A 3rd lady has stepped ahead alleging sexual misconduct by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) after two of his former aides publicly accused the governor of office sexual harassment, together with a forcible kiss.
A New York Times report printed on Monday evening particulars how the accuser, Anna Ruch, met Cuomo at a marriage in September 2019, the place he put his hand on the small of her again inside moments of being launched to one another. Ruch, who was sporting an open-back gown, advised the Occasions she “promptly eliminated his hand with my hand, which I’d have thought was a transparent sufficient indicator that I used to be not wanting him to the touch me.”
When she did so, nonetheless, Cuomo referred to as her “aggressive,” put his palms on her cheeks and requested “Can I kiss you?” in response to Ruch.
“I used to be so confused and shocked and embarrassed,” she advised the Occasions. “I turned my head away and didn’t have phrases in that second.”
The report features a photograph of that second, which had been taken by a pal of Ruch’s:
Ruch mentioned she later requested a pal if the governor’s lips had touched her face whereas she was making an attempt to dodge his kiss; the pal advised her he had kissed her cheek.
Ruch blasted Cuomo’s “act of impunity” in her interview with the Occasions.
“I didn’t have a selection in his bodily dominance over me at that second,” she mentioned. “And that’s what infuriates me.”
“And even with what I might do, eradicating his hand from my decrease again, even doing that was not clear sufficient,” she added.
Ruch is the third lady to accuse Cuomo of sexual misconduct. The opposite two, Lindsey Boylan and Charlotte Bennett, have been the governor’s former aides. They allege that Cuomo sexually harassed them within the office with inappropriate remarks, invasive questions on their intercourse lives, and tried overtures for sexual affairs. Boylan says that the governor forcibly kissed her at one level.
In his official response to Boylan and Bennett’s accusations on Sunday, Cuomo conceded that his feedback “might have been insensitive or too private” and “made others really feel in methods I by no means meant,” however he additionally tried to dismiss the allegations as misinterpretations of him merely “being playful” within the workplace.
“I acknowledge a number of the issues I’ve mentioned have been misinterpreted as an undesirable flirtation,” he mentioned. “To the extent anybody felt that approach, I’m really sorry about that.”
The governor insisted that he “by no means inappropriately touched anyone” and “by no means propositioned anyone.”
The string of accusations comes as Cuomo battles a different scandal over his administration’s misreporting of COVID-19 dying counts in New York nursing houses, which dramatically undercounted the true dying toll of the virus in his state final yr.
