New York

Revisiting the Sexual Harassment Complaints Against Andrew Cuomo

Published

1 month ago

June 6, 2025

Revisiting the Sexual Harassment Complaints Against Andrew Cuomo

Dave Sanders for The New York Times

Four years ago, Andrew M. Cuomo resigned as governor of New York under a cloud of multiple sexual harassment accusations. He seemed chagrined, embarrassed for acting “in a way that made people feel uncomfortable.”

But as he prepared to make his political return, his tone changed. He said he had been driven out of office by a political hit job. He sued the state attorney general and moved to sue one of his accusers. And he began to portray himself as the victim. “That which doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,” he told The Daily Beast recently.

Now, as he runs for mayor of New York City, Mr. Cuomo is treating the scandal as ancient history, even as some of the complaints are still being contested in court.

Here is a look at all of the known sexual harassment allegations, where they stand and what Mr. Cuomo has said about them. (Some of the accusers’ names were shielded, in part or whole, by state investigators in their reports.)

2019-2021

Cuomo’s third term as governor

Litigation ongoing

Brittany Commisso

Executive assistant, governor’s office

Ms. Commisso said Mr. Cuomo grabbed her buttocks; reached under her blouse and fondled her breast; held her in close, intimate hugs; and asked her about her relationship with her husband, including whether she had ever “fooled around” or had sex with anyone else. She recalled his saying something to the effect of “if you were single, the things I would do to you,” and said he once complimented her on showing “some leg.” During their hugs, she said she would try to lean away from his pelvic area, because she “didn’t want anything to do with whatever he was trying to do at that moment.”

Litigation ongoing

Charlotte Bennett

Executive assistant, governor’s office

Ms. Bennett, who was 25 at the time, said the governor asked if she had been with older men and if she practiced monogamy, and told her he was lonely and would date someone as young as 22. Mr. Cuomo, she testified, also told her he “wanted to be touched,” and, upon learning that she planned to get a tattoo, advised her to get it on her buttocks. She said she felt as though Mr. Cuomo was grooming her. In a conversation about a speech Ms. Bennett was about to give at her alma mater about sexual assault, she recalled his pointing at her and intoning, “You were raped, you were raped, you were raped and abused and assaulted.” It was “something out of a horror movie,” she texted a colleague that day. “It was like he was testing me.”

State Entity Employee #1

Anonymous state employee

While posing for a photo at a work event in September 2019, the governor “tapped the area” between the employee’s buttocks and thigh, she told investigators, and then moved his fingers upward to “kind of grab that area.” “I felt deflated and I felt disrespected and I felt much, like, smaller and almost younger than I actually am,” she said. She said she had reported the governor’s conduct to investigators to support the women who had come forward with “more extreme” stories and to help establish that they were part of a pattern. “If I could do that, I felt that it was my responsibility to do that,” she said.

Alyssa McGrath

Executive assistant in the governor’s office

Ms. McGrath said she was taking dictation from the governor in 2019 when she noticed the governor had stopped talking. She said she looked up and saw him staring down her shirt. The governor then asked what was on her necklace, whose pendant was hanging between her breasts and her shirt. She said it was a Virgin Mary and an Italian horn. The governor would also ask questions that made her uncomfortable, she said, including about her divorce and whether, if Ms. Commisso were to cheat on her husband, she would tell anyone.

State Entity Employee #2

Director at State Department of Health

This state employee, a doctor, performed a televised Covid test on the governor at a March 2020 news conference. Beforehand, he asked her not to put the swab in “so deep that you hit my brain.” She said she would be “gentle but accurate.” “Gentle but accurate,” he responded. “I’ve heard that before.” She found his demeanor flirtatious and understood his statement to have sexual undertones. At the news conference, when the doctor appeared in personal protective equipment, the governor said, “You make that gown look good.” The woman told investigators that she “felt that in my professional standing I should share these facts, whatever they are, in order to support if there are any other women. I can’t say there are or not, who are saying they have been put in an uncomfortable position, or if there is any sexual harassment, that you have the facts that you might need.”

Anna Ruch

Guest at wedding of a senior aide to Mr. Cuomo

At the wedding of an aide, the governor approached Ms. Ruch, shook her hand, and then put his hand on her bare back, she told investigators. She said she grabbed his wrist to move it, at which point the governor said, “Wow, you’re aggressive,” and cupped her face in his hands. “Can I kiss you?” he asked. She turned her head, she said, and he kissed her cheek. (Ms. Ruch was hired by the New York Times photo department in 2022.)

2015-2019

Cuomo’s second term as governor

Litigation ongoing

Trooper #1

Member of Cuomo’s protective detail

The trooper said she first remembered the governor touching her inappropriately in an elevator going up to his Midtown Manhattan office, where he stood behind her, placed his finger on her neck, and then ran it slowly down her back, touching her bra clasp.“Hey, you,” she recalled him saying. In a separate incident, she recalled him running his palm across her stomach, “between my chest and my privates,” while she was holding a door open for him, an act that made her feel “completely violated.” A witness corroborated the account of Mr. Cuomo touching the trooper’s stomach.
The trooper said he would also say sexually suggestive and sexist things, and told her to keep their conversations private. Among other things, he requested she help him find a girlfriend who could “handle pain,” and he asked why she did not wear a dress, she said.

Lindsey Boylan

Chief of staff at Empire State Development and then deputy secretary for economic development and special adviser to the governor

Mr. Cuomo paid so much attention to Ms. Boylan that her supervisor concluded the governor had a “crush” on her, both she and her boss testified. Her boss asked if Ms. Boylan needed help managing the situation. She said no. Mr. Cuomo would also compare her to an ex-girlfriend, even allegedly calling Ms. Boylan by that ex-girlfriend’s name. And, she said, he would touch her legs, waist and back.
On an airplane, Ms. Boylan recalled Mr. Cuomo suggesting, seemingly in jest, that they play strip poker. Ms. Boylan’s boss at first claimed not to remember those remarks. After Ms. Boylan sent her boss what he described as a “disparaging” message that he found “threatening,” he corroborated her account. “I’ve been sexually harassed throughout my career,” she told investigators, “but not in a way where the whole environment was set up to feed the predator.”

Virginia Limmiatis

Employee, National Grid

Ms. Limmiatis said she had been waiting to meet the governor at a 2017 event when Mr. Cuomo approached her and pressed his fingers into her chest, pausing atop each letter of the energy company’s name that adorned her shirt. Then he leaned in so his cheek touched hers and, in her telling, shared his cover story: He would just say there had been a bug on her shirt. Then, she said, he brushed the pretend bug from the area between her shoulder and breast and walked away. After seeing Mr. Cuomo say during a news conference on March 3, 2021, that he had “never touched anyone inappropriately,” she felt compelled to come forward. “I am a cancer survivor,” Ms. Limmiatis told investigators. “I know an oppressive and destructive force when I see it.”

Kaitlin

Aide in the governor’s office

Kaitlin met Mr. Cuomo at a fund-raiser that her employer, a lobbying firm, was hosting at the Friars Club. When she introduced herself, he pulled her into a dance pose and told her he was going to have her work for the state. Though she told investigators she had never shared her contact information with him or his staff, nine days later she received a voicemail message inviting her to interview for a job in his office, at his behest. It turned out that two of Mr. Cuomo’s aides had been told to find Kaitlin’s contact information. Her colleagues urged her to accept the job, and she did. “I knew that I was being hired because of what I looked like,” she told investigators. The governor paid undue attention to her physical appearance and would comment on her clothes and makeup, she said.

Stephanie Miner

Former mayor of Syracuse

In a new book, Ms. Miner recounted Mr. Cuomo’s kissing her at public events against her will, actions she believed were an expression of his will to dominate. “His kissing me was about power,” she wrote in “Madam Mayor: Love and Loss in an American City.” She went on: “I never viewed it as sexual. We were gladiators in a public ring and that’s how he showed he was boss.”

2011-2015

Cuomo’s first term as governor

Ana Liss

Aide in governor’s office

Mr. Cuomo would kiss her cheek and would almost always address her as “sweetheart” or “darling,” Ms. Liss said. He spoke to her, she said, like she was “a little girl, almost.” She said she considered Mr. Cuomo’s behavior improper, but not sexual harassment. (A judge, apparently referring to Ms. Liss, said a complainant’s legal conclusion on that matter was “irrelevant.”) Ms. Liss said she had spoken up because “the other young women that had come forward with more egregious allegations weren’t being believed, and I believed them, and I wanted to share an account that was less egregious and spoke to the broader culture that allowed for the things that happened to them to happen to them.”

1997-2001

Cuomo’s tenure as HUD secretary

Karen Hinton

Consultant to U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

While Ms. Hinton was working as a consultant for the Housing Department under Mr. Cuomo, he held her in a “very long, too long, too tight, too intimate” hug, she told The Washington Post. She told WNYC that Mr. Cuomo was “aroused” during the embrace. Years after the encounter, Ms. Hinton worked for Mr. Cuomo’s antagonist, Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York City.

Click to comment

New York

Video: Inside Rikers Island: A Suicide Attempt as Guards Stand By

Published

2 days ago

July 14, 2025

Press Room

Video: Inside Rikers Island: A Suicide Attempt as Guards Stand By

This is the inside of a psychiatric unit on Rikers Island. It’s the morning of Aug. 25, 2022. And soon, this inmate, Michael Nieves, will attempt to commit suicide by cutting his own throat. He’ll bleed out for 10 minutes as officers stand by and wait for medical help. But Michael Nieves is just one of many cases of preventable harm on Rikers Island that ultimately led a federal judge to strip control of the jail from the City of New York in May. Soon, an independent manager will be appointed. After almost three years of filing Freedom of Information requests and lawsuits, The New York Times has now obtained videos of incidents that contributed to this decision, including that of Nieves. They take us inside Rikers, a place rarely seen by the public, and show serious lapses in the care of inmates. A long-serving member of an independent oversight body, who we’ll hear from later, told us that the case of Michael Nieves is characteristic of the problems inside the jail. Here’s what happened. It’s around 11:30 a.m., and a search of Michael Nieves’s cell fails to turn up a shaving razor he was given to use in the shower that morning. Capt. Mary Tinsley, the supervisor in charge, instructs Officer Beethoven Joseph, whose body camera footage we see here, to take Nieves for a body scan to see if he is hiding the razor. But Tinsley grows impatient with Nieves. Officers close the door and walk away. This is one of a series of mistakes that play out. These officers are trained to work with severely mentally ill detainees like Nieves, a once-gifted student who was later diagnosed with bipolar and schizophrenia disorders. Like most inmates on Rikers, Nieves was awaiting trial and had not yet been convicted of a crime. He was arrested on burglary and arson charges in 2019, but was deemed unfit to stand trial and held in forensic psychiatric facilities before being sent back to Rikers. Nieves had a long history of suicide attempts. And even though officers suspect he has the razor, he is left alone for 12 minutes while they search the cell of another inmate. Then Joseph returns, followed by Tinsley. She radios for help. The scene is disturbing, but we’re showing it briefly to illustrate what the officers could see. Nieves has cut his neck and is bleeding heavily onto the floor. Pressure needs to be applied to the wound immediately, and he needs to get to a hospital. At first, Nieves doesn’t respond. And the officers and Captain Tinsley don’t intervene. Officer Joseph faces a complex situation. Jail guidelines do not clearly say he should treat a severely bleeding wound. And officers are advised to use caution when they might be lured into danger. But state law does require him to render care in life-threatening situations. It’s unclear if he recognizes it as such. No one enters the cell. Instead, they offer Nieves a piece of clothing. Five minutes have passed. Officer Joseph asks about the bleeding. Eight minutes have passed. Nieves slides down to the floor. Officer Joseph shows concern, but remains by the door. After 10 minutes, the medics arrive on the ward and enter the cell. But there’s been a communication breakdown. The medics aren’t aware that Nieves is bleeding profusely, and they don’t have the right supplies. As they spring into action, the medics berate the correction officers. As medics render aid, Officer Joseph goes to review his notes and talks with another staff member. About an hour after Nieves was found bleeding, over a dozen medics, staff, and E.M.T.s are treating him on site. Shortly after, he was taken to a nearby hospital, declared brain dead and removed from life support five days later. “This was preventable.” Dr. Robert Cohen is a member of the Board of Correction, which monitors Rikers, and agreed to speak about the jail and the Nieves case in a personal capacity, not on behalf of the board. He retired shortly after this interview. “He should not have been left alone once they believed that he was in possession of a razor. By policy, he should have been taken immediately to the body scanner.” “He was bleeding to death. The correction officer should have gone into the room, assessed what was going on and should have applied pressure to the area where the blood was coming from.” A city medical examiner found that the officer’s inaction contributed to Nieves’s death, but that he could have died even with emergency aid. The state attorney general’s office therefore declined to charge the officers. Their report also found that the officers lacked clear protocols and might not have had training on severely bleeding wounds. It recommended that officers be required and trained to act in these situations in the future. Dr. Cohen says that what happened to Nieves is characteristic of chronic problems inside Rikers. “Since I’ve been on the board, these deaths have happened multiple times. Jason Echevarria swallowed a number of soap balls. He was screaming all night long. Jerome Murdough was put in a cell where there was a heating malfunction, baked to death. Mercado had diabetes. He was trying to get help. He never received insulin. Nicholas Feliciano hung himself. Seven officers were completely aware of this, and they did nothing — 7 minutes and 51 seconds passed. He did not die, but he has severe brain damage.” Nieves’s death occurred two years into the Covid pandemic, a time when Rikers was facing acute challenges and a staffing crisis that watchdogs say led to a spike in preventable deaths. “Many deaths over the past five years and the reports of deteriorating conditions were instrumental in moving us to the point right now where the judge is going to take over the island with an independent manager.” But even after that happens, New York’s next mayor will be tasked with trying to close Rikers. The original plan was to replace it with smaller jails and in four New York City boroughs by 2026. But after years of delays, here’s what those sites look like today. They’re nowhere near done. Oversight bodies, and even the former Manhattan U.S. attorney, have said that Rikers remains unsafe for detainees. The Department of Correction told The Times that a new medical emergencies curriculum is still being developed. A spokesperson for the Correction Officers Union said they followed regulations and have been vindicated. And the Captain’s Union, which represented Captain Tinsley, said she also followed protocol. Nieves was one of three brothers. His family is now suing the city.

New York

At a Small School in the Bronx, Classical Music Thrives

Published

1 week ago

July 7, 2025

Press Room

At a Small School in the Bronx, Classical Music Thrives

On a recent afternoon, an ensemble of serious young musicians gathered to practice “Fuga con Pajarillo,” a piece by Aldemaro Romero that combines Western concert hall traditions with Venezuelan folk music. The strings soared dramatically, building against a syncopated beat, like a complex dance.

Two hours later, they were exhausted — and exhilarated.

New York

How NYC Neighborhoods Voted in the 2025 Mayoral Primary: Map

Published

3 weeks ago

June 25, 2025

Press Room

How NYC Neighborhoods Voted in the 2025 Mayoral Primary: Map

The candidate leading each neighborhood in the first round

Queens

Brooklyn

Bronx

Manhattan

Staten
Island

Zohran Mamdani, an upstart state assemblyman from Queens, was on the brink of winning Tuesday’s Democratic primary for mayor of New York City. While results were not yet final, Mr. Mamdani leaped ahead of a crowded field thanks to a surge of turnout in gentrifying neighborhoods, and strong support from Asian and Hispanic enclaves.

Mr. Mamdani, a 33-year-old democratic socialist, also ran up large vote tallies in the affluent brownstone-lined blocks of Brooklyn, in the diverse blocks of Upper Manhattan and in areas with substantial South Asian populations in Queens.

His main rival, former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, had hoped to reassemble Mayor Eric Adams’s winning 2021 coalition of Black, Hispanic and Orthodox Jewish voters, but instead lost ground in some of those communities.

Neighborhoods where Eric Adams won

The areas where the current mayor won in the 2021 Democratic primary are outlined.

Queens

Brooklyn

Bronx

Manhattan

Staten
Island

Mr. Mamdani, who campaigned on addressing New York’s affordability crisis, performed stronger than his rivals in areas where a majority of residents are college graduates, as well as in middle-income and higher-income neighborhoods. He won most areas with a majority of Asian residents and was modestly outpacing Mr. Cuomo in majority Hispanic areas.

Mr. Cuomo, 67, had more support in areas with a majority of Black residents and in areas where a majority of residents are low-income. There were some exceptions, most notably Mr. Cuomo’s strong performance on the Upper West and East Sides in Manhattan, where Mr. Mamdani struggled to win over an older, wealthier electorate, which includes a sizable segment of Jewish voters.

How candidates fared with groups of voters

Based on results in precincts where each group is a majority.

Precincts with…	Andrew Cuomo	Zohran Mamdani	Brad Lander
Higher income residents 24% of precincts Advertisement	30%	42%	20%
Middle income residents 49% of precincts	37%	47%	7%
Lower income residents Advertisement 24% of precincts	49%	38%	3%
More college graduates 27% of precincts	28%	45%	19%
More white residents 29% of precincts	34%	39%	19%
More Hispanic residents 16% of precincts Advertisement	41%	48%	4%
More Black residents 15% of precincts	51%	34%	3%
More Asian residents Advertisement 4% of precincts	36%	52%	5%
More renters 70% of precincts	33%	47%	11%

Mr. Mamdani, who would be the city’s first Muslim and South Asian mayor, won the largest vote share in gentrifying neighborhoods like Ridgewood in Queens and Greenpoint in Brooklyn that are home to groups of young, left-leaning voters. Voters in Jamaica Hills, a Queens neighborhood home to a sizable South Asian population, also chose Mr. Mamdani by a large margin.

Mr. Cuomo’s efforts to court the Orthodox Jewish vote paid off. Borough Park and Midwood in Brooklyn were two of his top-performing neighborhoods. He also won large margins in the less dense, coastal communities of Far Rockaway and Bayswater in Queens, far from Manhattan.

Brad Lander, the city comptroller, was in third place overall. The cluster of neighborhoods in Brooklyn where Mr. Lander fared the best — which include Park Slope, Cobble Hill and Windsor Terrace — are all neighborhoods where Mr. Mamdani won most of the votes. That could ultimately benefit Mr. Mamdani under the city’s ranked-choice voting system, because the two men cross-endorsed each other and encouraged their supporters to rank them both.

The system allowed voters to list up to five candidates on their ballots. If their top choices are eliminated, their votes will be transferred to candidates who are lower on their ballots next Tuesday.

Neighborhood	Pct.	Votes
Ridgewood, Queens	80%	7,030
Bushwick, Brooklyn	79%	14,164
East Williamsburg, Brooklyn	75%	2,586
Jamaica Hills, Queens	74%	1,458
Greenpoint, Brooklyn	72%	7,583

Neighborhood	Pct.	Votes
Borough Park, Brooklyn	80%	6,577
Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn	76%	236
Midwood, Brooklyn	72%	9,160
Far Rockaway, Queens	72%	2,489
Bayswater, Queens	72%	522

Neighborhood	Pct.	Votes
Park Slope, Brooklyn	35%	7,330
Windsor Terrace, Brooklyn	34%	1,689
Cobble Hill, Brooklyn	32%	1,199
Columbia St. Waterfront District, Brooklyn	31%	355
South Slope, Brooklyn	30%	632

Neighborhood	Pct.	Votes
Springfield Gardens, Queens	17%	891
Laurelton, Queens	16%	506
St. Albans, Queens	15%	828
Jamaica, Queens	14%	1,381
Cambria Heights, Queens	14%	425

Assuming he prevails in the primary, Mr. Mamdani will face a general election in November that has the potential to be unusually competitive. Mr. Adams is seeking a second term, this time as an independent. Curtis Sliwa, a Republican, will be on the ballot, along with Jim Walden, a lawyer and independent. Mr. Cuomo also still has the option to pursue a third-party fall campaign.