GOP signals Biden AG pick will come under pressure over Cuomo

Republican lawmakers are signaling that Merrick Garland, President Biden’s attorney general nominee, will come under pressure next week over New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s handling of COVID-19 in nursing homes.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is gearing up for Garland’s confirmation hearings Monday and Tuesday, and Republicans have made it clear that they will press Garland to commit to looking into Cuomo’s handling of nursing homes in his state.

A group of nine GOP members of the committee sent a letter to Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) on Wednesday demanding he investigate Cuomo.

“When Judge Garland testifies before this Committee, we expect him to commit the Department of Justice to fully investigating this cover-up to determine whether any criminal laws were violated and to prosecute any violations,” wrote the senators. 

“We will also ask him whether he has the resources he needs to fully pursue an investigation, not only into the deaths that occurred in New York but the deaths that occurred in other states that adopted similar directives leading to the admission of COVID-19 infected persons into elder care facilities,” they added.

New York’s Republican congressional delegation wrote a separate letter to Durbin and ranking member Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) on Friday requesting they ask Garland “a line of questioning about the role the U.S. Department of Justice should play in any investigation of a sitting Governor and his/her administration who conceivably obstructed justice.”

“We would also ask that Judge Garland make a strong statement promising to follow through with a proper obstruction of justice investigation into Governor Cuomo and his administration,” the lawmakers wrote. “The Governor’s wrongdoings did not disappear with the election of President Biden and are not to be ignored due to the transition of a new administration within the DOJ.”

Cuomo’s administration has faced criticism from all sides in recent weeks over the nursing home issue. 

New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) released a report earlier this year finding that the state underreported COVID-19 deaths in nursing homes by as much as 50 percent.

Melissa DeRosa, secretary to Cuomo, later said privately that the administration “froze” releasing information about nursing home deaths to state lawmakers out of concerns that the the Department of Justice under President Trump would launch an investigation.

DeRosa later clarified in a statement that there had been a pause in responding to state lawmakers’ request for information so that the state government could first deal with an inquiry from the Trump Department of Justice. 

Garland was nominated to serve as a justice on the Supreme Court by former President Obama but was blocked from even getting a hearing at the time by Senate Republicans. 

If all 50 Senate Democrats support his nomination, he will win confirmation from the Senate with Vice President Harris breaking a tie.