Photo: Getty
Everyone's wondering what's up with this New York governor.
By Nicole Pomarico — Written on Mar 31, 2020
With the horrific coronavirus outbreak that has overtaken New York, governor Andrew Cuomo has been getting a lot of screen time with his regular press conferences. And after seeing him so frequently, people are starting to ask a very specific question:
Does Andrew Cuomo have pierced nipples?
It all started with a particularly suspicious sighting of Cuomo where his shirt appeared to be hiding nipple rings ... and it all spiraled from there. Now, people want answers because even during a worldwide pandemic, we all need a break from the serious, scary stuff to focus on something a bit lighter.
Of course, Cuomo himself has yet to reveal what's really going on under his shirt, but here's everything we know about the situation anyway.
It all started with this tweet.
MSNBC producer Kyle Griffin shared a link to a Washington Post article on Twitter that happened to include a photo of Cuomo in a white polo shirt. It was easy to see that, through the shirt, it's possible Cuomo has a piercing going on — whether it's just an optical illusion or not, it didn't look like what we'd normally expect boring, unpierced nipples to look like under a man's shirt, so immediately, people became interested.
All kinds of people are now also tweeting, wondering about a possible piercing.
Seeing that photo set people off, and they took to Twitter to share their thoughts.
"I didn't expect Cuomo to be the nipple piercing type," one user tweeted, while another wrote, "Can I get an honest, sincere answer about what is going on with Andrew Cuomo's nipples?"
Fans on Reddit are debating the status of Cuomo's nipples, too.
The debate took off on Reddit, where photos from that day were posted and people began investigating. One linked to a Flickr album of photos of Cuomo in the white polo shirt, and it appeared that his possible piercing existed in all of them, so it wasn't just that one photo and angle that made it seem that his nipple was pierced.
Another hypothesized that it could be tape to prevent chafing on his nipples, writing, "Looks like he has an 'X' across each nipple. Maybe instead of a square or circular piece of tape on the nipple, he chooses two thin strands and makes an 'X' on each nipple? To...uh...prevent chafing, I guess? No explanation really makes sense here. Very weird, but probably a super simple, stupid explanation to it."
This piercing could possibly be a new addition.
These photos of Cuomo seem to be the first where a piercing seems to be visible, so if Cuomo does have one, it looks like he got it done pretty recently, which certainly begs a whole new line of questioning. Why would he get it? Was he preparing for summer and beach season? So many questions, and so far, zero answers...
No shirtless photos of Cuomo seem to exist.
Seeing a picture of Cuomo shirtless would certainly bring about a swift end to this particular debate but unfortunately, no such photos seem to exist. His Instagram is very professional, and even in photos with his family on the beach, he's fully dressed. Unfortunately, this isn't surprising, given that Cuomo is the governor of New York, so surely he wouldn't be openly sharing his new piercing with the world, even if he did have one.
Does Cuomo have pierced nipples? The jury's out on that one.
At this point, there's no clear answer to this question. It looks like we'll just have to wait and keep an eye out for Cuomo's future appearances to find out if the piercing theory is real or if it just happened to be a trick of the eye. But hey, at least it gives us something to do when we're stuck in side now that much of the country is under stay at home orders, right?
Nicole Pomarico is an entertainment and lifestyle writer whose work has appeared in Cosmo, Us Weekly, Refinery29, and more.