This week’s fake news award goes to none other than the Democratic Governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, and his attempt to condemn the Jewish community for not obeying social distancing mandates. In a news conference, Cuomo presented pictures to justify him shutting down religious institutions for safety concerns. The only problem, the pictures are over a decade old.

The brazen act of religious defiance took place during a news conference on Monday. Cuomo threatened the Jewish community that he would shut down synagogues if they didn’t start complying with the coronavirus mandates set by himself and colleagues. Not being one to come empty-handed, Cuomo happened to present evidence that the Jewish community was disobeying his rules.

Releasing the images featured below, Cuomo said, “We know religious institutions have been a problem. We know mass gatherings are the super-spreader events. We know there have been mass gatherings going on in concert with religious institutions in these communities for weeks. For weeks. I don’t mean little violations. I’m talking, you’re only supposed to have fifty outdoors … they had one thousand. These are pictures from the past couple of weeks,” he said. “And these are just emblematic. You’ve all seen pictures like this for weeks. What did you think was going to happen?”

#BREAKING: Cuomo threatens to close religious institutions that do not follow guidelines: "If you do not agree to enforce the rules, then we'll close the institutions down. I am prepared to do that." pic.twitter.com/nEb2kxRl96

— The Hill (@thehill) October 5, 2020

While the governor’s presentation was almost flawless, the pictures were called into question when reporters noticed striking similarities between the two. The picture on the left was not taken within the last few weeks like Cuomo wants people to believe, it was actually taken in 2006. The image description even reads, “Mourners pack the congregation Yetev Lev D’Satmar in the village of Kiryas Joel, N.Y., 45 miles northwest of New York City, after the casket containing the body of Rabbi Moses Teitelbaum arrived, Tuesday, April 25, 2006.”

Surprisingly, Cuomo almost caught his own fake news when he asked a staffer about the year the pictures were taken. The staffer, confused, merely tells the governor, “Well, the one on the right is more recent than the one on the left.”

Still, this isn’t the first time Cuomo has tried to attack religious institutions. At the height of the COVID hysteria, Cuomo and New York Mayor Bill De Blasio tried to limit religious gatherings while supporting mass protests. Luckily, a federal judge ruled against the pair and restored religious freedom to New York citizens.

This piece was written by Jeremy Porter on October 6, 2020. It originally appeared in DrewBerquist.com and is used by permission.

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