'Am I allowed to say it?' Daughter of NY nursing home resident rails against Cuomo, and media she says censored her
February 2, 2021 | Frieda Powers | Print Article
A woman whose mother died in a New York nursing home pointed a finger at Gov. Andrew Cuomo and demanded that he be held accountable for her death because of his failed response to the coronavirus pandemic.
Dawn Best told Fox News on Monday that she has been asked by other media outlets to change her words when she has attempted to blame the Democratic New York governor for policies that allegedly led to her mother's death in a nursing home in the state due to "neglect."
"Well, I'd like to say, Governor Cuomo failed us now. Am I allowed to say it on your program? Yes. All right, there we go," Best said, speaking with "Fox & Friends" co-host Brian Kilmeade on Monday.
"Well, I kind of got used to it because the media was never letting me say Governor Cuomo all along, and it was being cut out of every interview that I was in," she explained. "And then I started starting every sentence that they asked with Governor Cuomo so they couldn't do that to me so then they were forced to literally ask me to cut out Governor Cuomo's name."
(Source: Fox News)
Best noted that the requests were made in various interviews, including one with NBC anchor Lester Holt which was called out by Fox News senior meteorologist Janice Dean, who lost both of her elderly in-laws in New York last year. Dean has been waging a personal battle with Cuomo over the deaths of her family members and on behalf of thousands of others in New York who fell victim to the controversial policy which required nursing homes to admit patients even though they had been diagnosed with COVID-19.
Recounting her appearance on NBC News, Best recalled how she was speaking about Cuomo's failed leadership when "she stopped me and she said to me, can you say that a different way without Governor Cuomo's name and just say, 'New York failed you?'"
"So I had no choice. I had to say 'New York failed me,'" she told Kilmeade.
Dean had blasted the network and Holt for censoring her friend and covering for Cuomo.
"Shame on you @LesterHoltNBC @NBCNews @TODAYshow," Dean tweeted. "New York State did not fail us. The governor, his administration and his health department FAILED US. You are a disgrace to all families. Just like @andrewcuomo."
'You are a disgrace': Janice Dean goes scorched earth on media she says is STILL covering for Gov. Cuomo https://t.co/ywqz0kKAUm pic.twitter.com/xQDOfds00y
— Conservative News (@BIZPACReview) January 30, 2021
"I just wish that Governor Cuomo did as good of a job protecting the elderly as the press has done all along protecting him," Best said on "Fox & Friends."
"Well, I'd like to know how this happened. My mom was in the best nursing home, getting the best care pre-March — 24/7, fine, healthy and happy,"
"And within three weeks of his deadly directive, where he sent the COVID positive patients into the nursing home, my mother was dead from neglect. That was because the nursing home was overrun with COVID patients," Best continued.
"I know this because the doctor told me when I called and asked what was wrong with my mother, she said, and this is a quote, she was frantic. She said, the culprit is everywhere. It's in every unit — the doctors have it, the nurses have it and your mother may have it," she recounted.
"I had her tested — she didn't have it. It was dehydration," she explained. "My mother died of neglect because of Governor Cuomo."
New York's three-term governor, who wrote a self-congratulatory book amid the pandemic and even won an Emmy for his daily press conferences, has come under fire in recent days after New York State Attorney General Letitia James released a damning report indicating that the number of COVID deaths in the state may have actually been severely undercounted.
"If you look at New York State, we have a lower percentage of deaths in nursing homes than other states. A third of all deaths in this nation are from nursing homes," Cuomo said at a press briefing last week when asked about the findings.
'Who cares?' Gov Cuomo blames everyone but himself in callous COVID report response https://t.co/QIABNAb4LC pic.twitter.com/JkHftexOzO
"New York State, we're only about 28 percent, only, but we're below the national average in nursing homes. But who cares?" Cuomo said. "Thirty-three, twenty-eight, died in a hospital, died in a nursing home. They died."