Cuomo takes late night

Gov. Andrew Cuomo stayed within his comfort zone Wednesday, accepting the obsequious flattery of radio host Alan Chartock on WAMC and joining his beloved little brother Chris on CNN. 

But the governor also tried something downright presidential on Wednesday night: appearing on late-night TV. Cuomo joined Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show with Trevor Noah” for a 15-minute interview on the state’s response to the coronavirus. The show normally mixes hard news with comedy, but the laughs were few and far between, as Cuomo mainly stuck to his “just the facts, ma’am,” persona in the midst of crisis. Still, the father of three couldn’t let some dad jokes go unsaid, and joked with Noah about the necessity of barbershops being closed. “I want to see a person perform a haircut and maintain social distancing,” Cuomo said. “And I want to see the haircut that they give you after they did it socially distancing!”

Cuomo also talked about his Tuesday meeting with late-night TV’s favorite punching bag, President Donald Trump, saying it was productive despite their differences. “The relationship between myself and the president is, the president doesn’t like me,” Cuomo explained. “If you look at his Twitter account, you’ll see my name quite often. None of it good, Trevor. None of it good.”

And while Cuomo said a month ago that he “took care of the rent issue” with his 90-day eviction moratorium, the New York City resident Noah got him to discuss further plans for New Yorkers who had trouble paying rent during the crisis. “We’re talking about it, Trevor. And we’re thinking about it,” the governor said. “We don’t have a specific plan yet because we don’t know how bad it is.”