No Charges For Andrew Cuomo

It’s Wednesday, January 5th and this is your Morning Wire. Listen to the full podcast:

1) No Charges For Andrew Cuomo

The Topline: Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) will face no charges for sexual harassment or for misleading the public about the number of COVID-19 deaths tied to nursing homes in his state. 

Quote Of The Day: “[Andrew Cuomo] violated U.S. Code. As everyone knows, the facts are not disputed, that he altered and changed data, which is a violation of U.S. Code … The U.S. attorney should certainly be looking into this.”

– Representative Cynthia Tenney (R-NY)

Brendan McDermid-Pool/Pool/Getty Images

Background

One of the former governor’s attorneys, Elkan Abramowitz, made the announcement Monday that the charges were dropped, but the district attorney’s office didn’t make a public statement.

Cuomo’s Department of Health issued an order on March 25, 2020. The advisory read,“No resident shall be denied re-admission or admission to the [nursing home] solely based on a confirmed or suspected diagnosis of COVID-19. [Nursing homes] are prohibited from requiring a hospitalized resident who is determined medically stable to be tested for COVID-19 prior to admission or readmission.”

At the time, NPR described New York state as “the epicenter” of the COVID-19 outbreak, with 5% of all reported cases worldwide. Nursing homes began placing COVID-positive patients alongside senior citizens, who are the most susceptible population to the virus.

Cuomo’s office reported 6,600 nursing home deaths that August, but one of his aides, Melissa DeRosa, admitted on video that the office intentionally undercounted because they were afraid of prosecution from the Trump administration. 

State Attorney General Letitia James said the state underreported COVID-19 deaths by about half. The actual number of seniors who died in nursing homes from the virus was 15,000, according to The New York Times. A Democratic state assembly member named Ronald Kim said the governor threatened to destroy him if he went public about the scandal, but Kim still broke the news. 

Federal Government 

In August 2020, the Justice Department opened an investigation into New York and three other states where Democratic governors had issued similar nursing home orders: New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Michigan. However, the Biden administration’s Justice Department announced it had dropped the probe into Governors Cuomo, Phil Murphy, Tom Wolf, and Gretchen Whitmer last July.

Going Forward

If another office wants to open an investigation, Cuomo could face additional charges for his handling of the nursing home order. Cuomo’s defenders have said bad judgment isn’t illegal. The order was a political decision, so it requires a political punishment, such as impeachment, but the state assembly didn’t take action before Cuomo resigned last August. 

More Cuomo: On December 23rd, a prosecutor in Long Island declined to press charges against Cuomo for fondling the breast of an aide named Brittany Commisso. On December 28th, the Westchester County DA decided not to charge Cuomo with harassing two women, including forcibly kissing one of them. On Tuesday, Albany County District Attorney David Soares announced he wasn’t going to press charges against the governor for allegedly touching a state trooper in a suggestive way, even though they found her allegations to be “credible.”

Vithun Khamsong / EyeEm via Getty Images

2) Prenatal Genetic Testing Regularly Produces False Positives

The Topline: A stunning new report from The New York Times found that certain types of prenatal tests used to identify rare genetic disorders are inaccurate up to 85% of the time.

The Findings

The tests use a relatively new technology utilizing a small sample of maternal blood to screen for chromosomal abnormalities in the fetus, such as Down syndrome. 

In the case of Down syndrome, the tests are fairly accurate, but the tests also claim to identify other, rarer genetic disorders resulting from gene microdeletions, which are caused by a tiny missing portion of a chromosome. 

The report looked at five specific popular microdeletion tests. 

They found that the test for DiGeorge syndrome, which is associated with heart defects, is inaccurate 81% of the time when the result is positive. The four other tests also had drastically inflated positive rates. One was 80% inaccurate, another was 84%, 86%, and one had a 93% chance that a positive result was incorrect. 

These kinds of tests are not regulated by the FDA, which some say would impact at least how the tests are advertised to prospective parents, since many of the companies claim their results are “highly accurate” and provide “peace of mind.” 

The New York Times looked at 17 patient and doctor brochures, and 10 of those never mention that a false positive can occur. 

Effect On Abortion

The percentage of babies with Down syndrome who are aborted isn’t clear but the number of babies born with the condition has gone down dramatically around the world, likely due to abortion. 

A study from late

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