“Last night, news broke that the top aide to Gov. Cuomo admitted in a private meeting that the state willfully hid COVID-19 data from nursing homes to evade federal investigation. The more we look into the actions of the governor throughout the response to the pandemic, the worse the picture of the situation seems to appear. We now have both the attorney general and the governor’s top aide telling us that the governor lied through his teeth.

“If you were on the fence as to whether we needed to launch a full-scale investigation into the governor’s office, there should be no doubt left in your mind that it is beyond time. On the radio this morning, both Sen. Mike Martucci (R,C,I-New Hampton) and I called for an independent investigation to get to the bottom of this.

“If the executive branch broke the law in hiding this information, then whoever was involved must be prosecuted and held accountable. This coming week, the Legislature needs to do what it should have done months ago and remove the governor’s emergency powers. This is not a partisan issue — political corruption to protect yourself from scrutiny is unacceptable, and we owe it to the victims and families devastated by this to investigate.”