So far, New Yorkers appear willing to have Cuomo finish out his term

Seen through the lens of the moment, the extent to which the Democratic governor dove into his own narrative can induce grimaces. For example, there was a running bit about how one of his daughters — later tasked with overseeing a contest to promote mask-wearing in New York — had joined her sisters and father at the executive mansion with her boyfriend. This prompted gags in which Cuomo feigned uncertainty about whether he liked “the boyfriend” (as he was usually termed), generally along the lines of the tedious protective-father shtick.

“Yes, we like the boyfriend,” he told Stephen Colbert in one interview at the peak of his popularity. “Official comment, we like the boyfriend. Personal comment, we like the boyfriend. I learned that lesson the hard way. You have to say you like the boyfriend whatever you feel because they’re still in the rebellion phase. You say you don’t like the boyfriend, they will marry that boyfriend just to spite you. So, yes, I like the boyfriend.”

Despite that sort-of generous assessment, the coronavirus-mountain poster included something called the “boyfriend cliff,” showing a guy dangling by his fingertips. No one knew what this meant, exactly, nor did Cuomo’s office offer much insight. But it seemed to reinforce the ha-ha-careful-around-my-daughters bit that the governor was milking.

In light of the allegations that have recently emerged — that Cuomo harassed female employees, that he improperly touched an employee and that his office fostered a toxic culture that was particularly problematic for young women — those particular jokes have aged quite badly. (That the bit was praised by former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg, who has himself faced questions about his interactions with women, probably wasn’t helpful.) At the time, they were sort of idiosyncratic, but New Yorkers were pleased with how Cuomo was handling the pandemic. Now, the jokes land differently.

But, as it turns out, the political dynamic for Cuomo has remained consistent. A poll from Siena College released Monday indicates that, despite the allegations, New Yorkers still have confidence in the direction of the state and Cuomo’s handling of the pandemic.

The survey has Cuomo’s favorability down 13 points since a Siena poll in February, but still about evenly split, with 43 percent of New Yorkers viewing him favorably and 45 percent viewing him unfavorably. Less than half the state views his job performance with approval, down five points since February, but 60 percent still approve of the job he’s doing handling the pandemic, which remains the driving concern for the state. New Yorkers are 10 points as likely to say that the state is going in the right direction than to say it’s on the wrong track.

Unsurprisingly, Republicans are more critical of Cuomo, but even a quarter of them say that he is doing a good job regarding the pandemic. His favorability overall is higher than former president Donald Trump’s (by 12 points) and the same as Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s. (In part, that’s because Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) is not as well known. Her net favorability rating — those who view her favorably minus those who don’t — is plus-16; Cuomo’s is minus-2.)

Gillibrand was part of calls from New York’s congressional delegation for Cuomo to resign, calls that came after Siena’s latest poll was conducted. According to the survey, though, most New Yorkers disagree. Half of the state thinks he should not resign, and, perhaps more important, 57 percent say they’re satisfied with his response to the allegations (namely, that he apologized and supported an investigation). Even a third of Republicans say they are satisfied with that response. New Yorkers are more likely to say that Cuomo can still do his job despite the allegations than they are to say that he can’t.

Cuomo isn’t emerging from this unscathed, of course. His favorability rating has dropped, although it’s still higher than it was in February 2020, before the pandemic response became a crisis. Should he have been thinking about running for a fourth term in office, though, some bad news: More than half of New Yorkers told Siena that they’d prefer someone else be elected governor in 2022.

Some part of both Cuomo’s often-odd response to the pandemic and the allegations that have since emerged stem from the same impulse: Cuomo, in part thanks to being a Cuomo, did things his own way — often, it seems, from a starting position that those things were good because he was doing them. His coronavirus briefings were praised in part because they were unusual, involving a casualness that endeared him to New Yorkers.

That sense lingers. Siena College asked about various parts of Cuomo’s response to the pandemic. He got no higher marks than on the effectiveness of his communications about the pandemic, something that, even now, nearly 40 percent of Republicans view as either “excellent” or “good.”