- Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York has taken a star turn with his daily coronavirus press briefings, even getting more consistent airtime abroad than President Donald Trump.
- From the hand sanitizer made in New York state prisons to the governor getting two glasses of water while officials flanking him get only one, the details of the briefings shed light on Cuomo's political style and how he got here.
- His steady approach and emotional anecdotes on camera have earned plaudits from former rivals, and Democrats who have known Cuomo for years say the briefings bring out the best in him.
- The mechanics of the press conferences and their quirks reveal what has and hasn't changed about Cuomo over his decades in politics, with his relishing of crises and strong executive force of will bringing him to a unique point in history.
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ALBANY, New York — The sound of pumps from bottles of prison-made hand sanitizer echo through the cavernous hallways of the New York State Capitol as reporters file into the Red Room, disinfecting themselves before peppering Gov. Andrew Cuomo with questions.
Once the red lights on the row of TV cameras turn on, Cuomo becomes the center of the coronavirus universe — not just in New York or the US but on major networks worldwide — for about an hour most weekdays.
In addition to the capital press corps, a French magazine reporter is in attendance. In England, Sky News makes sure to carry Cuomo live just about every time he goes on, even though the mega-channel has largely stopped airing briefings from President Donald Trump.
Through a strange set of circumstances brought by the pandemic, the normally cautious Cuomo has been giving a level of access to the press unprecedented in his decades-long political career, making his gubernatorial coronavirus briefings must-see TV around the world.
For longtime New York political operatives in both parties, Cuomo's star turn is the culmination of his approach to executive power and his relishing of disaster management, suddenly offering Americans a sense of relief through many of the same traits that have made him the most feared politician in the Empire State.
"I think what we're seeing right now is the best of Andrew Cuomo, and it's the Andrew Cuomo that the people who are close to him know and love," Lis Smith, a longtime Democratic communications operative who rose to national prominence atop Pete Buttigieg's presidential campaign, told Insider.
Smith cut her teeth in New York City and New York state politics, having served as a communications adviser for Cuomo during his 2018 reelection campaign.
"Yes, he's super confident, but he's also, deep down, a really sentimental guy who has a wicked sense of humor, and I think all of those things come out daily in his press conferences in a way that we haven't previously seen," Smith said.
Like many other political observers, Smith described what she sees as a "leadership void" that has opened up amid Trump's meandering, chaotic, and, at times, misinformative press briefings over the past few weeks. Coupled with "a total hunger for news and information right now," she said Cuomo's foray into Americans' living rooms had been such a success because of his emotional anecdotes.
The level of empathy at the briefings stands in stark contrast to Trump's, Smith noted, saying Cuomo was also showing "spiritual and moral leadership" in addition to strength.
"That's one thing Donald Trump is just constitutionally incapable of doing," Smith said.
"And the things I hear about most from people about Governor Cuomo's press conferences is not the statistics that he goes through — it's when he talks about his family, when he talks about how you should reach out to the people in your life and tell them you love them. And those are the things that really resonate with people, because people feel really isolated right now. They feel scared. They feel anxious."
That connection is even more relevant this week, after Cuomo's younger brother, the CNN host Chris Cuomo, tested positive for COVID-19.
Cuomo's midday fireside chats have even earned plaudits from former rivals.
Marc Molinaro, the Republican who ran against Cuomo for reelection in 2018, recently said Cuomo was "doing a good job providing the voice and the leadership that is necessary at this time."
Michael Caputo, who managed perhaps the most heated Republican campaign against Cuomo to date back in 2010 for the Buffalo businessman Carl Paladino, praised Cuomo's performance throughout the crisis so far.
In 2010, "I spent most of my time tearing Cuomo down," Caputo told Insider. "In recent years that I watched him get reelected and reelected, I've opposed him across the board. Today, I'm very appreciative for his leadership."
Caputo is an ardent supporter of Trump. He got his start as Roger Stone's driver at age 24, and he ended up serving as a senior communications adviser for the Trump campaign in 2016 after helming the successful New York primary effort.
While Caputo was adamant that he thought Trump was getting shortchanged by the non-Fox News American cable networks for not airing the president's briefings in full in recent days, he noted that none of that changed his view that Cuomo was a crucial voice in this moment.
"My family is paying very close attention, because we need his help, and we know it's our job to listen now," the East Aurora, New York, resident said.
While Cuomo's press briefings have introduced him to a wide swath of Americans and news consumers around the globe, the mechanics and peculiarities of the briefings are revelatory of longer-standing dynamics in Cuomo world.
Often flanked by public-health officials and other key state-level figures, Cuomo always gets two glasses of water at the Capitol to their one — a custom not as strictly observed when he holds briefings in Manhattan.
A Cuomo staffer at the Capitol was hesitant to comment on the PowerPoint presentations that are a fixture of the briefings, saying they would not want to divulge the "secret sauce" of the slideshows.
Cuomo has used PowerPoint since the 1990s when he was the director of housing and urban development under President Bill Clinton, but the daily briefings have drawn attention to their sometimes strange or comical captions.
A staffer in the back of the room tinkers with the slideshow and manages it during the briefing, even though Cuomo also has a clicker to go to the next slide. Otherwise, Cuomo's press staff keeps the "secret sauce" in a black box.
—Rebecca Baird-Remba (@thecitywanderer) March 21, 2020
Despite his willingness to take questions from reporters throughout the coronavirus crisis, Cuomo has a history of avoiding the press that is not lost on Empire State politicos.
"This is a departure from how he's done things in the past," one veteran New York Democratic operative told Insider on condition of anonymity out of a fear of retribution from Cuomo's staff. "There were points in this administration where he went months without doing a press briefing, and he's someone generally who has not allowed the press a lot of access, and certainly has not allowed the national press a lot of access."
Many of Cuomo's best-documented moments in his near decade as governor have come while wearing a windbreaker during various natural disasters, and his penchant for relishing dire scenarios that call for executive leadership has served him well through the pandemic, the Democratic operative said.
"This is his comfort zone, this is his wheelhouse," the person said, adding: "He's a really smart guy, and I think he's really cool and calm in a crisis. And maybe what he and the people around him are seeing is that maybe there's no need to be so cautious about press access."
Nevertheless, no amount of free hand sanitizer or ratings bump will erase the memories many journalists have of covering Cuomo over the years, the Democrat said.
"I'm not going to sugarcoat it — I think most reporters would tell you that in the past, dealing with his press office has been a nightmare."
