During President Donald Trump's news conference yesterday night, he told reporters that his authority to reopen the states amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic is "total".
"When somebody's the president of the United States, the authority is total," he asserted. "And that's the way it's gotta be."
Re-watch the moment below:However, in an interview on Today Show this morning, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo refuted the idea that Trump has "total" power when it comes to reopening states.
"I don't know what the president is talking about, frankly," he said per NBC New York. "You have to remember it's the states that created the federal government, right? It's the colonies that created the federal government, not the other way around. We don't have a king, we have a president."
New York's three-term governor assured the hosts that allowing public places, schools and businesses to run as normal would have a detrimental effect on the rate of infections.
"The president's just wrong on that point," Cuomo added. "If he pushed it to that absurd point, then we would have a problem."
During a different interview on MSNBC's Morning Joe, he said there was no "value" for governors in watching the president's news conferences.
"A governor should not watch that. There's no value in it. It is infuriating and offensive and frankly ignorant of the facts," he said. "It's frightening. It is frightening. This is the last place we should be."
Furthermore, in an interview on CNN, Cuomo insisted he would use his authority to go against a presidential order if push came to shove.
"If he ordered me to reopen in a way that would endanger the public health of the people of my state, I wouldn't do it," Cuomo said.
Trump has since taken to Twitter to slam Cuomo's response to his comments during last night's conference.
New York remains the epicenter of the USA's COVID-19 crisis, with 7,349 deaths as a result of the pandemic.
