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Another scandal involves the governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, who is now accused of allegedly committing sexual harassment against a former assistant.
Former Deputy Secretary of Economic Development and Special Advisor to the Governor, Lindsley Boylan, claims that Cuomo sexually harassed her while co-workers viewed the behavior as “normal.”
Boylan said Cuomo constantly sought her out and staff would arrange meetings with her where he would make inappropriate comments. The former governor’s aide wrote an essay on Medium where she recounted her story “of working with Governor Cuomo.”
Boylan said his behavior “was so normalized, particularly by Melissa DeRosa and other important women around him, that I only now realize how insidious his abuse was.”
The former aide said that in another incident, this time in Cuomo’s office, the governor “kissed her on the lips.” “I was in shock, but I kept walking,” she wrote.
Boylan accused the governor of harassment last year, but did not elaborate on his experiences at the time.
Cuomo’s office did not respond to numerous requests for comment from Fox News, but a spokesman said earlier in December that “there is simply no truth to these claims.”
Boylan wrote in his Wednesday essay that he expects “the governor and his top aides to try to discredit me further, just as they have done with Assemblyman Kim,” who recently accused Cuomo of threatening him.
Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, for her part, immediately called on Cuomo to resign after Boylan’s story; the lawmaker had previously called for the allegations to be investigated further, but they never came to anything.
“It is an inexcusable shame that nearly every other elected official in New York state swept this serious and credible allegation under the rug,” Stefanik said in a statement Thursday.
“Sexual harassment and sexual abuse in the workplace is not a political issue, it’s about right and wrong,” she said.
Boylan’s newly detailed allegations triggered renewed calls for Cuomo to resign, as he faces intense scrutiny after it emerged that he knowingly lied about the true number of elderly deaths in the state’s nursing homes.
Not the first time
Last December, when Andrew Cuomo’s name was being bandied about as a possible U.S. Attorney General, the former aide denounced through her Twitter account that Cuomo “sexually harassed her for years” and assured that “many saw and watched” what was going on.
“I could never anticipate what to expect: would I be questioned about my work (which was very good) or harassed about my appearance? Or would they both be in the same conversation? This was the path for years,” he said.
Boylan said she “knows she’s not the only woman” and accused Andrew Cuomo of “abusing his power.”
Regarding the possibility of Cuomo becoming prosecutor, the former aide assured in a tweet that the governor “has no ethics” and “takes advantage of people.” In addition, she described as “terrifying” to offer him that position: “I saw how he exercised power for years. He takes advantage of the people, including me,” Boylan denounced.
The governor, for his part, denied having harassed Boylan: “I’ve heard about the tweet, and what it said about comments I had made, and it’s simply not true,” Cuomo said in a conference call with members of the press.
Although the veracity of Boylan’s allegation is unclear; according to the Associated Press news agency, Cuomo’s former assistant reportedly resigned after receiving several complaints about her behavior.
“Several women complained to Empire State Development’s human resources department that Ms. Boyland had behaved toward them in a manner that harassed them, belittled them, yelled at them, and was generally unprofessional,” wrote the administration’s ethics officer, Julia Pinover Kupiec, in a memo.
Sabrina Martín Rondon is a Venezuelan journalist. Her source is politics and economics. She is a specialist in corporate communications and is committed to the task of dismantling the supposed benefits of socialism // Sabrina Martín Rondon es periodista venezolana. Su fuente es la política y economía. Es especialista en comunicaciones corporativas y se ha comprometido con la tarea de desmontar las supuestas bondades del socialismo