series of photographs, including one also provided to The Post that shows Cuomo grasping Ruch’s face.
“It’s the act of impunity that strikes me,” Ruch said. “I didn’t have a choice in that matter. I didn’t have a choice in his physical dominance over me at that moment. And that’s what infuriates me.”
After the encounter, Ruch said her friend “looked at me and said, ‘Are you OK?’ with such genuine concern in her face that I realized how obviously inappropriate it was.”
Later, she tried to find the governor at the reception to give him a piece of her mind but couldn’t track him down.
“I would have rather just said it that night,” Ruch said.
“I wanted to say, ‘That wasn’t
OK.’ ”
She added, “I felt so uncomfortable and embarrassed — when really, he is the one who should have been embarrassed.”
Reached by The Post on Monday night, Ruch said the photo of Cuomo clutching her face speaks for itself.
“The photo pretty much sums it up. Gross. What the f--k?” she said, adding: “Every woman has to go through this in the 21st century.”
The Governor’s Office didn’t immediately return a request for comment from The Post. Instead of directly addressing Ruch’s account, a Cuomo spokesman referred the Times to a statement the governor released Sunday night, in which he apologized if his “jokes” were misinterpreted as “unwanted flirtation.”
His two other accusers, Charlotte Bennett and Lindsey Boylan, expressed their support for Ruch soon after her allegations were made public.
“I stand with Anna Ruch,” former gubernatorial aide Bennett, 25, wrote on Twitter.
Cuomo’s “inappropriate and aggressive behavior cannot be justified or normalized,” she added. “Thank you for your courage and
strength. Here for you always.”
Boylan, 36, also tweeted in support of Ruch. She said the latest allegation “doesn’t make me feel validated. It makes me feel sick.”
“I feel nauseous thinking about Anna’s experience,” Boylan tweeted.
“I am sending her love and light,” she added. “Charlotte and I are with you, Anna.”