NEW YORK — Gov. Andrew Cuomo predicted a "long two months" until the January start of President-elect Joe Biden's term, noting COVID numbers are going up during the lame duck phase of the Trump administration.
"We're coming up to the worst two months, I think, that we may have seen vis-a-vis COVID," Cuomo said on ABC's "This Week." "You see the numbers going crazy all across this country, all across the globe ... and you're seeing it in the fall with the cold coming back and we're going to have a long two months."
Last week, the country's daily number of coronavirus cases reached an all-time high of more than 100,000.
The governor saw a silver lining in Trump's defeat, saying, "you'll see a different tone now."
"You'll even see some governors start to take a different tone now that Mr. Trump is out of office," he said. "I think the political pressure of denying COVID is gone. I think you'll see scientists speak with unmuzzled voice now. And I think the numbers are going to go up and Americans are going to get how serious this is."
Cuomo described last week's election as a repudiation of Trump's divisive style of politics.
"(Trump) did everything he could ... to divide the nation, right? He disunited the states of America," he said. "And Joe Biden is the exact opposite.
"He's about finding commonality, which is an affirmative effort," Cuomo added. "You'll see Joe Biden is going to be all about that affirmative effort to find the commonality, that core that connects. I think that's what it was about."
