I was dismissed, given the run-around, and my valid concerns were downplayed. Health-care workers fed me half-truths, assuring me my mother was healthy and safe when all the while she was suffering with COVID-19, gasping for air. My family was not notified until weeks after my mother’s passing that her nursing home had been admitting COVID-19 patients in accordance with a statewide mandate Cuomo had issued on March 25. Cuomo closed the doors on loved ones and opened them instead for the deadly coronavirus.

In my mind, I kept replaying what Cuomo had said: “If you have a vulnerable person, it’s best to keep them in a situation where you have the most control.” At no point, however, were we told to remove our loved ones from nursing homes. At no point did we have control over the situation.

As governor, Cuomo took our control away, failing to enact policies that could have spared our mother’s life, while issuing orders that doomed her. We were not privy to the same information he was, and certainly, his mother was not subjected to the same neglect and maltreatment. In fact, Cuomo said he wouldn’t dare put his mother in a nursing home. He subjected our parents and grandparents to the very danger he admitted was too dangerous for his own mother.