Opinion

Time to impeach the unmasked Gov. Cuomo

Gov. Cuomo has long portrayed himself as a model of propriety — a paragon of virtue, competence, leadership. Yet now a starkly different picture of him is emerging: that of a bully, a liar and, it appears, a sexual harasser.

The latest charge comes from his former deputy secretary for economic development, Lindsey Boylan, who’s now running for Manhattan borough president.

In a 1,700-plus-word essay, she lays out creepy details of how Cuomo eyed her from early on; went “out of his way” to touch her on her “lower back, arms and legs”; asked her to play strip poker while flying home on “his taxpayer-funded jet”; and blocked her exit from his office and kissed her “on the lips” without warning.

Her piece, which provided e-mail and text images to support her claims, backed up accusations she’d first made in December.

New York Post front page cover

Cuomo’s abusive behavior was par for the course, she says. When he mentioned strip poker, “I should have been shocked,” recounts Boylan, “but I wasn’t.” The gov had “created a culture within his administration where sexual harassment and bullying is so pervasive” that it’s “expected.”

The governor, she adds, uses “intimidation” to silence critics. Another woman told her that she, too, was “scared of what would happen” if she rejected his advances. When Boylan first lodged her accusations in December, someone from Team Cuomo leaked parts of her confidential personnel file “in an effort to smear me.”

Lindsey Boylan accused Gov. Cuomo of sexual harassment.
Lindsey Boylan accused Gov. Cuomo of sexual harassment. Rashid Umar Abbasi

Yes, it’s all allegations; Cuomo has every right to give his side of the story. On the other hand, when Christine Blasey Ford accused then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault, the governor insisted everyone believe her — and that Kavanaugh take a lie-detector test.

All right, governor: Take a lie-detector test.

More, the pattern here is unmistakable: Assemblyman Ron Kim, a fellow Democrat, says Cuomo called him at home and threatened to “destroy” him if he didn’t recant his charges against the governor for nursing-home misdeeds. Right on cue, the gov began to lodge accusations against Kim days later.

Others have come forward, too: In The Post this week, Morgan Pehme disclosed how Cuomo “terrorized” him in a bid to suppress a story set to appear in City & State, where Pehme was editor. Karen Hinton, another ex-Cuomo aide, blasts Cuomo’s “penis politics.” Mayor de Blasio calls Kim’s account “classic Cuomo,” adding he knows “a lot of people” who’ve suffered similar abuse.

Team Cuomo’s order sending COVID-contagious patients to nursing homes, fueling needless deaths, is surely enough to question his pose as a competent “leader.” All the more reason to impeach.