ВИБОРЧА ГАЗЕТА

Biden Seeks Return to Normal, Both in Life and Presidency

U.S. President Joe Biden is touring the country to pitch his $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package as he seeks to help Americans return to normalcy, both in life and in how they view the presidency. White House correspondent Patsy Widakuswara looks at how Biden’s crisis communication style compares to his predecessor’s.
…

US: Russia, Iran Meddled in November’s Election; China Held Back

A just-released assessment by U.S. intelligence officials finds Russia and Iran, joined by a handful of other countries and groups, did seek to influence the outcome of the November 2020 presidential election. But the assessment also concludes that, despite repeated warnings by a number of top officials, China ultimately decided to sit it out. The declassified report, issued Tuesday by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, is the U.S. intelligence community’s final take on foreign meddling in the hotly contested race, in which then-presidential candidate Joe Biden defeated former President Donald Trump. FILE – A newspaper with a front picture of U.S. President-elect Joe Biden is seen at a newsstand in Tehran, Iran, Nov. 8, 2020.Initially completed and shared with the Trump administration in a classified form in January, the unclassified version, required by law, seeks to give U.S. voters an overview of the threats and of their impact on American democracy.  While the assessment concludes no adversary managed to infiltrate critical systems or change how votes were cast, the conclusions on China could lead to new questions about how the intelligence was initially presented to the public. “We assess that China did not deploy interference efforts and considered but did not deploy influence efforts intended to change the outcome of the US Presidential election,” the newly released ODNI report said, adding it had “high confidence” in its finding. “China sought stability in its relationship with the United States, did not view either election outcome as being advantageous enough for China to risk getting caught meddling, and assessed its traditional influence tools — primarily targeted economic measures and lobbying — would be sufficient to meet its goal of shaping U.S. China policy regardless of the winner,” the report stated. Earlier warnings Those findings contrast with earlier warnings from intelligence officials who spent months warning voters of the potential threats, specifically calling out efforts by China along with Russia and Iran. “China is expanding its influence efforts to shape the policy environment in the United States, pressure political figures it views as opposed to China’s interests, and counter criticism of China,” then National Counterintelligence and Security Center Director FILE – Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe waits on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Dec. 12, 2020.In August, then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe grouped China with Russia and Iran in an interview with Fox Business News. “I don’t want to say this is only about China,” Ratcliffe said at the time. “China, Russia, Iran, other actors, are all trying to interfere or influence our elections for their own gain.” He added, however, that Beijing’s efforts stood apart. “China’s using a massive and sophisticated influence campaign that dwarfs anything that any other country is doing,” Ratcliffe said.  Another top Trump official, National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, echoed those thoughts less than a month later. “The intelligence community has made very clear, first you have China, which has the most massive program to influence the United States politically,” O’Brien told reporters at the time. White House Defends Trump’s Concerns About Mail-In Voting National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien defended the president’s warning of fraud while dismissing an intel bulletin that suggested Russia is using mail-in voting to sow confusion ahead of the November electionTrump, himself, also played up the notion China was seeking his defeat. “China would love us to have an election where Donald Trump lost to sleepy Joe Biden,” Trump said during a news conference last August. “They would own our country.” Declassified report In the newly declassified report, however, U.S. intelligence officials concluded Beijing did not use its well-developed influence machine to alter the results. “We did not identify China attempting to interfere with election infrastructure or provide funding to any candidates or parties,” the report said. It said Beijing had previously sought to influence U.S. politics, including in the 2018 U.S. elections. “We did not, however, see these capabilities deployed for the purpose of shaping the electoral outcome,” the report said. Report Puts Russia, China and Iran in Line for Sanctions for Election Meddling

        Voters who went to the polls last month in the United States' midterm elections can rest assured that their votes were registered and counted properly.However, a new report by the U.S. 

While stating it had high confidence in its findings regarding China, the ODNI report admitted there was some disagreement. “The National Intelligence Officer [NIO] for Cyber assesses that China took at least some steps to undermine former President Trump’s reelection chances, primarily through social media and official public statements and media,” it said, explaining the NIO gave more weight to indications that Beijing preferred Biden, seeing him as more predictable than Trump. The NIO also argued, with moderate confidence, that evidence suggested China increased its influence operations from June to August 2020, while calibrating its effort so as to “avoid blowback.” Still, several former intelligence officials who spoke to VOA about the ODNI report said its prevailing view in regard to China was not surprising. “[Former Director of National Intelligence] John Ratcliffe had the political mission of downplaying the whole Russian influence issue, with one way of doing that being to play up the idea that Chinese influence was at least as likely and significant as anything the Russians did,” said Paul Pillar, a former senior CIA officer who has been critical of Trump. Pillar, now with Georgetown University, said, in his view, the more notable conclusion from the ODNI report was how Russia sought to push Trump’s candidacy. FILE – Then-nominee for national intelligence director Avril Haines speaks during a confirmation hearing in Washington, Jan. 19, 2021. (Joe Raedle/Pool via AP)”Foreign malign influence is an enduring challenge facing our country,” Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines said in a statement Tuesday.   “Addressing this ongoing challenge requires a whole-of-government approach grounded in an accurate understanding of the problem, which the Intelligence Community, through assessments such as this one, endeavors to provide,” she added. A separate report Tuesday, from the departments of Justice and Homeland Security, reaffirmed earlier findings that foreign adversaries failed to impact the tallying of ballots. “We … have no evidence that any foreign government-affiliated actor prevented voting, changed votes, or disrupted the ability to tally votes or to transmit election results in a timely manner; altered any technical aspect of the voting process; or otherwise compromised the integrity of voter registration information of any ballots cast during 2020 federal elections,” the report said. The second report also rejected claims made after the November 2020 U.S. election that foreign governments, including Venezuela, Cuba and China, were in any way in control of critical election infrastructure to manipulate the election’s outcome. Such claims “are not credible,” the Justice Department and DHS concluded. Some key lawmakers, though, reacted to the reports by warning it is more critical than ever for the U.S. to maintain its guard. “The problem of foreign actors trying to influence the American electorate is not going away,” Democratic Senator John Warner, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement. “Given the current partisan divides in this country, [it] may find fertile ground in which to grow.” 
 
…

Biden to Hold First News Conference on March 25  

U.S. President Joe Biden will hold his first formal news conference on March 25, after drawing some criticism for not putting himself before reporters sooner for an extended question-and-answer session. White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki announced the date in Darby, Pennsylvania, as Biden promoted his $1.9 trillion pandemic stimulus plan in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Biden has had a number of brief encounters with reporters since taking office on January 20, but usually only takes one or two questions before walking away. The White House has cited Biden’s preoccupation with tackling the coronavirus pandemic as the main reason why he has held back from a formal news conference. Republicans and some media critics have called on Biden to appear at an actual news conference as part of the president’s traditional role of being held accountable to the public. They have pointed out that the nearly two-month span since January 20 is the longest period a recent new president has gone without holding a formal news conference. Biden, with a job approval rating in the 50s, has had little incentive to appear at length before reporters. His predecessor, Donald Trump, held many more encounters with reporters than Biden but they often did him more harm than good politically. 
…

Washington Post Corrects Misquote About Trump’s December Call with Georgia Election Official

The Washington Post has corrected a major story it published in January about the presidential election in the state of Georgia, saying it had “misquoted” then President Donald Trump in a phone call with a state election official. In the December call, Trump was voicing his concerns about alleged fraud.The original story, which was based on an anonymous source, said that in the call, Trump had told Georgia’s top election official to “find the fraud” and that they’d be a “national hero” if they did.On March 11, the Wall Street Journal revealed audio of the conversation, which showed Trump did not say those things.“Two months after publication of this story, the Georgia secretary of state released an audio recording of President Donald Trump’s December phone call with the state’s top elections investigator,” the Post wrote in its correction.The recording revealed that the Post misquoted Trump’s comments on the call, based on information provided by a source. Trump did not tell the investigator to “find the fraud” or say she would be “a national hero” if she did so. Instead, Trump urged the investigator to scrutinize ballots in Fulton County, Georgia, asserting she would find “dishonesty” there. He also told her that she had “the most important job in the country right now.”Numerous national media outlets repeated the erroneous quotes, citing The Washington Post.During the call, the former president did claim he had won Georgia and that “something bad” had happened with the election in the state.“I can assure you that our team and the (Georgia Bureau of Investigation), that we are only interested in the truth and finding the information that is based on the facts,” the election official replied, according to the audio released by the Wall Street Journal.Trump responded to the correction by calling the Post’s original reporting a “media travesty” but thanked the paper for correcting it.President Joe Biden won Georgia by about 12,000 votes. 
…

US Report Says Russia, Not China, Tried to Influence 2020 Election

Russia’s government tried to seed the 2020 U.S. presidential campaign with “misleading or unsubstantiated allegations” against then-candidate Joe Biden through allies of former President Trump and his administration, U.S. intelligence officials said Tuesday.The assessment was made in a 15-page report into election interference published by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. It underscores allegations that Trump’s allies were playing into Moscow’s hands by amplifying claims made against Biden by Russian-linked Ukrainian figures in the run up to the November 3 election. Biden defeated Trump and took office on January 20.U.S. intelligence agencies found other attempts to sway voters, including a “multi-pronged covert influence campaign” by Iran intended to undercut Trump’s support. The report also punctures a counter-narrative pushed by Trump’s allies that China was interfering on Biden’s behalf, concluding that Beijing “did not deploy interference efforts.””China sought stability in its relationship with the United States and did not view either election outcome as being advantageous enough for China to risk blowback if caught,” the report said.U.S. officials said they also saw efforts by Cuba, Venezuela and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah to influence the election, although “in general, we assess that they were smaller in scale than those conducted by Russia and Iran.”U.S. intelligence agencies and former Special Counsel Robert Mueller previously concluded that Russia also interfered in the 2016 U.S. election to boost Trump’s candidacy with a campaign of propaganda aimed at harming his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton. 
 
…

Haaland Confirmed as Interior Secretary, 1st Native American Cabinet Head

The Senate on Monday confirmed New Mexico Congresswoman Deb Haaland as interior secretary, making her the first Native American to lead a Cabinet department and the first to lead the federal agency that has wielded influence over the nation’s tribes for nearly two centuries.Haaland was confirmed by a 51-40 vote.Democrats and tribal groups hailed Haaland’s confirmation as historic, saying her selection means that Indigenous people — who lived in North America before the United States was created — will for the first time see a Native American lead the powerful department where decisions on relations with the nearly 600 federally recognized tribes are made. Interior also oversees a host of other issues, including energy development on public lands and waters, national parks and endangered species.”Representative Haaland’s confirmation represents a gigantic step forward in creating a government that represents the full richness and diversity of this country,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. “Native Americans for far too long have been neglected at the Cabinet level and in so many other places.”Haaland’s nomination has been closely watched by tribal communities across the country, with some virtual parties drawing hundreds of people to watch her two-day confirmation hearing last month.Supporters projected a photo of Haaland, a two-term congresswoman who represents greater Albuquerque, on the side of the Interior building in downtown Washington with text that read “Our Ancestors’ Dreams Come True.”Many Native Americans see Haaland, 60, as someone who will elevate their voices and protect the environment and tribes’ rights. Her selection breaks a two-century pattern of non-Native officials, mostly male, serving as the top federal official over American Indian affairs. The federal government often worked to dispossess tribes of their land and, until recently, to assimilate them into white culture.”It is long past time that an American Indian serve as the secretary of the Interior,” said Fawn Sharp, president of the National Congress of American Indians, the nation’s oldest and largest tribal organization.”The nation needs her leadership and vision to help lead our response to climate change, to steward our lands and cultural resources and to ensure that across the federal government, the United States lives up to its trust and treaty obligations to tribal nations and our citizens,” Sharp said.Jonathan Nez, president of the Navajo Nation in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, called Haaland’s confirmation “an unprecedented and monumental day for all first people of this country. Words cannot express how overjoyed and proud we are to see one of our own confirmed to serve in this high-level position.”Haaland’s confirmation “sets us on a better path to righting the wrongs of the past with the federal government and inspires hope in our people, especially our young people,” Nez added.Not everyone was celebrating. Some Republican senators have criticized Haaland’s views on oil drilling and other energy development as radical and extreme, citing her opposition to the Keystone XL oil pipeline and her support for the Green New Deal, a sweeping, if mostly aspirational, policy to address climate change and income inequality.Wyoming Senator John Barrasso, the top Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said Haaland’s “extreme views” and support of “catastrophic legislation” such as the Green New Deal would make her confirmation as interior secretary disastrous, harming America’s energy supply and economy.”American jobs are being sacrificed in the name of the Biden agenda, and Representative Haaland couldn’t defend it,” Barrasso said, referring to decisions by President Joe Biden to reject the Keystone XL pipeline and impose a moratorium on new oil and gas leases on federal lands.Barrasso also faulted Haaland’s support for continued protection for grizzly bears in the Yellowstone region of the Rocky Mountains, despite a recommendation by the Fish and Wildlife Service that about 700 bears in parts of Montana, Wyoming and Idaho no longer need protections.”Representative Haaland has chosen to ignore the science and the scientists of the very department that she is now nominated to lead,” Barrasso said, calling on Interior to remove protections for the grizzly under the Endangered Species Act.Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell said she appreciates Haaland’s leadership in the House on a range of issues, adding that Haaland’s status as a Native American “will give us an extra advantage on (tribal) issues that are so important to Indian Country overall.”Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said she had “some real misgivings” about Haaland because of her views on oil drilling and other energy issues, but said Native Alaskans, an important constituency in her rural state, had urged her to back Haaland.”Quite honestly, we need (Haaland) to be a success,” Murkowski said.Senator Martin Heinrich, a Democrat from New Mexico said he was disappointed at the rhetoric used by Barrasso and other Republicans. Heinrich, who lives in Haaland’s district, said she “always has an open door and an open mind” to a range of views.
…

Biden, Democrats to Promote Coronavirus Relief Benefits

U.S. President Joe Biden and other Democrats are embarking this week on visits to numerous states to promote the benefits of the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package Biden signed into law last week, hoping to make sure voters know how the aid could help them and that it was approved over uniform Republican opposition.  Biden is scheduled to discuss the plan in remarks at the White House on Monday, while his wife, Jill, goes to the state of New Jersey to join Governor Phil Murphy at an elementary school where she is expected to talk about steps the school took to reopen and how the relief package can help families. Biden Signs Coronavirus Relief Package$1.9 trillion measure cleared Congress over uniform Republican opposition  Vice President Kamala Harris travels Monday to Las Vegas where she will visit a COVID-19 vaccination site. Biden makes his first trip promoting the relief plan Tuesday when he goes to Delaware County, a key suburban Philadelphia jurisdiction in the eastern state of Pennsylvania that he carried over former President Donald Trump in the November election.  The relief package is one of the largest economic assistance packages in U.S. history and the first major legislative victory for Biden. It was approved solely with the votes of Democrats. Republican lawmakers objected to the size of the deal and to the fact that some of the funding is not tied directly to trying to end the pandemic in the United States, where more than 534,000 Americans have died.Senate Passes $1.9 Trillion COVID-19 Relief Bill50-49 vote falls along party lines in 100-member chamber Biden said in a speech Thursday night that members of his administration will spread out across the country to “speak directly” to Americans about the plan.  Biden and the other Democrats plan to highlight that millions of adult Americans, all but those in the upper-income brackets, will receive $1,400 stimulus checks, with tax credits for children. Billions of dollars are being sent to state and local governments and businesses that have been hit hard by the yearlong pandemic in the United States. Additional aid is being spent to boost vaccinations of millions of Americans.  Key Facts About the $1.9T COVID Bill Legislation still needs final passage in House, president’s signature The president and his aides hope to highlight how much assistance is being spent in individual states. National polls have shown that the relief package has wide support, even among Republicans, but Biden is not taking its popularity for granted.Democrats are mindful that in 2009, the last Democratic president, Barack Obama, under whom Biden served as vice president, spent little time promoting the $800 billion economic stimulus package he and fellow Democrats helped push through Congress to help rescue the U.S. economy from the steep recession they inherited from Republican President George W. Bush.Republicans, who mostly opposed the stimulus, went on to capture the House of Representatives in the 2010 elections.Biden press secretary Jen Psaki, a veteran of the Obama administration, told reporters last week: “We didn’t do enough to explain to the American people what the benefits were” in 2009.The White House is planning to make surrogates and senior administration officials available for local television interviews in cities across the country and get more than 400 mayors and governors to talk about what the relief package means for them and their communities.Congresswoman Liz Cheney, the House’s No. 3 Republican, said in a statement that only a small fraction of the $1.9 trillion deal was aimed at the virus and warned that it might eventually lead to tax increases to help pay for it.
…

Biden, Democrats to Tout Coronavirus Relief Benefits

U.S. President Joe Biden and other Democrats are embarking this week on visits to numerous states to promote the benefits of the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package Biden signed into law last week, hoping to make sure voters know how the aid could help them and that it was approved over uniform Republican opposition.On Tuesday Biden is to visit Delaware County, a key suburban Philadelphia jurisdiction in the eastern state of Pennsylvania that he carried over former President Donald Trump in the November election.Biden Signs Coronavirus Relief Package$1.9 trillion measure cleared Congress over uniform Republican opposition  Meantime, first lady Jill Biden is headed to the northeastern state of New Jersey on Monday and to New Hampshire on Wednesday. Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, are visiting Colorado and New Mexico in the western United States in the coming days, as well as New Jersey, Georgia and Pennsylvania on the East Coast.The relief package is one of the largest economic assistance packages in U.S. history and the first major legislative victory for Biden. It was approved solely with the votes of Democrats. Republican lawmakers objected to the size of the deal and to the fact that some of the funding is not tied directly to trying to end the pandemic in the U.S., where more than 534,000 Americans have died.  Biden said in a speech Thursday night that the first and second couples and members of his Cabinet will spread out across the country to “speak directly to you” about the plan.Biden and the other Democrats plan to highlight that millions of adult Americans, all but those in the upper-income brackets, will receive $1,400 stimulus checks, with tax credits for children. Billions of dollars are being sent to state and local governments and businesses that have been hit hard by the yearlong pandemic in the U.S. Additional aid is being spent to boost vaccinations of millions of Americans.Key Facts About the $1.9T COVID Bill Legislation still needs final passage in House, president’s signature The president and his aides hope to highlight how much assistance is being spent in individual states. National polls have shown that the relief package has wide support, even among Republicans, but Biden is not taking its popularity for granted.Democrats are mindful that in 2009, the last Democratic president, Barack Obama, under whom Biden served as vice president, spent little time promoting the $800 billion economic stimulus package he and fellow Democrats helped push through Congress to help rescue the U.S. economy from the steep recession they inherited from Republican President George W. Bush.Republicans, who mostly opposed the stimulus, went on to capture the House of Representatives in the 2010 elections.Biden press secretary Jen Psaki, a veteran of the Obama administration, told reporters last week: “We didn’t do enough to explain to the American people what the benefits were” in 2009.The White House is planning to make surrogates and senior administration officials available for local television interviews in cities across the country and get more than 400 mayors and governors to talk about what the relief package means for them and their communities.Congresswoman Liz Cheney, the House’s No. 3 Republican, said in a statement that only a small fraction of the $1.9 trillion deal was aimed at the virus and warned that it might eventually lead to tax increases to help pay for it.
…

Pentagon Chief sees Asia Ties as Deterrent Against China

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Saturday he was traveling to Asia to boost military cooperation with American allies and foster “credible deterrence” against China.Austin kicked off via Hawaii, seat of the American military command for the Indo-Pacific region, his first foreign visits as Pentagon chief.”This is all about alliances and partnerships,” he told reporters on the trip that is to include meetings with key allies in Tokyo, New Delhi and Seoul.”It’s also about enhancing capabilities,” he added, recalling that while the United States was focused on the anti-jihadist struggle in the Middle East, China was modernizing its army at high speed.”That competitive edge that we’ve had has eroded,” he said. “We still maintain that edge. We are going to increase that edge going forward.””Our goal is to make sure that we have the capabilities and the operational plans… to be able to offer a credible deterrence to China or anybody else who would want to take on the US,” he added.Lloyd will be joined in Tokyo and Seoul by Secretary of State Antony Blinken.”One of the things that the secretary of state and I want to do is begin to strengthen those alliances,” he said. “This will be more about listening and learning, getting their point of view.”This tour in Asia of the heads of diplomacy and defense of the United States follows an unprecedented summit of the “Quad,” an informal alliance born in the 2000s to counterbalance a rising China.Blinken will join President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, in Anchorage on March 18 with their Chinese counterparts Wang Yi and Yang Jiechi.The Alaska talks will be the first between the powers since Yang met Blinken’s hawkish predecessor Mike Pompeo in June in Hawaii — a setting similarly far from the high-stakes glare of national capitals.The Biden administration has generally backed the tougher approach to China initiated by former President Donald Trump but has also insisted that it can be more effective by shoring up alliances and seeking narrow ways to cooperate on priorities such as climate change. 
…

Schumer, Gillibrand Join Calls for Cuomo to Resign; Governor Remains Defiant

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand called Friday on New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo to resign, adding the most powerful Democratic voices yet to calls for the governor to leave office in the wake of allegations of sexual harassment and groping. Both had earlier said an independent investigation into the allegations against Cuomo was essential. FILE – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.Earlier Friday, Cuomo insisted he would not step down in the wake of sexual harassment allegations and condemned the coalition of Democrats calling for his resignation. “I’m not going to resign,” the third-term Democratic governor said during an afternoon phone call with reporters. “I did not do what has been alleged. Period.” The governor’s comments came on the day his party in New York and beyond turned sharply against him following allegations of harassment as well as sweeping criticism of Cuomo for keeping secret how many nursing home residents died of COVID-19 for months.  Cuomo’s growing list of detractors now covers every region in the state and the political power centers of New York City and Washington. A majority of Democrats in the state legislature and 21 of the state’s 27 U.S. House members have called on him to step down. The escalating political crisis jeopardizes Cuomo’s 2022 reelection in an overwhelmingly Democratic state. Republicans across the country have seized on the scandal to try to distract from President Joe Biden’s success with the pandemic and challenge his party’s well-established advantage with female voters. Number of critics growingHours earlier, White House press secretary Jen Psaki declined to say whether Biden believes Cuomo should resign. She said every woman who has come forth about harassment by the New York governor “deserves to have her voice heard, should be treated with respect and should be able to tell her story.”  FILE – U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.Dozens of Democrats called on Cuomo to resign this week, but the coalition of critics expanded geographically and politically on Friday to include the likes of New York City progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez; the leader of the House Democratic campaign arm, Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney; and a group of Long Island-based state lawmakers who had been loyal Cuomo allies.  “The victims of sexual assault concern me more than politics or other narrow considerations, and I believe Governor Cuomo must step aside,” Maloney said. Ocasio-Cortez said she believes the women who accused Cuomo of wrongdoing. “After two accounts of sexual assault, four accounts of harassment, the Attorney General’s investigation finding the Governor’s admin hid nursing home data from the legislature and public, we agree with the 55+ members of the New York State legislature that the Governor must resign,” she tweeted. FILE – Activists with VOCAL-NY block traffic outside New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office, demanding his resignation, in New York, March 10, 2021.In recent days, Cuomo has been calling lawmakers and supporters asking them to refrain from calling for his resignation and instead support the ongoing investigations. His strategy does not appear to be working. The state Assembly allowed an impeachment investigation into Cuomo on Thursday as lawmakers investigate whether there are grounds for his forcible removal from office. The firestorm around the governor grew after the Times Union of Albany reported Wednesday that an unidentified aide had claimed Cuomo fondled her at his official residence late last year.  The woman hasn’t filed a criminal complaint, but a lawyer for the governor said Thursday that the state reported the allegation to the Albany Police Department after the woman involved declined to do so herself. Additionally, Cuomo is facing multiple allegations of sexually suggestive remarks and behavior toward women, including female aides. One aide said he asked her if she would ever have sex with an older man. And another aide claimed the governor once kissed her without consent and said governor’s aides publicly smeared her after she accused him of sexual harassment. Cuomo stands firmThe governor on Friday vowed that he’ll still be able to govern despite a growing list of New York elected officials who say they’ve lost faith in him.  Cuomo didn’t address the reality of an increasingly untenable position: He’s seeking a fourth term next year, managing the state’s pandemic response and negotiating a state budget with state lawmakers who’ve lost confidence in his leadership.  He again raised questions about the motives of women accusing him of inappropriate behavior. “A lot of people allege a lot of things for a lot of reasons,” he said Friday. “I won’t speculate about people’s possible motives. But I can tell you as a former attorney general who has gone through this situation many times, there are often many motivations for making an allegation. And that is why you need to know the facts before you make a decision.” But dozens of Democrats have already determined the allegations are serious enough to warrant his immediate removal. Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler, who chairs the powerhouse U.S. House Judiciary Committee, said Cuomo has lost the confidence of New Yorkers. “The repeated accusations against the governor, and the manner in which he has responded to them, have made it impossible for him to continue to govern at this point,” Nadler said. 
 
…