January 1, Lauded Gov. Cuomo resigns in disgrace

Good morning Americans,

The once-celebrated New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) announced his resignation on Tuesday, marking an end to a tumultuous six-month run of bungling his state’s COVID-19 response and sexual harassment allegations. Cuomo said he would formally leave office in two weeks. Defiant to the end, Cuomo specified that he was not resigning because of the accusations against him from 11 women, but instead because he didn’t want to be a distraction. “This is one of the most challenging times for government in a generation. Government really needs to function today. Government needs to perform. It is a matter of life and death, government operations. And wasting energy on distractions is the last thing that state government should be doing,” Cuomo said.

Journalist Glenn Greenwald lambasted the liberal discourse surrounding the investigation that found Cuomo had sexually harassed multiple women. “Few things are more repulsive in liberal discourse right now than the Andrew Cuomo saga,” he wrote. “They’re all now lamenting that he’s everything they claimed Trump was: as if they just found out. They always knew it, yet they all supported & championed this dynastic heir for decades,” Greenwald wrote on Twitter. “Like his brother @ChrisCuomo, Andrew Cuomo has a career for only one reason: his dad was Mario Cuomo. He’s always been an authoritarian bully and sleazy scumbag — the kind that comes from life-long entitlement. Yet Clinton put him in his Cabinet and Dems cheered him for years.” The soon-to-be-former governor previously received immense praise from President Biden, and he was even awarded an Emmy for his daily COVID-19 press conferences.

President Joe Biden raised eyebrows on Tuesday following his comments on Gov. Cuomo’s resignation, saying the governor did “a hell of a job” amid the sexual harassment scandal. “Well, he’s done a hell of a job. He’s done a hell of a job. And I mean, both on — everything from access to voting to infrastructure to a whole range of things. That’s why it’s so sad,” said Biden. Cuomo is under investigation by at least four of the state’s district attorneys for assault, and he’s under federal investigation for admittedly hiding data on COVID-19 nursing home casualties. CNN’s Kaitlan Collins questioned the president about his praise, given that “he’s accused of sexually harassing.” Biden said he was talking about Cuomo “outside of his personal behavior.”

The Senate passed a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure deal, a victory for the Biden administration. The measure passed with a vote of 69-30. The package includes funding for infrastructure projects including roads, bridges, broadband, and water. The massive bill is now on its way to the House, where its future is uncertain. According to a Congressional Budget Office analysis, the bill would add $256 billion to the deficit. Former President Trump criticized the Republicans who voted to advance. “Nobody will ever understand why Mitch McConnell allowed this non-infrastructure bill to be passed. He has given up all of his leverage for the big whopper of a bill that will follow. … He is working so hard to give Biden a victory, now they’ll go for the big one, including the biggest tax increases in the history of our Country,” Trump said in a statement.

In light of the recent climate change report from the United Nations that indicates a dire future for our planet, some are reflecting on former President Obama’s climate inaction. David Sirota of The Daily Poster notes that Obama “campaigned in climate poetry and then governed in fossil fuel prose.” An examination of some of Obama’s speeches shows an anti-climate, pro-oil disposition, despite his support of things like the Paris Accords and electric vehicles. “Under my administration, America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years,” he said in a speech promising to boost pipeline capacity to flood the world with even more fossil fuels,” Obama said in a 2012 speech. “American energy production, you wouldn’t always know it, but it went up every year I was president,” Obama said in 2018. “Suddenly America is like, the biggest oil producer — That was me, people,” he said, adding: “Just say, ‘Thank you,’ please.”

Experts say that a migrant child detention center, Pecos Emergency Intake Site, in Texas is worse than ever before. “Based upon my direct observations and experience working since 2005 as an attorney who primarily represents immigrants detained in Texas, I find the conditions at Pecos among the harshest and most restrictive of any ORR or ICE facility that I have visited in my career,” said Jonathan Ryan, president and CEO of immigrant-rights group RAICES. The shelter, constructed on a former oil worker lodge, is not licensed by any state child welfare agency. Advocates say that children are held for as long as 90 days—far longer than the 20-day holding limit. Children at the facility complained about health problems stemming from being fed undercooked food.

Be well,

Fraser Dixon

Sources

• Cuomo resigns after investigation finds he harassed multiple women
• Greenwald sounds off on ‘repulsive’ delayed discourse on Cuomo: ‘They’re pretending to be horrified’
• Cuomo did ‘hell of a job’ as governor, Biden says in shock remark after resignation over sex harass claims
• Senate passes $1T bipartisan infrastructure bill in major victory for Biden
• “That Was Me, People”
• The Migrant Child Detention Center That’s Worse Than Ever