A lawyer for the woman who has accused former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo with sexual harassment said she is “disgusted” by what she called his hypocrisy of attempting to discredit the women who made allegations against his brother, former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.
Shortly after Cuomo was fired from CNN, the woman, who has chosen to remain nameless, made the allegations. Cuomo garnered criticism for his potential breach of ethics as tried to defend his brother’s many sexual assaults allegations. The woman’s lawyer, Debra Katz, made the claims public.
Cuomo has refuted the charges. His spokesperson said the claims were untrue and “If the goal in making these false and unvetted accusations was to see Mr. Cuomo punished by CNN, that may explain his unwarranted termination.” Katz affirmed this, sayin CNN took swift action once her client’s allegations came to light: “CNN acted promptly on my client’s complaint and fired Mr. Cuomo.”
The long-time anchor was suspended on Tuesday. CNN alleged the suspension came after obtaining documents in which the New York attorney general stated that Cuomo’s involvement in supporting his brother’s case was greater than anyone had previously thought.
CNN hired law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore to conduct a third-party investigation into his involvement. The firm claimed the media giant had reason to fire Cuomo. In addition to the new allegations, CNN officials made the decision to fire Cuomo, informing him on Saturday.
Katz claimed that Cuomo’s defense of his brother and his claims that he felt strongly about cases of sexual misconduct motivated her to take action. The client believes Cuomo “played an active role in attempting to smear women” who had accused his brother. “Hearing the hypocrisy of Chris Cuomo’s on-air words and disgusted by his efforts to try to discredit these women, my client retained counsel to report his serious sexual misconduct to CNN,” the lawyer said.
Recently, Shelley Ross wrote and published a column in the New York Times alleging Cuomo had groped her at a party 16 years ago while they worked together at ABC News. Cuomo responded to the newspaper saying, “I apologized to her then, and I meant it.”
