Governor Cuomo’s top assistant personally apologized to Democratic lawmakers for withholding the state death toll at COVID-19’s nursing home – telling them ‘we were frozen’ for fear the real numbers would be ‘used against us’ by federal prosecutors, The Post has been informed.
The stunning confession of a cover was made by Gov. Secretary Melissa DeRosa during a video conference call with Democratic state leaders, in which she said the Cuomo government rejected a legislative request for the census in August because “ around the same time, [then-President Donald Trump] turns this into a gigantic political football, ”said an audio recording of the two-hour meeting.
“He’s starting to tweet that we killed everyone in nursing homes,” DeRosa said. He’s going to the back [New Jersey Gov. Phil] Murphy, get behind [California Gov. Gavin] Newsom, go to the back [Michigan Gov.] Gretchen Whitmer. “
In addition to attacking Cuomo’s fellow Democratic governors, DeRosa said, “ Trump is ordering the Justice Department to investigate us. ”
“And actually we stood still,” she told lawmakers during the phone call.
“Because then we were in a position where we weren’t sure if what we were going to give to the Justice Department, or what we’re giving you, what we’re starting to say, would be used against us while we were still at it. I don’t know. sure if there will be an investigation. “
DeRosa added: “That played a very big role in this.”
After dropping the bomb, DeRosa asked for “a little appreciation for the context” and offered what appears to be the Cuomo government’s first apology for its treatment of nursing homes amid the pandemic.
But instead of a mea culpa to the grieving relatives of more than 13,000 deceased seniors or the critics who say the health department was spreading COVID-19 in healthcare facilities with a March 25 state health department guideline that nursing homes admit infected patients, DeRosa tried to make amends with fellow Democrats for the political discomfort it caused them.
“So we apologize,” she said. ‘I understand the position you have been placed in. I know it’s not fair. We did not intend to put you in that political position with the Republicans. “
Assembly Health Committee Chairman Richard Gottfried (D-Manhattan) immediately rejected DeRosa’s expression of remorse, according to the recording.
“I don’t have enough time today to explain all the reasons why I don’t credit that at all,” said Gottfried, one of the lawmakers who demanded the data on the death toll in August.
Chairwoman Rachel May (D-Syracuse) of the state Senate Committee – who was battered during her re-election last year over the issue of the death of a nursing home – also tore into DeRosa, saying her former opponent took another job earlier in the day. had launched.
“And for me, the biggest problem is the feeling that I had to defend – or at least not attack – a government that seemed to be covering up something,” she said.
“And in a pandemic, when you want the public to trust the public health officials, and there is a clear sense that they are not coming, but arriving with you, that is very difficult and it remains difficult.”
Assembly Ron Kim (D-Queens), who took part in the call, told The Post on Thursday that DeRosa’s comments sounded “as if admitting they were trying to evade with any incriminating evidence that the administration or the [Health Department] in further trouble with the Justice Department. “
“That’s how I understand their reasoning as to why they couldn’t share the data in real time,” said Kim.
“They first had to make sure the state was protected from federal investigation.”
Kim, whose uncle believed to have died of COVID-19 in a nursing home in April, also said he was unhappy with DeRosa’s apology.
“It’s not enough how sorry they are with us,” he said. “They have to show that to the public and the families – and they haven’t.”
In addition to thwarting lawmakers over the total number of nursing home residents killed by COVID-19, Cuomo’s government also denied requests from the news media – including The Post – and fought a freedom of information lawsuit filed by the Empire Center on Public Policy.
Instead, it only released data on the number of residents who died in their nursing homes.
But after Attorney General Letitia James released a damning report last month estimating that the deaths of nursing home residents in hospitals would increase the stark figure by more than 50 percent, Health Commissioner Howard Zucker finally released figures showing that the combined total was 12,743 as of January. 19.
Just a day earlier, the DOH acknowledged only 8,711 deaths in nursing homes.
In a Wednesday letter to lawmakers, Zucker said the total number of nursing home residents killed by COVID-19 has risen to 13,297.
The controversy generated by James’s report led to an infamous press conference in which Cuomo stubbornly rejected the issue of where fatalities in nursing homes actually occurred.
“Who cares [if they] died in hospital, died in a nursing home? They died, ”he said.
During Wednesday’s conference call, DeRosa said it appeared that the DOJ was no longer focused on the New York nursing home deaths.
“All signs indicate that they are not looking at this, they have dropped it,” she said.
“They never formally opened an investigation. They sent a letter with some questions and then we answered those questions and it looks like they are gone. “
In a prepared statement, Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi said: “ We explained that the Trump administration was in the midst of a politically motivated effort to blame Democratic states for COVID deaths and that we were partnering with federal document production and that was the priority. and now that it’s over, we can appeal to the state legislature. “
That said, we were working at the same time to complete the verification of the information they asked for, ”he added.
The DOJ declined to comment.