The hype about Andrew Cuomo running for mayor continues to grow, with Friday’s release of a campaign-style video of Cuomo at a Valentine’s event, an endorsement letter from his former rival Carl McCall and endorsement from the Staten Island Democratic Party. Were Cuomo to enter the race, it would be a mistake — for him. Any mayoral run by the former governor would immediately become a referendum on his leadership during COVID-19, something he is still dining out on to this day, and even a moderately critical look at that period reveals that he was not just a disaster for New York, but a corrupt, shameless liar who tried to cover up thousands of deaths.

The “Andrew Cuomo nursing home scandal,” to use what will soon be a popular Google search if Cuomo were to run for mayor, broke in a big way in January 2021, literally days after Joe Biden was sworn in as president. That’s almost certainly what saved Cuomo’s hide — and the reason his reputation is still, somewhat, intact. The scandal, which is genuinely shocking in its details, was drowned out by a deluge of other news and the fleeting nature of modern attention spans. And soon enough, Cuomo himself would top it, sort of, when it emerged that he had sexually harassed many women.

Of course, we now live in the post-Me Too era, where sexual harassment and assault scandals are actually beneficial for politicians because they can claim to be victims of woke. (Cuomo, in his usual smarmy manner, has embraced this defense.) And so Cuomo’s sex scandal won’t take him down. But his COVID scandal really might.

Here’s what happened. On March 25, 2020 — when the coronavirus was stampeding through New York — Cuomo issued a directive to New York nursing homes: They could not bar new residents just because they were COVID-positive. Under this policy, approximately 9,000 COVID patients were placed or readmitted into nursing homes. 

Mind you, at this time, it was already common knowledge that the elderly were more at risk. This wasn’t some “we had no idea!” thing. Nursing homes were getting hit particularly hard. In  April 2020, even Cuomo called COVID’s effect on nursing homes a “feeding frenzy.” One New York nursing home resident told The New York Times he felt the state was playing Russian Roulette with his life.

The nursing home order was finally rescinded in May. But the damage and death would take years to uncover, because the Cuomo administration went to great lengths to hide it.

In the immediate aftermath of the nursing home directive, the Cuomo administration refused to release documents about the spread of COVID in nursing homes, citing privacy protections. Families — who, at this point, were barred from visiting their elderly relatives — were freaking out, and understandably so.

In June 2020, while Cuomo was still giving his feted daily briefings, the New York State Department of Health (NYSDOH) issued a report finding, in part, that 9,250 nursing home residents had died from the virus to date, a number far higher than any other state’s — and far higher than the Cuomo administration had been publicly reporting. 

The Cuomo administration was so alarmed by the potential reveal of its negligence that three of the then-governor’s top aides, including now-infamous Cuomo consigliere Melissa DeRosa, simply removed the number from the report before it was made public. The NYSDOH pushed back to no avail. The real number was kept hidden. And, incredibly, multiple witnesses later testified to a House of Representatives committee that Cuomo himself edited the NYSDOH report. (Cuomo testified that he did not, a claim that House Republicans felt was perjurious and resulted in a criminal referral to the Biden DOJ. We shall see if Trump moves forward with criminal charges — and if a potential Mayor Cuomo would find himself in an Eric Adams “deferred prosecution” situation.) The edited and sanitized report, eventually released on July 6, 2020, became the Cuomo administration’s defense against claims that its policies were killing grandma and grandpa. 

At the same time, the Cuomo administration was refusing to comply with state lawmakers’ demands for nursing home statistics. The legislature — controlled entirely by Democrats — was so concerned about nursing home deaths that it held hearings on the issue over the summer of 2020, only to be met with stonewalling from Cuomo. (DeRosa later apologized to lawmakers for this, claiming that the administration didn’t want to provide the documents because Donald Trump might have used them against Cuomo.)

Also in June of 2020, the NYSDOH found — in documents that would not be made public until 2024 — that nursing homes that had accepted COVID patients had death rates nearly double those of homes that had not accepted COVID patients. 

Not until January of 2021 was Cuomo exposed, by Attorney General Letitia James, in a lengthy report that revealed, for the first time, the staggering number of deaths in New York nursing homes, 50% higher than the number being officially reported by the Cuomo administration. Later exposure would come from the above-mentioned House committee, which obtained the documents showing the increased death rates in nursing homes, as well as emails and testimony indicating Cuomo’s heavy involvement in the July 6 report.

There are really two scandals here. First, Cuomo made a terrible — and fatal — decision to force nursing homes to accept COVID patients, even while outside observers were screaming that this was a mistake. Second, Cuomo and his cronies (at least some of whom he would probably bring to City Hall) engaged in a desperate coverup of both the total number of nursing home deaths, and how his own policies increased that number.

Cuomo’s overall leadership during New York’s COVID crisis was nothing short of disastrous. Throughout the summer and fall of 2020, top health officials quit in droves, frustrated by Cuomo’s dictatorial management style. New York City’s vaccine rollout was hampered by Cuomo’s decision to hand the reins over to a hospital lobbying group that had donated to his campaigns. However you feel about the broad lockdown on businesses, schools and even private social gatherings (and many potential Cuomo voters probably don’t feel too favorable), these were pure Cuomo policies, and he sidelined both health experts and local governments in enacting them. In the end, New York State wound up with the second worst COVID per capita death rate among states for 2020. This man was not a successful governor.

All of this is going to be up for debate if Cuomo runs for mayor. There’s more, of course, including his decision to use state funds to write a book (about leadership!) for which he was paid $5 million, money he has spent the last several years litigating to keep. And maybe, for some voters, it matters when a candidate has been repeatedly accused of forced kissing, under-the-blouse groping, and other pervy behavior by at least 15 different women.

Right now, Cuomo is flying high in mayoral polls. Part of that is undoubtedly name recognition. But part of it is also because Cuomo has been lucky enough to avoid many news cycles devoted exclusively to his incompetence and malevolence. Once he declares for mayor, everything is on the table. Cuomo is a rich man who still enjoys a reservoir of goodwill. Does he really want to drain that reservoir for a race he might lose?

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