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Cuomo's Nursing-Home Deaths: Undercounted by Up to 50%, After Nine Prime-Time Visits on His Brother's CNN Show

New York Attorney General Letitia James found the Cuomo administration had undercounted COVID-19 deaths of nursing-home residents by as much as 50%. In 2020, while the March 25 readmission order was in force, CNN had relaxed its own rule so that Chris Cuomo could interview his brother the governor nine times.

Jan 28, 2021
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Whose side it served: Democrats

Light 2020 coverage protected a Democratic governor then being promoted as the model pandemic leader.

What the record shows

On March 25, 2020, the state ordered nursing homes not to deny admission solely because a resident had COVID-19; the order was rescinded May 10. The AG's Jan. 28, 2021 report said deaths were undercounted by as much as 50%, and the official long-term-care toll rose from about 8,500 to about 15,000 within weeks. On Feb. 12, 2021, the New York Post released audio of top aide Melissa DeRosa telling lawmakers the administration 'froze' over data requests. The International Emmy given to Cuomo for his briefings was revoked in August 2021 (over the harassment findings), and in 2025 the Justice Department opened a criminal inquiry into his congressional testimony on the matter. An MRC/NewsBusters study (Rich Noyes and Nicholas Fondacaro, March 8, 2021) counted only two nursing-home mentions, totaling 51 seconds, among 401 Cuomo references on ABC, CBS and NBC evening news in 2020, and 15 minutes 35 seconds on the scandal in all from May 2020 to March 7, 2021, against 44 minutes 14 seconds for the harassment allegations in just 11 days. The AP reported that Andrew Cuomo appeared on Chris Cuomo's CNN show nine times between March 19 and June 24, 2020, including the giant cotton-swab bit; CNN reinstated its ban only in February 2021.

In their words

“CNN: Chris Cuomo's interviews with his brother were "of significant human interest" (AP, Feb. 19, 2021)”— · source
The other side

Once the AG report landed, the AP, NPR, ABC7, NY1 and the New York Times covered the undercount heavily, and the NYT broke the story that aides rewrote a state report to drop 9,250 deaths. The Emmy was revoked over the harassment findings, not the nursing homes, and DOJ declined to act on the House's first criminal referral in 2024.

Sources

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