BUFFALO, N.Y. — It only took the governor about five seconds to utter those words, but the backlash from them has continued for days.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo, D-NY, again explained his comment that America "was never that great" during a Friday conference call.

"The expression I used the other day was inartful so I want to be very clear, of course America is great and of course America has always been great," he said.

But President Donald Trump continued to attack Cuomo for his riff on the MAGA campaign slogan. He tweeted about it a handful of times just Friday alone.

"All I know is Donald Trump tweets at everybody and it's not anything that's unusual but the fact that he wants to take on our governor, our governor's up for that fight," Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul said.

When asked whether Trump's tweets could potentially hurt Cuomo's reelection bid for governor, or perhaps go the other way and legitimize him as a Democratic potential candidate in 2020, Hochul chose to pass.

However, she said the administration has been challenging Trump since he took office on issues like tax and health care reform.

"Fighting with Donald Trump is not new for us and the Twitter wars, I'm going to guess, will continue regardless of whether it's related to any particular year or any particular election," she said.

Hochul continued to defend the governor, arguing as Cuomo has, that Trump's policies are not making America great again.

"Here in the state of New York were going to continue pushing to make sure that all people feel that they are part of a recovery that has left some behind, people that feel marginalized by policies out of Washington," she said.

Hochul said the administration wants to make New York and the country greater by becoming more inclusive, transforming communities, addressing poverty and education.