Thread: NY Gov. Hochul says she is considering special legislative session on migrants

NY Gov. Hochul says she is considering special legislative session on migrants


Tim Balk, New York Daily News
Thu, September 7, 2023 at 5:01 PM EDT·5 min read



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Darren McGee/New York Daily News/TNS


NEW YORK — Gov. Kathy Hochul said Thursday that she is “entertaining” the possibility of calling lawmakers back to Albany for a special session to address New York City’s migrant crisis.

“I’m entertaining all of my options right now — we’re working closely with [Mayor Eric Adams] to resolve this,” Hochul, a Democrat, said at a news conference in Albany.

Hochul has previously called the Legislature back from vacation to address gun safety and abortion protections. But her remarks Thursday, with the next session months away, marked her strongest public suggestion she might convene an extraordinary session on migrants.

For weeks, the governor has been under pressure from Adams, a Democrat, to unlock more resources for the city, which has been strained by the arrival of more than 100,000 asylum seekers since spring 2022.

And last week, Republican state lawmakers issued a letter calling for a special session on the migrant surge.

Senate Minority Leader Rob Ortt, a Lockport Republican, said in a statement Thursday that Hochul “should be doing more than entertaining the idea of a special session – as we have urged, she should call the Legislature back.”

It is unclear what issues might animate a special session. Some of the Republicans’ migrant demands, including a declaration that New York is not a sanctuary state, might be nonstarters in the left-leaning state Legislature. Hochul on Thursday rejected the demand.

And upstate and suburban lawmakers of both parties may be wary of some of the mayor’s aims, which include forcing more areas of the state to welcome migrants, and securing more taxpayer money from the state government, which has already pledged about $1.5 billion to help the city with the surge.

Adams has not explicitly called for a special session. Last week, he said, “the governor and our leaders up there will determine how to get the resources to us — the governor has been a partner.”

On Thursday, an ally of the mayor, Assemblywoman Jenifer Rajkumar, introduced bills that would ban upstate and suburban municipalities from refusing to welcome asylum seekers and establish a statewide migrant coordinator.

“It is time for New York State to lead a Statewide response as New York City faces one of the greatest humanitarian crises in its history,” Rajukmar, a Queens Democrat, said in a statement.

The city has projected the challenge could cost the city $12 billion by 2025. Adams said Wednesday that the “issue will destroy New York City.”

In their letter last week, Republicans in the state Legislature called for a session addressing a laundry list of requests, including steps to limit the locations where migrants can be sheltered and to ensure an audit of spending on humanitarian aid.

“With the lack of appropriate action coming from Washington, D.C. and little reason to believe immediate help is on the way, the duly elected representatives of New York have a responsibility to take matters into their own hand,” said the letter.

Assemblyman Will Barclay, an Oswego Republican and the minority leader, acknowledged in an interview last week that a special session could go in a different direction than his party hopes, but said Democrats seem divided on the issue.

“A lot of my colleagues on their side of the aisle are trying to have it both ways: They support a sanctuary state, they support a sanctuary city, they supported more money in the budget,” he said. “But now when there’s a pushback from their constituencies, some are having a change of heart.”

Hochul and Adams have blamed the White House for the crisis, and have urged faster federal work permitting for asylum seekers who have flooded into a network of about 200 shelters that the city has built over the last year to accommodate them.

Hochul said Thursday that expedited work permits could allow migrants to legally begin to fill some 5,000 farm jobs upstate.

The mayor and the governor — whose administrations have engaged in several rounds of sniping and recriminations in a Manhattan court proceeding centered on government responsibilities to the arrivals — also appear keenly aware of the potential peril the situation poses for their party going into the 2024 elections.

With the public souring on Democrats’ handling of the migrant crisis, Republicans have begun to seize on the issue.

“I don’t define our challenges as political or not political; we have to do what’s right,” the governor insisted Thursday. “These are individuals who came here legally, seeking asylum.”

She described the migrant crisis as a “challenge for all of us,” though she has not acceded to Adams’ calls for an executive order overruling county-level orders meant to block city-financed transfers of migrants upstate.

This spring, the city embarked upon a controversial, trouble-plagued program intended to bus migrants outside of the city.

The program has been hampered by a wave of litigation and local orders stopping the buses. But the city has continued to send migrants to Democratic-led cities like Albany. About 2,000 migrants are currently living upstate through the program, according to Adams’ office.

Hochul has critiqued some of the transfers, and her office has suggested state officials are focused on moving the migrants to places where they would be welcome and could thrive. But it seems certain that forced transfers could also pose political headaches for the governor and damage Democrats going into 2024.
Hochul said Thursday that she was encouraging GOP Congress members from New York to push House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican, to call a session to reform the nation’s immigration laws and give more money to New York.

“They don’t come to this with clean hands,” Hochul said of House Republicans who have hammered Democrats on the issue. “They should get back to session and do their jobs as well.”



https://www.yahoo.com/news/ny-gov-ho...210100058.html

They do not qualify for asylum.

NYC and sanctuary cities rang the dinner bell of free stuff for these feral overbreeding animals.

They have texted each other down the pipeline to South America and around the world. There is a never-ending stream of these locusts on the way here!

Close the damn border down and ramp up deportations of them with their offspring and UACs.


21,000 illegal alien kids in NYC schools @ $38,000 per illegal per year = $798,000,000



That is just NYC. Does not include the entire states costs.




That is just school. Now add in billions for healthcare, housing, food, anchor babies, welfare, and food stamps. Costs for crime, rape, diseases, garbage, theft, court, assaults, destruction of property, murder, rape, security, law enforcement, lawyers, lawsuits. These politicians have lost their damn minds!

They are destroying our country and bankrupting us!