Toggling Between Intimidation and Flirtation, Cuomo Was Shielded From Accountability

The account of a state trooper who felt “completely violated” bolsters a meticulous new report on Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s misdeeds — and how such conduct was allowed to fester.

The governor placed his finger on the back of the trooper’s neck, standing behind her in an elevator at his Manhattan office, tracing the path of her spine with a two-word narration: “Hey, you.” Sometimes, he asked questions — Why didn’t she wear a dress? Why pursue marriage when “your sex drive goes down” afterward? Could he kiss her? — and sometimes, he made statements: He remarked that his ideal girlfriend could “handle pain.” He said that the trooper, in her late 20s, was “too old” for him. He instructed her to say nothing of their conversations. The trooper was perhaps most unsettled after an event on Long Island in 2019. As she held a door open for him, she felt the palm of his hand on her bellybutton, pressing toward her right hip, where she kept her gun. “I felt completely violated,” she later told investigators. “But, you know, I’m here to do a job.”