American Crisis

by Andrew Cuomo

  It had been more than three weeks since our first case, and all the news was increasingly disturbing. There is only so much bad news you can take without a semblance of hope. For me the courage and generosity of people brought the light. Their positive energy sustained me. At one of the daily briefings, I had asked retired health-care workers in New York State to volunteer to assist, and I said that we would reinstate their licenses as nurses and doctors if they came back to help. I also asked health-care workers across the country who were not busy to come and help in New York. At the time, I had no realistic expectation that a significant number of people would be volunteering from across the country to come to New York in the midst of this crisis. But I was just plain wrong. Amazingly, within just weeks, nearly one hundred thousand people signed up to help. How incredible! One hundred thousand health-care professionals willing to step into dangerous, overcrowded, ill-equipped emergency rooms driven only by love.

  I was so touched and humbled I spoke about it in the briefing. Their actions put my contribution into perspective. I was in a comfortable office with all the equipment I needed. I didn’t have to look in the eyes of a dying patient. These people, including more than thirty thousand from other states, had no obligation to show up, but they did. Imagine the size of the heart and the capacity for generosity it takes for a person from another state to willingly step into the fire of the COVID crisis in the global hot spot. It was truly humbling.

  I should have learned to never underestimate the courage and love of Americans. After 9/11, people also came from across the country to help New Yorkers. They just got in the car and came to help in any way they could. And within the state, when downstate coastal areas were hit by Superstorm Sandy, people drove from upstate just to be there to help, console, and support. These are powerful reminders of the essential goodness that is in most people. Why can’t we appeal to the good in people more often? Why does government so often bring out the bad?

  I had begun speaking to governors all across the country, regardless of political party, because many of us were facing the same challenges and were trying to work together. Of course, our closest relationship was with New Jersey and Connecticut, but we talked to everyone. Oregon sent us ventilators. Governor Mike DeWine from Ohio told us they had a company making washing machines that were proven to disinfect masks.

  All states had a PPE shortage, testing shortages, equipment shortages, and we were all trying to find someone we knew in China. Many states do not have the government capacity of New York State, and even we were struggling. It was clear that a number of states would have serious issues. It was infuriatingly obvious that making fifty states compete against one another for scarce resources was a cruel form of the Hunger Games. Why would one nation deliberately cause its member states to compete with one another for the equipment necessary to save lives? Why force us to compete when our instinct is to cooperate with one another? We knew what was ahead, and it was clear there was a better way to address it.

  The scientists were all predicting the same basic national phenomenon. The virus would move across the country much like a storm hitting certain areas hardest at certain times. The virus would peak in a rolling wave. The most problematic time was at the high point of the infection rate. A state government could manage a low infection rate, but when its hospital system was overwhelmed, it could no longer manage. That was the point when procuring equipment, ventilators, staff, and hospital beds was beyond the capacity of any state government.

  That day I recommended that the federal government organize the states to participate in a “Rolling National Deployment Plan.” It would have been so easy and would have made a tremendous difference. The experts had predicted that there would be a period of time between peaks in different states. In other words, New York would peak and a few weeks later Illinois and a few weeks later Oregon and so forth and so on. Because we were at our peak, I was asking other states to send us equipment and help. I told them that we would reciprocate and send staff and equipment when they hit their peak. If the federal government were to institutionalize this approach, it would allow one state to receive assistance from the other states when it was in dire need and likewise contribute assistance when its peak passed. It was the extension of the policy we were implementing within our state at the time. The statewide system moved the resources across the state as the need presented. A competent federal government should do the same for the nation, and I knew that the states would have been receptive and cooperative. Of course the idea went nowhere. Prophetically, months later, when our peak had passed and our infection rate was very low, we did just that. We were available to help other cities and states who were just hitting their peak, and we did.

  Imagine how much better America’s situation would have been if the federal government had just organized states to do mutual aid. How many lives could we have saved?

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  —

  ON MY VISITS to Manhattan, the empty streets were striking. I had never seen anything like that before. I didn’t want people to give up on New York City. They needed hope for the future. We announced a working group that would start preparing for New York’s reopening, identifying ways to immediately jump-start the economy. We could institutionalize lessons learned through the crisis and build back better. Every storm has a silver lining, and when you must rebuild, it would be foolish to just replace. We should take the opportunity to enhance and progress. If your home is destroyed, you don’t replace the kitchen with the same kitchen; you replace it with a better kitchen. We closed the economy; when we reopen the economy, it will be better than before. I had worked on rebuilding after many disasters in the federal government, and the message “Build Back Better” brought the impacted community hope. It was also totally true.

  The president was becoming increasingly aggressive in his push to reopen the economy, and he was casting cautious governors as the problem. Once again Trump was blind to the actual consequences of his pronouncement about reopening by Easter. If governors followed Trump’s advice, they would be walking into a trap. Accelerated reopenings would not in fact help the economy but rather hurt it by increasing the viral transmission spike. Other countries that had been reopening had been seeing dramatic spikes in their infection rate that resulted in hot spots popping up. Reopening wasn’t that simple.

  I was just as eager to reopen as Trump was, but the real question was not whether we reopen or not; the smart question was how. We announced a committee that would begin working on it full-time. My two former top aides, Steven Cohen and Bill Mulrow, both of whom served as secretary to the governor, would take charge. I’d worked with them for years and they were great. While I was focused on the immediate COVID issues, they would liaise with the business community to discuss the aftermath, whenever that would be!

  It was truly a family affair. My brothers-in-law also pitched in on the effort: Brian O’Donoghue worked with Bill and Steve day and night to assist in the NY Forward initiative while Kenneth Cole worked with his designer contacts to track down PPE while launching the “How Are You, Really?” campaign to destigmatize mental health challenges. Howard Maier had a great background in advertising and would tell me how my communication efforts were being received. My cousin Matthew Cuomo, a highly talented attorney, moved into the mansion for the month of March to help stand up hospitals.

  At this moment, the number of cases was still going up, so we were very much focused on reducing the spread and protecting vulnerable people. But we would run two operations in parallel. One would be dealing with the crisis of today—testing, hospital capacity, PPE, and ventilators—while one would be preparing for the reopening tomorrow.

  MARCH 27 | 7,379 NEW CASES | 6,481 HOSPITALIZED | 134 DEATHS

  “This is a moment that is going to change this nation.”

  THE JAVITS CENTER HAD BEEN transformed into a field hospital in just a week, and it gave me hope that we woul
d be saving lives. Normally home to everything from the New York Boat Show to Comic Con to the New York International Auto Show, the center was now a twenty-five-hundred-bed hospital with medical staff coming from the military, the National Guard, and Northwell Health. We were still weeks away from the predicted apex of the curve. Estimates said it could take several weeks to reach the maximum hospital need, but we had to be ready.

  Hopefully, we still had a chance to reduce the viral transmission rate so that we would not hit the maximum hospital need. However, we had to be ready for the worst-case scenario, which was that we would overwhelm the hospitals and need the emergency beds. Javits would be one of those emergency facilities that I hoped to God we would never need.

  At Javits, we wanted to avoid the “hurricane shelter” imagery that was ingrained in so many of our minds when we saw the images of the Superdome in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina: rows and rows of cots as a shelter of last resort with conditions deteriorating by the day. It was critical that the Javits Center and other facilities be as close to real hospitals as we could get them, both to deliver the quality of care expected in a state with a globally renowned health-care system and to alleviate the trepidation and fear patients or their families would naturally feel when being told they were being transferred to a “field hospital.” Conveniently, the Javits had hundreds of exhibit-booth room dividers that could be repurposed to build individual rooms with curtains for doors. My daughter Michaela worked with Gareth to prepare individual rooms to be welcoming to patients—including a welcome gift of a jar of honey from the bees on the roof of the Javits. But make no mistake, there was no denying or masking what Javits would actually be. It was the place of last resort. It was a place that you didn’t want to need.

  Walking around Javits, I could see on the faces of National Guard members that they were scared. They were mostly young, in their twenties, white, Black, brown, from all over the state. Some of them had worked on previous disasters with me and approached me, saying, “I was with you in Buffalo.” “I was with you on Long Island.” They had just gotten an extensive briefing about what to do and not do, what not to touch, what to wash. I’m sure their families had said to them, “Do you really have to do this?” I knew how they felt. Between the empty city outside, the thousands of green uniforms and Humvees and military jeeps, and the vision of row upon row of hospital beds, it felt like the end of the world. I wanted them to know I knew they were scared, and it was okay, and how proud I was of them for showing up anyway.

  As I was doing the briefing from Javits that day, what people couldn’t see on the television was that sitting in front of me were hundreds of National Guard and army personnel. In my remarks, I was speaking directly to them. I knew everyone was anxious and they were looking for guidance and comfort. I wanted to energize them and thank them for their courage. I said,

  Ten years from now you’ll be talking about today to your children or your grandchildren and you will shed a tear because you will remember the lives lost. You’ll remember the faces and you’ll remember the names, and you’ll remember how hard we worked and that we still lost loved ones, and you should because it will be sad. But you will also be proud.

  I had an issue close to home as well. A couple of the state troopers on my security detail tested positive. My state police security detail is critical. When I was at HUD, we had tremendous logistical support from the U.S. Marshals and military. Now that I’m governor, the state police provide all logistical support. While security is the priority for the state police, my priority is my ability to travel and actually get to places. I know I present them challenges. On a sunny day, life is easy, but if there is an emergency, I want to be on site. In emergencies, I want the first responders to know that I respect them and understand their sacrifice. Snowstorms, hurricanes, prison breaks—whatever the situation, I need to be able to get there. New York State is large, and in the midst of an emergency that’s often easier said than done. Sometimes it is a scene from Planes, Trains and Automobiles. The state police have been extraordinary. The superintendent is Keith Corlett, who worked his way through the ranks. The deputy superintendent is Kevin Bruen, who is experienced in all aspects of criminal justice. And the head of the detail, Major Vincent Straface, served on other governors’ details and has been with me from the beginning of my first term. He knows that as soon as a situation develops, we will need to be on site ASAP. Their support has allowed an additional dimension to my role as governor. I would never be comfortable as an “armchair general.” I won’t ask anyone to put themselves in a situation in which I’m unwilling to put myself.

  The challenge presented by troopers testing positive for COVID was obviously a new one. Being in a car, a closed environment, is a huge risk for contracting COVID.

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  —

  ONCE AGAIN, I was on notice to see if I was infected. The constancy of people around me getting infected created its own anxiety and was a reminder of how real this threat was. It seemed every few days someone close to me, or someone I was just with, tested positive. I was always wondering if I had gotten infected. Between the lack of sleep and the anxiety, I often thought I was coming down with it. It was another mind game for me to resolve. Ironically, I never did get COVID—so far! After we discovered the risk of being in a car with other people, we decided I would drive myself. There was actually a silver lining for me. I like the ability to drive and move around alone. I am very aware of the “bubble” that executives can become trapped in. I’ve seen presidents, mayors, and governors become isolated to the point where they are talking only to a small cadre of sycophants. I enjoy walking the dog, going into a store and meeting people casually, and having candid conversations. It keeps me grounded and in tune with what people feel. I learn what they actually think about what I am doing and what they are concerned about. It also reminds me that being governor is a temporary state. Always remembering my experience and my father’s experience after losing office, I am acutely aware of the difficult return to reality upon leaving office, so I don’t want to leave reality in the first place!

  MARCH 28 | 7,681 NEW CASES | 7,328 HOSPITALIZED | 209 DEATHS

  “You go to war with what you have, not with what you need.”

  THE FIRST SLIDE OF THE PowerPoint said, “Today is Saturday,” and everyone at the briefing laughed. After a month in the land of COVID, with everyone confined largely to home for weeks, no one knew what day it was anymore. There was no workweek as we knew it. There was no weekend. Every day was the same, like the movie Groundhog Day. You stayed home with your family, maybe you had some Zoom meetings if you were able to work remotely, maybe you had a Zoom cocktail hour with friends, maybe you helped your kids with their distance learning. But the usual cues for the days of the week were largely gone. Rush hour? Gone. “Today is Saturday” went viral, and we would do that every Saturday thereafter. How do we know if it’s Saturday? Because Governor Cuomo says it’s Saturday.

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  —

  A NEW CHAPTER opened in the COVID story when Congress was preparing to pass the CARES Act.

  Even at this time of crisis, the process was mired in politics. The Republican Senate didn’t want to give federal funds to Democratic states for the simple reason that it wasn’t in their political interest. Even in the middle of a historic world pandemic, Republican senators could not see beyond their own self-interest.

  Trump personifies this divide, and his affirmative hostility to New York has long been a fundamental problem for me. Everything Trump did to New York was a negative. His tax reform plan of 2017 included ending the deductibility of state and local taxes, which hurt New York more than any other state. It also hurt other Democratic states, including California, Massachusetts, Michigan, Illinois, New Jersey, and Connecticut. It was the height of Republican hypocrisy. It turns out that the party that is against redistribution of income is only against redistribution if they don’t
benefit. SALT took tax dollars from Democratic states and gave them to Republican states. It was redistribution on steroids, and it was vicious to New York.

  Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan was obsessed with the fact that New York State contributes more in tax dollars than any state in the United States. And he was right. We contribute more to the federal government than we get back, and our differential is the highest in the nation. New York subsidizes Kentucky, Florida, Alabama, Tennessee, and most of the Republican states. The Republican senators Mitch McConnell from Kentucky and Rick Scott from Florida are the greatest hypocrites, because their states get much more in federal funds than they contribute. This is nothing new and has been a long-term issue. However, the SALT provision and tax reform increased this disparity by forcing New York to contribute an additional $14 billion to the federal trough. I have been working to get the SALT provision repealed since it was passed three years ago. To further compound the injustice, after the COVID pandemic, Congress’s first piece of legislation bailed out all the classic Republican donors—wealthy businessmen.

  Even at this critical moment, their bailout legislation did not assist state and local governments, which fund essential services like police and firefighters—the very essential workers we were now relying on. Why? Because the states that had the highest number of COVID cases were Democratic states. McConnell was quoted saying he didn’t want to “bail out blue states.” Bail out blue states? It is the blue states that have supported his state for decades. In addition, all economists say that you cannot maximize an economic recovery without state and local governments functioning.