Harvey Weinstein, a convicted rapist who treated Hollywood like his own hunting ground, became the marquee figure of the #MeToo movement. But that movement wasn’t really about targeting purely criminal behavior. Rather, its initial targets were men who used their power to prey on women, often subordinates in the workplace, who felt unable to speak out against them.
There are now three credible allegations of unwanted, persistent advances by Gov. Andrew Cuomo against women young enough to be his daughter. Two of them were his subordinates. He appears to be exactly the sort of creep whose behavior the #MeToo movement was designed to address.
Cuomo never deserved the adoration of the media. He should have lost it back in May when anyone willing to look could see the red flags. There were already signs he was covering up the number killed by his disastrous March order, which forced nursing homes to accept COVID-positive patients. It is fitting that the media are finally catching on to both that tragedy and to his predations simultaneously.
First, former staffer Lindsey Boylan alleged that after a series of sexually charged remarks and overt appeals to intimacy, Cuomo forced a kiss on her. Then the New York Times corroborated a new claim from Charlotte Bennett that she had told others while she worked for Cuomo that he was sexually pursuing her.
The latest allegation comes from Anna Ruch, who didn’t work for Cuomo but met him at a wedding where he tried to force a kiss on her. The photographic evidence of Cuomo forcefully gripping her face while Ruch pulls away in clear disgust belies Cuomo’s earlier defense that while he may have said insensitive remarks that crossed a line, he “never inappropriately touched anybody” or “propositioned anybody.”
Even so, that Cuomo hasn’t been accused of raping anyone is still not a defense for his being allowed in polite society. And no, a dumb teenager trying to force a drunken kiss on a stranger wouldn’t be worthy of calling for their resignation years after the fact, but Cuomo is the governor of the fourth-most populous state and has young daughters of his own. If he found out that one of his own daughters’ bosses was behaving as he does, do you think he wouldn’t want some action taken?
It took the #MeToo movement to galvanize Weinstein’s victims so that they could come forward with their allegations. But the #MeToo movement originated specifically to prevent behavior like Cuomo’s and to remove men like him from the positions of power they abuse.
