Latest news with #SelectSubcommittee
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
DOJ investigating claims Cuomo lied about handling of Covid-19
The Brief The Justice Department is investigating New York City mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo. The investigation is related to Cuomo's allegedly false testimony to Congress regarding the Covid-19 pandemic. The New York City mayoral primary election will be held on June 24, 2025. NEW YORK - Former New York Governor and mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo is under fire for his handling of Covid-19 once again. The investigation was discovered a day after Cuomo released a political ad focusing on his experience navigating New York through the pandemic; the mayoral primary election is only five weeks away. What we know The New York Times is reporting that the Justice Department launched the criminal investigation about a month ago. The probe is reviewing allegedly false statements Cuomo made to Congress about his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic made in June 2024. A transcription of the full interview, conducted by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, can be found here. An executive order made by Cuomo on March 25, 2020 that restricted nursing homes from refusing to admit or readmit residents "solely based on confirmed or suspect[ed] diagnosis of Covid-19." Click to open this PDF in a new window. The order directed nursing homes to admit patients carrying Covid-19. The order was reversed not even two months later. The New York State Department of Health (NYSDOH) released a report alleging nursing home staff, not the Executive Order, was the cause for excess Covid-19 deaths in nursing homes. In January 2021, New York State Attorney General Letitia James released an investigative report claiming that Cuomo and his team undercounted the total number of nursing home deaths by as much as 50 percent. The Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic began its investigation into New York's response to the pandemic, specifically regarding Cuomo's executive order, in 2023. The committee announced a subpoena to compel Cuomo to appear for a deposition on May 24, 2024. Cuomo appeared for his interview on June 11, 2024. The seven-hour testimony centered on the executive order that forced New York nursing homes and long-term care facilities to admit contagious Covid-19 patients. He testified that he did not draft, review or discuss the report with the NYSDOH, but a former assistant to Cuomo testified he was involved. Evidence that was later uncovered by the Select Subcommittee revealed that Cuomo "reviewed, edited and even drafted portions of a purportedly independent and peer-reviewed New York State Department of Health Report." Representative James Comer, a Kentucky Republican who chairs the House Oversight Committee, recommended Cuomo be charged with making false statements to Congress. The full criminal referral is below: Click to open this PDF in a new window. The request was denied by former Attorney General Merrick Garland. A Republican-led congressional committee sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi in April 2025 to renew the referral. Click to open this PDF in a new window. Cuomo's spokesperson Rich Azzopardi released a statement saying that Cuomo was unaware of any investigation. "We have never been informed of any such matter, so why would someone leak it now? The answer is obvious: This is lawfare and election interference plain and simple — something President Trump and his top Department of Justice officials say they are against," Azzopardi said. Newly appointed interim U.S. attorney for Washington, DC Jeanine Pirro will be handling the matter. "Let's be clear: lying to Congress is a federal crime. Mr. Cuomo must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law." House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman James Comer News of the investigation broke a day after Cuomo released a political ad for his mayoral campaign, advertising "his experience navigating New York through the Covid-19 pandemic." New York City Mayor Eric Adams responded to news of the investigation, saying, "Investigations must take their course… I'm going to allow the investigation to take its course." Assembly member and mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani also posted a statement on the situation. House Republican Leadership Chairwoman Elise Stefanik also released a statement announcing her support of the investigation. Cuomo's campaign has already released a new political ad about the investigation. The New York City mayoral primary election will be held on June 24, 2025. The Source This article includes reporting from several press releases and statements from the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, statements made by political officials and separate reporting from The New York Times, who broke the story of the Justice Department's investigation.
American Military News
22-04-2025
- Politics
- American Military News
Fmr. top Democrat behind major Covid ‘cover-up,' House GOP says
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) announced on Monday that former Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) has been referred to the Department of Justice for potential criminal prosecution by U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi for 'making false statements to Congress' regarding the 'COVID-19 nursing home disaster and the ensuing cover-up' in the state of New York. 'Andrew Cuomo is a man with a history of corruption and deceit, now caught red-handed lying to Congress during the Select Subcommittee's investigation into the COVID-19 nursing home tragedy in New York,' Comer said in a Monday press release. 'This wasn't a slip-up—it was a calculated cover-up by a man seeking to shield himself from responsibility for the devastating loss of life in New York's nursing homes.' 'Let's be clear: lying to Congress is a federal crime. Mr. Cuomo must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,' Comer added. 'The House Oversight Committee is prepared to fully cooperate with the Justice Department's investigation into Andrew Cuomo's actions and ensure he's held to account.' The House Oversight Committee claimed that 'overwhelming evidence' documented by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic indicated that the former Democrat governor 'reviewed, edited, and even drafted' sections of a New York State Department of Health report from July of 2020 that 'low-balled nursing home fatalities and blamed nursing home staff for causing excess COVID-19 deaths.' READ MORE: Top anti-Trump official hit with criminal referral In a Tuesday letter to Bondi, Comer explained that the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic previously referred Cuomo in October of 2024 for 'making criminally false statements' to Congress. Comer claimed that the Biden-Harris administration seemingly 'ignored' the criminal referral 'despite clear facts and evidence.' As a result, Comer requested that Bondi review the criminal referral and 'take appropriate action.' In Tuesday's press release, the House Oversight Committee said, 'Evidence and witness testimony gathered suggest Mr. Cuomo knowingly and willfully made false statements to the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic on numerous occasions about material aspects of New York's COVID-19 nursing home disaster and the ensuing cover-up.' According to the House Oversight Committee, the former Democrat governor's administration ordered nursing homes to admit patients exposed to COVID-19, which led to the 'most vulnerable population' being 'recklessly exposed' to COVID-19. The committee noted that New York State Attorney General Letitia James claimed that Cuomo's administration 'undercounted the total number of nursing home deaths by as much as 50 percent,' leading to a congressional investigation. The House Oversight Committee claimed that during his testimony to Congress, Cuomo 'made false statements about his involvement in and knowledge of the drafting of the July 6 Report.'
Yahoo
22-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
House GOP-led panel refers Ex-N.Y. Gov. Cuomo to DOJ for prosecution
April 22 (UPI) -- A House GOP-led panel has renewed its call for the Justice Department to prosecute Andrew Cuomo, the former Democratic governor of New York, on accusations of lying to Congress about the state's handling of COVID-19 nursing home policies. Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., in his position as chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, sent a criminal referral for Cuomo to Attorney General Pam Bondi on Monday recommending the former governor be charged with making false statements to Congress. According to the criminal referral, Cuomo lied during testimony when he denied being involved in drafting a New York State Department Health report that was used to evade criticism over COVID-19 policies for nursing homes. The report seemingly blamed COVID-19-infected staff for bringing the virus into nursing homes while undercounting the number of COVID-19-related deaths in those facilities. The since-shuttered Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic had referred Cuomo for prosecution in the fall, but then-Attorney General Merrick Garland, under the previous Biden administration, appears not to have taken action on the request. "Andrew Cuomo is a man with a history of corruption and deceit, now caught red-handed lying to Congress during the Select Subcommittee's investigation into the COVID-19 nursing home tragedy in New York," Comer said Monday in a statement. "This wasn't a slip-up -- it was a calculated cover-up by a man seeking to shield himself from responsibility for the devastating loss of life in New York's nursing homes." He added that lying to Congress is a federal crime and that Cuomo must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. "The House Oversight Committee is prepared to fully cooperate with the Justice Department's investigation into Andrew Cuomo's actions and ensure he's held to account," he said. Cuomo was governor of New York from 2011 to 2021 when he resigned from office amid allegations that he sexually harassed nearly a dozen women in recent years.
Yahoo
22-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
GOP panel seeks prosecution of Andrew Cuomo
A GOP-led House panel sent a letter Monday asking Attorney General Pam Bondi to prosecute former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) for allegedly lying to the panel investigating his administration's COVID-19 pandemic-era nursing home policies. The letter renewed a referral made last fall by former Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), who was chair of the now-defunct Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis. The Justice Department, led at the time by former Attorney General Merrick Garland, seemingly ignored the committee's referral. Comer's move to resurrect the effort suggests Republicans think the Trump administration will be more willing to look into the actions of the former governor, who resigned in 2021 in the wake of multiple sexual misconduct allegations, which he denied. Cuomo is now the leading candidate for New York City mayor. According to the referral, Cuomo told members of the House panel investigating the coronavirus pandemic that he was not involved in the review or drafting of a state health department report that was used to deflect criticism of his administration's pandemic-era nursing home policies. The report blamed staff for bringing the virus inside nursing homes and causing excess COVID-19 deaths, rather than the Cuomo administration's policies. 'Let's be clear: lying to Congress is a federal crime. Mr. Cuomo must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The House Oversight Committee is prepared to fully cooperate with the Justice Department's investigation into Andrew Cuomo's actions and ensure he's held to account,' Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) said in a statement. Cuomo spokesperson Rich Azzopardi said the move was a political stunt. 'This is nothing more than a meritless press release that was nonsense last year and is even more so now,' Azzopardi said. 'As the DOJ constantly reminds people, this kind of transparent attempt at election interference and law-fare violates their own policies.' Updated at 9:15 p.m. EDT Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
18-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
White House changes COVID.gov web page to page supporting lab leak theory
The White House has redirected to a new landing page called "Lab Leak: True Origins of COVID-19," which makes a five-point argument for the theory that COVID-19 originated from a mistaken lab leak in Wuhan, China. The new site appears to use theories from the final report of the Republican-led Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, released in December 2024. There has never been a consensus or a "smoking gun" to explain what started the pandemic. The page, as recently as last week, listed resources for testing, treatment, and vaccination against COVID-19, as well as information for Long COVID. The five pieces of evidence put forth by the White House for the theory include the following assertions: that the "virus possesses a biological characteristic that is not found in nature," that data shows all cases "stem from a single introduction into humans," that "Wuhan is home to China's foremost SARS research lab," that researchers at that research lab "were sick with COVID-like symptoms in the fall of 2019," and that "if there was evidence of a natural origin it would have already surfaced." What the 'lab leak' theory report about COVID's origins does and doesn't mean The page includes claims that government officials, including former NIAID Director Dr. Anthony Fauci, helped edit and then amplify a research paper on the origins of COVID-19 published in 2020 that supported natural origin theory. The current page suggests this paper's explicit intention was to discredit the lab leak theory and remove any doubt that the origins were of natural origin. This is not a new accusation and in the past Fauci and the paper authors disagreed with the accusations that the paper was manipulated or had any specific goal. The origins of the pandemic have been hotly debated since its start. The prevailing theories always seemed to focus on two scenarios: either natural exposure to an infected animal or an accidental lab leak. With no "smoking gun" and limited access to raw data, discussion of the science has played out in a haze of circumstantial evidence. In October 2021, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a declassified report on the intelligence community's views on the origin conundrum, which also leaned toward a natural spillover, but represented divided views. A subsequent declassified report released in 2023 also noted that most of the intelligence community was split on the origins of the pandemic. In reports, US agencies generally agreed that the virus was most likely not developed as a biological weapon and that China's leaders did not know about the virus before the start of the global pandemic. The new splash page features a photo of Fauci and the pardon that former President Joe Biden granted him, highlighting that it was for "any offenses." The page also accuses federal agencies, including NIH and HHS, of breaking laws and violating rules about transparency and cooperation with Congressional investigation. The agencies complied with FOIA requests and other regulatory requests from the committee and also appeared before lawmakers when asked to testify. New report from Senate Republicans doubles down on COVID lab leak theory The web page also calls into question the efficacy of social distancing, masking and lockdown. The White House also criticized the response from New York officials. Fauci testified about the accusations before lawmakers in 2024, saying that accusations about him covering up or influencing research about the lab leak theory are untrue. "The accusation being circulated that I influenced the scientists to change their minds by bribing them with millions of dollars in grant money is absolutely false, and simply preposterous. I had no input into the content of the published paper," Fauci said in June of 2024. Key takeaways: Fauci defends against GOP claims on COVID origins, response "The second issue is a false accusation that I tried to cover up the possibility that the virus originated from a lab. In fact, the truth is exactly the opposite," Fauci said during that 2024 hearing. This is not the first time that the White House has made clear its position on the origins of COVID-19. In January, President Trump said that COVID-19 had "strained" his relationship with President Xi Jinping of China. "But, I like President Xi very much. I've always liked him. We always had a very good relationship. It was very strained with COVID coming out of Wuhan. Obviously, that strained it. I'm sure it strained it with a lot of people, but that strained our relationship," Trump said in remarks to the World Economic Forum. ABC News' Eric Strauss, Sony Salzman and Cheyenne Haslett contributed to this report. White House changes web page to page supporting lab leak theory originally appeared on
