‘VICIOUS’

Howard Stern Asks Governor Cuomo: Is Trump ‘Happy’ Your Brother Has Coronavirus?

“Do you think that he sits there and says ‘oh, good,’ like there is an enemies list or something like that?” Stern asked the governor on Monday.

By Matt Wilstein & Andrew KirellApr 13, 2020

Howard Stern hosted Andrew Cuomo on Monday’s episode of his SiriusXM show. And while, remarkably, he did not ask one question about the New York governor’s nipples, he did cover a lot of other ground. And it did not take long for the host to start grilling the governor about his rocky relationship with President Donald Trump.

“It’s not perfect. What relationship is perfect?” Cuomo told Stern. “There are incidents even during this where he has taken shots at me and I have taken shots at him. Not gratuitous shots, but on my side they were bona fide bones of contention with things I needed. But by and large, it has worked.”

This led Stern to wonder how the president took the news that the governor’s brother, CNN host Chris Cuomo, was recently diagnosed with the coronavirus.

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“Don't you think—I don't know this for a fact—but don't you think he is happy that your brother, Chris, got coronavirus,” Stern said early in their conversation. “Because he works for CNN and he has been critical of Trump? Do you think that he sits there and says ‘oh, good,’ like there is an enemies list or something like that? I feel it's that vicious.”

While Cuomo allowed that as a New Yorker, Trump “can be vicious” and has a “confrontational relationship with my brother,” he insisted that the president has taken no pleasure from the news.

“He would say Chris on CNN attacks him and CNN always attacks him and he has personally attacked my brother, partially because of me, I think, and partially because of my brother's reporting,” Cuomo said. “I do not believe—I will say this, the president always makes a point of saying to me, ‘How is Chris? Is he doing OK?’ And that's not in his usual character, you know, we're not chit-chatty when we're on the phone. But he always makes the point to say that about Chris.”

Later in the interview, Stern echoed many on the left when he expressed the opinion that Cuomo “would in a landslide” if it were him running against Trump as opposed to Joe Biden. “Is there any regret?” the host asked.

“No there's no regret,” Cuomo said. “I'm doing what I said I would do. And when you are doing that and you've been true to yourself and you are true to the relationships around you, you have no regrets and that's the most important thing.”