Ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Sunday dismissed a $450,000 taxpayer-funded settlement over sex-harass allegations in opposition to him — whereas suggesting his administration helped do the “not possible’’ to “save lives’’ throughout COVID.
“I said when it started from the beginning that [the sex lawsuit] was all political, and that’s the way it turned out,” Cuomo, 67, advised The Submit exterior Calvary Baptist Church in Jamaica, Queens, the place he had simply delivered a quick handle on the home of worship to mark Easter Sunday.
“I was dropped from the suit, so it was up to the state. The state did a settlement, which was basically settling a nuisance suit — sometimes it [costs] more to litigate than to settle. But it was all politics,” he stated.
Requested for his ideas about how New Yorkers should now foot the invoice for the settlement, Cuomo responded, “That’s why you possibly can’t politicize these items.
“If you start allowing political lawsuits and claims, then the taxpayers are gonna be paying a lot of money,” he stated earlier than wishing reporters a cheerful Easter and stepping into the motive force’s seat of a black Dodge.
Cuomo has persistently maintained his innocence in opposition to a slew of sexual-harassment claims.
Cuomo stepped down from workplace in August 2021 amid the sexual-harassment scandal and claims that his administration hid the true variety of state nursing-home deaths involving COVID in the course of the pandemic.
His administration was blamed for scores of COVID deaths due to its coverage of transferring contaminated sufferers into nursing properties, the place among the state’s most weak inhabitants was, when hospitals turned overcrowded.
The previous governor, who’s operating for New York Metropolis mayor, advised the church crowd Sunday that there’s “too much negativity” nowadays — “an excessive amount of us vs. them reasonably than we.
“Let us rise above the chaos and the clamor so America may hear its better angels,” he stated.
“New York Metropolis has all the time been within the means of renewal and betterment. You knock us down, we stand up stronger than ever earlier than. You knock us down on 911, we stand up stronger than earlier than. You hit us with Hurricane Sandy, we come again stronger than ever earlier than.
“You hit us with COVID, life and death, we come together as a community and do what they said was impossible, and we save lives.”
Within the case of the almost half-million-dollar sex-harass settlement involving him, Charlotte Bennett, 29, a former assistant to Cuomo when he was governor, filed swimsuit in opposition to the state in March 2023. She alleged that it did not act to handle her criticism that Cuomo subjected her to degrading sexual harassment on the job and accused her of mendacity when she got here ahead with the accusations.
She was awarded the settlement Friday. She’s going to personally obtain $100,000, whereas the opposite $350,000 will go for her attorneys and authorized prices, all of which will probably be paid out of state coffers.
As a part of the settlement, Bennett agree to not search additional employment within the state Government Chamber.
Cuomo resigned two weeks after a report by the state lawyer basic’s workplace that decided he had sexually harassed 11 ladies and created a hostile work setting in his workplace — a discovering later backed by the federal prosecutors.
All advised, New York has incurred upward of $9 million to defend Cuomo in opposition to Bennett’s claims, in accordance with public information.
In December, Cuomo filed a discover that he would sue Bennett for defamation. A civil criticism detailing his allegations has but to be filed.
He’s at present sitting comfortably within the lead amongst a crowded discipline vying for New York Metropolis mayor. The Democratic major will probably be June 24.
