Gov. Katie Hochul took center stage on Tuesday night, finally facing her Democratic rivals in a debate that was largely as expected.
Her rivals, Thomas R. Suotzi of Long Island and New York Public Defender Jumaan D. Williams, attacked the governor at every opportunity, but failed to create an instant memorable moment that could shake the race.
Mr Williams, the party’s left-wing flag bearer, waved his populist message as he introduced himself as a candidate who felt the pain of New Yorkers, sometimes trying to connect Ms Hochul with her predecessor, Andrew M. Cuomo.
Mr Suotzi, a vocal centrist, reminded viewers of his many years of experience in local government and repeatedly sought to accuse Ms Hochul of failing to tackle crime, which he said was the most worrying issue for New Yorkers.
And Ms. Hochul sought to project the calmness of a leader: cold-blooded under fire and already working to address many pressing issues of the state.
Ms. Hochul, who holds a leading position in public opinion polls and fundraising, did not try to win points from her opponents, most notably trying to leave the arena unscathed. It has been largely successful in bearing the expected blows to its previous support for gun rights and the management of the Buffalo Bills Stadium deal, but has remained under intense fire from the left and right.
The moderators interviewed candidates on a wide range of topics, from congestion pricing and passive marijuana smoking to whether they believe in ghosts (in a rare moment of consensus, everyone guaranteed some form of life after death).
Here are some conclusions from the evening debate:
Applicants test their messages on public safety
Ms Hochul entered the debate, ready for her opponents to attack her for crime, and the preparations paid off. She rocked projects ranging from an intergovernmental arms working group to violent violence programs to 10 weapons bills she signed earlier in the week that demonstrated the power. And she claimed responsibility for changes to state bail laws, which she insisted on, detailing how the changes would give judges discretion to assess a defendant’s danger using a specific set of criteria.
“I think what we have given to the judges is better than this vague term, which can be subjective and used many times against the individual because of the color of his skin,” Ms Hochul said.
Her response helped blur the line of attack from Mr Suotzi, who put crime at the heart of his platform. He still insisted that the governor had done “nothing to correct the reform of the guarantee”. He later stressed the need for a comprehensive mental health plan and said police and social workers must be able to remove the mentally ill from the streets in order to receive humane care and treatment.
Mr Williams agreed that there was a need for mental health support, but said the police should not respond to mental health crises. In a personal moment, he described being nearly taken off the train because of Tourette’s syndrome, saying his experience would put him in the best position to deal with public safety and mental illness with humanity.
“These things are not theoretical to me,” he said. “It’s not just things I read about in the newspaper or see on TV. These are things I’ve been doing, my family has been doing, my constituents have been doing. “
Check out the deal with Buffalo Bills Stadium
There was a glaring topic that Mr. Swatzi and Mr. Williams raised repeatedly during the debate: the deal that Ms. Hochul struck with Buffalo Bills in late March to subsidize the construction of a new NFL stadium using $ 850 million dollars in state and local funds.
Ms. Hochul’s rivals sought to describe the deal – which some recent polls say may be unpopular with voters – as a waste of taxpayers’ money at a time when the state has other urgent needs.
The deal created a digestible topic of conversation that Ms. Hochul’s enemies used to criticize her – not only because of its high cost, but also because of the secretive nature of the negotiations that led to the deal.
Mr Swatzi relentlessly turned his tide against Buffalo’s bills, forcibly inserting the subject even when asked about abortion rights or the prospect of a casino in Manhattan.
“When it came to Buffalo Bills, she did something no one thought could be done,” Mr Suozzi said. “It was the most lucrative deal in NFL history.”
Mr Williams accused Ms Hochul of giving priority to wealthy Biffalo Bills owners over investing in programs to prevent violence or reduce inequality, saying “people suffer” in Buffalo.
Ms. Hochul has repeatedly defended the deal, which aimed to ensure that the football team will not give up the state. She cited the construction jobs she would create, saying it was “the best we can do for New York’s taxpayers.”
“Every part of the state has regional priorities,” she said. “Buffalo accounts are the identity of western New York, just as Broadway is New York. That’s part of who they are. I made sure they would stay there for the next 30 years. “
Hochul’s ten-year courtship of the National Revenue Agency
In 2012, Ms. Hochul won the support of the National Rifle Association, an approval she was once very proud of, but has since begun to regret.
Yet neither the moderators nor her opponents managed to get Ms. Hochul to extrapolate beyond the position she had taken in the past – namely, that it was in the past and that it had previously been a very conservative House neighborhood in western New York. .
– Where is the principle in this? Mr Suozzi spoke of Mrs Hochul’s reference to political necessity. “I do not understand this.”
“We are 10 years behind because the people in Congress were carrying out the NRA’s orders,” Mr Williams said.
Ms. Hochul says she has evolved and hopes voters will judge her for her recent actions – such as the gun safety legislation she signed into law – instead of past ones.
But if voters want to impose a test on the purity of weapons, Mr Suotsi has suggested that Ms Hochul will fail.
“All three of us here support the adopted legislation on weapons. It’s great. It’s wonderful. It’s fantastic, “Mr Suotsi said at one point. “Only one of us standing here has ever been approved by the NRA.”
Hochul remained uncommitted on several issues
Since taking office, Ms Hochul has been able to avoid positions on some of Albany’s most divisive political issues, whether to avoid creating a political vortex, alienating voters or cutting off talks with legislative leaders.
She continued to lift that needle on Tuesday night, remaining non-committal on a number of topics in life.
She said she was still considering signing a recently passed bill that would impose a two-year moratorium on cryptocurrency mining in fossil fuel plants, insisting that donations and support from the cryptocurrency industry would not affect her decision.
Asked if the state should compensate families whose loved ones died in nursing homes during the pandemic, Ms Hochul said it was something she was investigating, but that she would gather a blue-ribbon commission to investigate the pandemic’s response. in nursing homes. (Mr Suotzi did not answer the question directly, while Mr Williams said he supported compensation.)
In other cases, it has relied on a philosophy of governance that it has emphasized before: its desire to enable and respect the autonomy of local authorities.
She said, for example, that she respected New York’s decision to allow people with green cards to vote in local elections, but would leave any expansion. Mr Suotsi said the vote should be reserved for citizens, while Mr Williams said non-citizens should be “civic engaged”.
Asked if a casino in Manhattan should be built, Ms. Hochul, a Buffalo native, said she would not put her “finger on the scales” and would be “open” to various locations for a new casino in the lower state. have not previously been allowed.
Mr Williams, who is from Brooklyn, said he was not sure Manhattan would be the best place for a casino, while Mr Suozzi said he was not against it, but stressed the need for public hearings on such a decision. .
Measuring the damage caused by the arrest of Brian Benjamin
When Ms. Hochul’s former vice governor, Brian A. Benjamin, was arrested on charges of federal bribery and fraud in April, many political analysts predicted that his arrest could change and jeopardize the governor’s campaign and its convenient lead in public opinion polls. .
Last year, Ms. Hochul had elected Mr. Benjamin, a former U.S. senator from Harlem, as her vice governor and vice president. But Mr. Benjamin’s improper screening process was ignored by her team and she failed to uncover ethical red flags, which eventually led to his arrest.
However, Ms Hochul continued: she recently appointed Antonio Delgado, a former congressman from the Hudson Valley, as her new vice-governor and successfully removed Mr Benjamin’s name from the ballot.
On Tuesday night, Mr Benjamin’s name and the corruption scandal that led to his death were almost unrecorded, even if Mr Suotsi sporadically tried to link his arrest to what he described as Ms Hochul’s failure to completely clean up corruption in Albany.
Ms Hochul described Mr Benjamin’s arrest and subsequent resignation as a disappointment.
“I promised voters in New York and the people of the state that I would do my best to restore their faith in the government,” she said. “It was a failure.”
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