Trump touts New York’s COVID-19 aid, says Cuomo could have ‘saved lives’

Former President Donald Trump said Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s nursing home scandal is “surprising” — given all the help his administration offered during the pandemic — assistance that “would’ve saved a lot of lives.”

Speaking to Newsmax Wednesday evening, the 45th commander-in-chief recounted how he worked to help the embattled governor as the Empire State became a COVID-19 epicenter.

“We gave him the Javits Center, we gave him the ship, the great hospital ship and essentially they weren’t used. Spent a lot of money and they weren’t used and they should’ve been used,” Trump said.

“He could’ve had the patients go there. It would’ve saved a lot of lives, it’s too bad.”

Asked about the political fallout, the former president said it was unusual to see Democrats go after one of their own — before taking a dig at members of his own party.

“I’m a little surprised because usually the Democrats don’t do it but a lot of people don’t like him. I got along with him, you know we actually got along sort of okay,” he noted. “He’s being hit hard, and he’s being hit hard by his own people. Those are the people that are really hitting him. It’s pretty amazing.”

He berated the GOP for not going after the left more.

“The Republicans are soft, they only hit their own. Like [Senate Minority Leader] Mitch [McConnell]. They hit their own, they don’t hit. If he spent the same time hitting [Senate Majority Leader Chuck] Schumer and [President] Biden, the Republicans would be much better off, that I can tell you. But no,” Trump said.

Cuomo is facing a legal and political reckoning over his administration’s alleged withholding of data related to the state’s nursing home death toll from COVID-19.

State Attorney General Letitia James released a damning report late last month saying the state likely undercounted the nursing home COVID-19 death toll by more than 50 percent.

After that, the state’s embattled health commissioner confirmed that the total number of resident fatalities were just under what the AG had predicted.

Earlier this month, The Post exclusively reported that top Cuomo aide Melissa DeRosa privately apologized to Democratic lawmakers, telling them “we froze” out of fear that the true numbers would “be used against us” by federal prosecutors.

Now, the FBI and the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York have opened a probe into the matter.

The bombshell admission by DeRosa led to calls for an investigation from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi said in response to news of the federal probe, “As we publicly said, DOJ has been looking into this for months. We have been cooperating with them and we will continue to.”