Vivian Wang and Jesse McKinley

In total, six gun bills passed easily through the state Senate and Assembly, a remarkable sight in a Capitol that for years had resisted any new legislation on the subject.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, last ushered a major gun safety package into law in 2013, after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. The governor successfully corralled recalcitrant Senate Republicans into supporting the so-called Safe Act that expanded the state’s ban on assault weapons, tightened certification requirements, increased criminal penalties for illegal guns and closed private sale loopholes.

Cuomo has described the Safe Act as one of his signature achievements. But it has also become a rallying cry for some gun-owners and Republican politicians who felt it overreached.

“Sometimes history irrefutably bears out your actions,” the governor said Tuesday, at a news conference lined with gun safety advocates. “Today is the next evolution in this ongoing crusade.”

The relative ease of the laws’ passage highlighted, for the second time in just two days, the upheaval that November’s election brought to Albany. Democrats captured the Senate for the first time in a decade, delivering one-party control of state government. Since the legislative session began this month, both chambers have sent long-stymied bills in rapid-fire procession to the governor’s desk.

On Monday, for example, a bill to protect child sex abuse victims sailed through the Legislature, 13 years after its introduction. The Senate, which under Republican rule never allowed the bill to reach the floor for a vote, unanimously approved it.

Tuesday’s marquee gun bills passed largely along partisan lines. No Republican senators voted to extend the waiting period for completing background checks to 30 days from three. Just one voted for the proposal to ban arming teachers.

The most debated item was a so-called red flag bill, which would allow family members, school officials or law enforcement to ask courts to temporarily block someone from buying or owning a gun, if the judge decided that person posed a potential risk.

That provision in particular drew an emotional response from Linda Beigel Schulman, whose son, Scott, grew up on Long Island and was teaching at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida during the massacre there last year; he was killed while helping students flee the shooter.

“Parkland would’ve never happened if they had a red flag law,” Schulman said while sitting alongside Cuomo, adding that one of the killer’s former teachers told her that the shooter had showed disturbing tendencies.

Sen. Brian Kavanagh, a Democrat from New York City who sponsored the bill, said the number of New York state residents who die each year — 772 in 2017, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — because of guns “is unacceptable.” He added: “It’s also preventable.”

California, Washington, Indiana and Connecticut have similar provisions to keep guns away from high-risk people.

Republicans suggested the bill would allow people to randomly curtail Second Amendment rights for many New Yorkers.

“Today’s actions infringe upon the rights of law-abiding citizens,” said Sen. Pamela Helming, from Central New York.

The bill ultimately passed the Senate 42-21, and the Assembly 83-32.

A few proposals did earn Republican votes: those that would establish a gun buyback program, and that would prohibit the sale of bump stocks, which enable semi-automatic rifles to fire in sustained, rapid bursts. A bill allowing New York regulators to access mental health records for out-of-state gun buyers passed nearly unanimously.

The governor acknowledged that strengthening New York’s gun laws could invite legal challenges from gun-advocacy groups and activists, given the conservative tilt of the Supreme Court. The high court’s justices recently announced that they would review a New York City gun law, its first Second Amendment case in nearly a decade.

Several Republicans accused Democrats of grandstanding by pushing laws that already exist; for example, President Donald Trump imposed a federal ban on bump stocks last year after the mass murder of 58 people in Las Vegas. (The ban is regulatory, however, not statutory, and several groups have announced their intention to challenge it in court.)

Cuomo, a frequent and favorite antagonist of the National Rifle Association, has been accused of politicizing gun control for his own benefit. But he also has a long record of fighting for stricter gun regulations, and he has frequently pointed out that his public support, especially upstate, never fully recovered after passage of the Safe Act.

On Tuesday, Democratic leaders in the Legislature also made their antipathy to widespread gun use clear.

“I personally don’t agree with it, but I respect it,” the Assembly speaker, Carl E. Heastie, said of the Second Amendment.

Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the Senate majority leader, promised further action in the coming months. The only other major gun legislation passed since the Safe Act was a law last year to take guns away from domestic abusers.

“It will not be six years, believe me, between sensible gun laws,” she said.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/29/nyregion/gun-laws-new-york.html" id="e436f69f-ff37-3291-a2db-dc6f5369953c">The New York Times</a>.

ALBANY, N.Y. — New York lawmakers on Tuesday approved the most comprehensive set of gun bills in the state in six years, including measures that would ban bump stocks, prohibit teachers from carrying guns in schools and extend the waiting period for gun buyers who do not pass an instant background check.

New York Passes First Major Gun Control Bills Since Sandy Hook

Cuomo, a Democrat, won a third term in November by running on an aggressively progressive platform that promised to make New York a leader among liberal states. And his new agenda, which he unveiled in his ninth State of the State address, seemed crafted with other Democrat-dominated states in mind.

By mandating that energy producers in the state rely completely on carbon-free electricity by 2040, something the governor described as the most aggressive clean power agenda in the country, New York would outpace a similar proposal in California that calls for such action by 2045.

“We know the future,” Cuomo said of his environmental plan. “Let New York lead.”

If the state succeeds in legalizing marijuana within 100 days, it could grab attention and revenue from New Jersey, which is looking to do the same. And if New York enacts the governor’s plan to ban single-use plastic shopping bags, it would be the second in the nation, after California.

Much of Cuomo’s plan would require legislative approval. But unlike in years past, when some of his plans were thwarted by a Republican-led state Senate, the governor is now operating with the first Democratic monopoly in the state Legislature in his eight years in office.

Indeed, even before Cuomo delivered his State of the State speech, the Legislature had in its first three days passed a suite of new voting and election reforms; banned conversion therapy for gay minors; and expanded legal protections for transgender people.

The governor also used the speech as an opportunity to unveil his budget proposal for the new fiscal year, which begins April 1. All told, the governor anticipates the state spending $175 billion next year, with some of the revenue coming from monetary settlements from legal actions.

The largest expenditure would, as always, go to education spending, which would see a $1 billion increase over the current year, to $27.7 billion. Cuomo also proposed new legislation requiring school districts to distribute state aid to their highest-need schools using a method modeled on the state’s formulas for giving aid to high-need districts.

One of the most closely watched parts of the governor’s speech was his plan to legalize recreational marijuana, a proposal that has taken on increased urgency as popular support has crescendoed.

Cuomo offered scant details, but he indicated that New York’s law would likely be more restrictive than in other states that have legalized recreational marijuana.

The drug would be available to adults 21 and older, and subject to local veto, with counties and large cities able to opt out. Cuomo has estimated that legalization would bring in $300 million each year in tax revenue by the time it was fully implemented.

That number, though, would not be available until the fiscal year starting in 2023, according to Cuomo’s budget director, Robert Mujica.

The initial rollout would bring in much less revenue, projections show. Budget documents released Tuesday projected no revenue from marijuana regulation and taxation for the 2020 fiscal year, and $83 million for 2021.

Cuomo also provided little detail about how the state would spend that revenue — a topic that has inspired intense speculation and suggestion, with proposals ranging from subway repairs to criminal justice rehabilitation to tax relief. In budget documents, the governor’s description of possible uses was just as far-flung, including beneficiaries such as small business development, substance abuse treatment and “any other identified purpose recommended” by a new cannabis office.

He also said that the state would seal certain cannabis-related criminal records, though he did not specify which ones. Several legislators and advocacy groups have demanded a social justice component to any legalization bill. Even before Cuomo’s speech had ended, some were pushing for more.

The embrace of marijuana marks a fast evolution in Cuomo’s thinking: Less than two years ago, he called it a “gateway drug.” But the political landscape has been upended since then, both in Albany — where a group of young insurgents helped take back the state Senate for Democrats — and the nation, where the Trump administration continues to act as both a foil and a punching bag for Cuomo.

At the same time, the governor said he wants to raise the statewide minimum age to purchase cigarettes to 21, and to prohibit the sale of tobacco products at pharmacies.

On New York City’s unraveling subway system — the source of much ire against the governor in recent years, at least from city residents — Cuomo proposed establishing clear authority for its oversight, which is divided between the state and city.

The governor has repeatedly denied responsibility for the subway’s deterioration, even though the state largely controls the Metropolitan Transportation Authority board, and Cuomo has, in recent years, shown an unparalleled ability to influence the agency’s decision-making, such as when he recently announced the cancellation of the planned L-train shutdown.

“Everybody can point fingers but nobody has responsibility and nobody has authority,” he said. “That is the fundamental problem with the MTA.” He did not say, however, who exactly would take on that clarified authority.

To fund the system, Cuomo once again proposed a congestion pricing plan, which would charge drivers who enter areas of Manhattan during the busiest times of day. The idea won support last year from powerful labor groups, business interests and activists, but foundered under objections from legislators from outside Manhattan.

The plan would bring in $15 billion, Cuomo’s office said — a figure that would amount to just a fraction of the amount the MTA has said it needs for its next capital plan.

And there is no guarantee that the plan would win more support this year, with many of the legislators last year who opposed it reaffirming their doubts. Even a stopgap measure last year, to add a surcharge to for-hire vehicles in Manhattan, has been held up by opposition from drivers.

The state also plans to push to legalize sports betting at its four casinos, hoping to pump life into several underperforming betting halls that were legalized in 2014. Sports betting would not be allowed at the state’s so-called racinos, such as Aqueduct or Yonkers.

The Green New Deal extends and expands the governor’s earlier mandate to make New York 50 percent carbon-free by 2030, a requirement created by regulatory order rather than state law; the new proposal, if passed by the Legislature, would be more difficult for future administrations to undo.

While the all-Democratic monopoly may make passing bills easier, the governor’s budget proposal comes amid ongoing worries about the larger economy and some troubling signs in New York. The governor’s budget office noted in a summary of the governor’s plan that personal income tax collections had been weaker than expected in recent weeks, something it said could be attributed to volatility in the stock market.

The governor, who has cut taxes on the middle class and corporations in years before, outlined a series of “revenue actions” to help fill the state’s coffers, including several that had previously languished in the Republican-led Senate. They included a long-suffering idea to require so-called “marketplace providers” like Amazon to collect sales tax. There was also a proposal to close the carried interest loophole, which allows hedge fund managers and real estate investors to pay a lower tax rate on their investment income rather than the higher rate on ordinary income.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/15/nyregion/cuomo-state-address.html" id="f9c391ef-5f63-3403-ac26-778d574dc213">The New York Times</a>.

ALBANY, N.Y. — With a Democrat-controlled state Legislature and the bold promises of an election year behind him, Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Tuesday laid out a sweeping progressive agenda for the coming year, including legalizing marijuana, establishing a congestion pricing program in New York City and embracing a popular environmental and economic platform known as the Green New Deal.

With Legalized Marijuana and a 'Green New Deal,' Cuomo's 2019 Vision Tacks Left

Several were swept in amid a blue wave that saw incumbents — Democrats and Republicans alike — unseated in the primaries or the general election, giving Democrats control of the Senate for the first time in a decade.

But before the new senators can get down to the people’s business, there are some logistical hurdles to overcome. They must learn how to navigate, both literally and metaphorically, the corridors of a state Capitol fabled for its traditions, secrets and, often, impenetrability.

Figuring out legislative house rules? Slow down. Let’s start with figuring out where to park.

The New York Times followed four of the new senators on Tuesday and Wednesday — the first day of the legislative session — to see how they were adjusting to a state lawmaker’s life.

Tuesday

The walls in Sen. Zellnor Myrie’s office were bare, which made the furniture all the more prominent. There was a stately chair and a sprawling desk, behind which Myrie still had not ventured.

“I’ve never had an office like this before,” he said as he perched atop an empty shelf. “I certainly have never sat in a chair like that.”

Myrie, a Democrat who represents parts of Brooklyn, was touring his office for the first time, after a morning meeting with various county election officials — he will chair the Senate’s elections committee — and an interview with a job candidate for his staff.

Before winning his general election in November, Myrie said, he had been to Albany five or six times. He found the Capitol’s layout overwhelming.

“I go downstairs, and I just ask the first person that I see in the lobby, ‘Where can I get a coffee or a munch?'” he said. “To the extent I have a favorite place to eat, it’s the little corner where the vending machines are.”

Myrie, 31, is one of a cohort of young new senators. Sen. Julia Salazar of Brooklyn is 27; Sen. James Skoufis of the Hudson Valley is 31. Walking the halls, Myrie said he was acutely aware of his youth.

“It’s going to take awhile for people to adjust and say I’m the senator,” he said. “It’s cool. It’s a new energy. I get the sense that people are reinvigorated.”

The start of session Wednesday was giving him jitters, so he planned to pump himself up by listening to “Sunflower,” from the soundtrack of the latest “Spider-Man” movie. (“Don’t laugh,” he said.)

Myrie had not really considered office décor, but at least one piece was settled: the nameplate outside his door.

His mother was traveling to Albany for his swearing-in Wednesday.

“She’s going to get a kick out of seeing her son’s name on the wall.”

3 p.m.

Sen. Rachel May had trouble finding parking.

May, a Democrat who represents the Syracuse area, was a few minutes late to her first tour of her office because she could not get into the parking garage for lawmakers near the Capitol.

“Somehow the magic words ‘incoming senator’ didn’t quite work,” she said with a laugh.

May, who coordinated sustainability education at Syracuse University before running for office, at times seemed almost surprised to realize the influence she could wield in state policy. She had hoped to take the train to Albany most weeks, she said, because it was a low-carbon alternative to driving, but only a few trains ran each day from Syracuse.

Then she perked up as she remembered that she could talk to her fellow legislators about improving infrastructure upstate.

May’s sister, a Hollywood costume designer, had sent boxes of clothing to May that matched her vision of how politicians dressed. “She wants me to look like ‘Veep’ or something, but it’s not my style at all,” May said. “No power heels.”

4 p.m.

Sen. Anna Kaplan was still unwrapping presents as the sun went down. Kaplan, a Democrat, was elected to represent Nassau County, where she had sat on the town council in North Hempstead.

They were sad to see her go, she said, and they sent her to Albany with a bevy of gifts, including one representing her penchant for high heels: a tape dispenser in the shape of a stiletto. She also received a glass nameplate reading, “Anna M. Kaplan, New York State Senate.”

Kaplan’s rise to senator caps a personal saga, which includes fleeing her native Iran as a Jewish teenager during a repressive time. Considering that back story, and her surprising win in November, Kaplan was emotional Tuesday.

“I think back to that 13-year-old girl, who came here on a very cold night, without my parents and with 40 other kids,” she said, pausing to gather herself. “And now I’m elected to the New York state Senate. I’m one of 63. Really? How amazing.”

Kaplan said that she said a prayer when she entered her office Tuesday and promptly filled shelves with photographs of her husband and two college-age daughters, one of whom is set to graduate from nearby Union College in Schenectady.

Like other newly empowered Democrats, Kaplan has an ambitious agenda that includes gun control and more funding for public schools. But on Tuesday, at least, Kaplan was giving herself a moment or two to reminisce.

“I look around at all of these pictures,” she said, “and really see how far I’ve come.”

5 p.m.

The Capitol is full of historical treasures, from the imposing grandeur of its architecture to artifacts stashed, half in shadow, in the corners of the legislative galleries.

May and her husband, as well as her brother and sister-in-law, took advantage of the mostly empty Capitol to play tourist, admiring an old desk near the entrance to the Senate chambers — “doesn’t look very comfortable” — and strolling the steps of the so-called Million Dollar Staircase, the reddish-gold opulence of which can inspire even seasoned legislators to stop in awe.

“I thought we were downsizing,” May joked to her husband.

Wednesday

11 a.m.

Myrie stood outside the Senate chamber, waiting for his turn to be sworn in by Chief Judge Janet DiFiore. His father stood facing him, and his mother was seated on a couch to his left.

Afterward, Myrie said he had succeeded in avoiding choking up — barely.

“I was trying to sound confident in my swearing-in,” he said. “I had to clear my throat a couple of times.”

A big cheer had gone up when Myrie was sworn in, and then he and his friends and family crowded the dais for a photo. As Sen. Brian Benjamin of Manhattan watched the proceedings, he mused, “Zellnor brought the whole borough of Brooklyn.”

Noon

Bob Antonacci, a Republican, knew he was heading to Albany at a rough time for his party. After decades of almost uninterrupted rule of the Senate, the Republicans got clobbered in November, losing their majority, their committee chairmanships and the bigger suites of offices in the Capitol.

Not that Antonacci, who represents the Syracuse area, plans on spending too much time in the building.

“I’m not a creature of Albany. I want to come here, do my job and go back,” he said, adding: “I don’t see myself being a swamp thing.”

On Wednesday, however, Antonacci, 54, was surrounded by his wife, Michele, and their two children, and seemed to be enjoying the bustle of opening day. He was amiably chatting with well-wishers and colleagues on both sides of the aisle.

As for his hopes for the GOP, Antonacci said, “We can rebuild. We can rebrand.” But he conceded that sitting in the minority is not optimal. And while he said he does not care about perks — “Give me the broom closet,” he said. “It is what it is.” — he still thought that coming to Albany was the right move.

“You have got to go where the policy is made,” he said.

After the session ended, dozens of people crowded the office of new Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins for a reception and a chance to schmooze with senators. Kaplan, who with her family was led by an aide from the Senate chamber to the reception, looked shocked at the line winding against a wall.

“You don’t have to wait in line,” the aide told her.

“Oh, I like that!” Kaplan said.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/11/nyregion/albany-senate-democrats-.html" id="c073d978-ad4a-3119-ac4e-932f00567118">The New York Times</a>.

ALBANY, N.Y. — If the 2019 legislative session seemed to begin with a breath of fresh air, it may be because of the newcomers: The New York state Senate this week welcomed 17 new members, all but two of them Democrats.

They Won Senate Seats. Now Comes the Hard Part: Adjusting to Albany.

“There are no more excuses, my friends,” the governor said last week, as he declared his agenda for the coming year. “Do what you’ve said you were going to do all those years, and make a Democratic vision a reality.”

Within days, questions about the governor’s intentions had emerged. They came from the Assembly and the state Senate, from new lawmakers and veterans. They accused the governor of dishonesty, stinginess, even betrayal.

The backbiting was not altogether unexpected — this is Albany, after all. But what was unexpected was the source of the dissent: Cuomo’s fellow Democrats.

There was the cohort of six newly elected senators, five from New York City, who took issue with Cuomo’s calling a legal fight over equitable school funding a “distraction.” One of the six, Robert Jackson, who won a seat in Manhattan, called Cuomo’s remarks “fiction”; another, John Liu, who won a seat in Queens, compared the governor to Ebenezer Scrooge.

Even Assembly Speaker Carl E. Heastie recently made clear his displeasure with Cuomo over the governor’s desire to limit legislators’ outside income.

“God knows the governor has had issues in his office,” Heastie said in a radio interview, probably in reference to recent corruption trials connected to Cuomo’s administration. “Yet only the Legislature was told, ‘You have to reform the way you do business.’ ”

It was a striking comment from Heastie, who has typically been cautious when it comes to criticizing Cuomo.

Together with the senators’ statements, it suggested a subtle but potentially momentous shift in the power dynamics of Albany: Newly empowered by resounding Democratic majorities in both chambers and watched closely by an expectant electorate, legislators may be emboldened to push back against the governor.

In other words, the strength of Democratic victories in November has raised the paradoxical possibility of more headaches for the state’s Democratic governor than he endured from Republicans.

“I think that as a new senator, I’m less concerned about managing expectations,” said Julia Salazar, one of the six victorious insurgents who also panned the governor’s education remarks. “And a little bit, given my position on the political spectrum, I’m less concerned about my direct relationship with Gov. Cuomo.”

Cuomo’s office pushes back on any assertion that it has shortchanged education, noting that it has increased 36 percent since 2012, including a $1 billion increase this year, to a record high: $26.7 billion. And there is no doubt that during his two terms in office, the governor has forged a reputation as a master tactician who dominates all major negotiations, putting his political weight behind issues such as same-sex marriage or gun restrictions, and winning victories despite daunting odds.

But legislation he dislikes often languishes, and open criticism of him from fellow Democrats is rare.

Progressives have long worried that Cuomo was using his political acumen to secretly undermine the liberal agenda he promoted, in particular by tacitly accepting the decision of a group of Democratic senators, known as the Independent Democratic Conference, to collaborate with the Republicans. Until recently, those senators helped allow Republicans to maintain control of the chamber and stall expensive bills that Cuomo, a fiscal moderate, might have wanted to avoid.

Cuomo, progressives said, could then blame the Senate Republicans rather than having to veto the bills himself. He also blamed the Republicans for blocking some progressive legislation, such as the DREAM Act, which would have made it possible for undocumented students to receive state financial aid.

But after a slate of insurgent candidates won victory after victory this year, that dynamic has shifted.

Five of the six senators who criticized Cuomo’s education comments, including Jackson and Liu, had defeated former IDC members.

“Members cannot be afraid. Members need to represent their constituency, and they need to speak up for what they believe is right,” said Jackson, senator-elect from Manhattan and a longtime proponent of more funding for low-income schools. “If the governor is going to be — people say that he’s like a dictator, things like that — well, let’s stand up and fight.”

Democrats hold a supermajority in the Assembly, and will hold 40 of the Senate’s 63 seats, their strongest majority in more than a century, and just two votes shy of the two-thirds needed to override a veto by the governor.

(One of those 40 is Sen. Simcha Felder, who has previously sat with Republicans in that chamber. He has not indicated whom he will caucus with in the coming session, which begins in early January.)

Heastie and Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, leader of the Senate Democrats, have already signaled their intention to work closely together. On Thursday, Stewart-Cousins wrote on Twitter that she and Heastie had met to discuss a “united and historic legislature.” Heastie replied that they would work “closely together” toward shared goals.

At the same time, the governor may also be facing more aggressive legislative oversight, with the appointment of James Skoufis as chairman of the Investigations and Governmental Oversight Committee in the Senate. Skoufis, a Democrat who was elected to the upper chamber in November after serving in the Assembly, has signaled a willingness to criticize the governor in the past. And Saturday, he suggested on Twitter that he would have his hands full, given Albany’s well-deserved reputation for corruption.

“For the first time in recent Albany history, I am hiring staff whose entire focus will be conducting investigations,” Skoufis wrote. “There’s a lot of work to do.”

Other newcomers to the Senate also seem to be champing at the bit. Alessandra Biaggi, who defeated Jeffrey D. Klein, former leader of the IDC, said her experience knocking on doors as an insurgent candidate empowered her to speak more boldly than previous legislators might have.

“Because I have the grassroots and the people behind me — it’s less about him,” she said of her willingness to challenge Cuomo on school funding. “It’s more about, ‘These people are relying on me to make the right decision on their behalf. I’d better say things that are in line with what they want, always.’ ”

All the senators said they wanted to work with Cuomo and were ready to applaud him on issues where they agreed. They also emphasized their cohesion with the rest of their conference, including senators who had been in office longer and had not openly clashed with the governor.

For its part, the governor’s office says it is expecting a lot from the Assembly and the Senate, too.

“The Legislature will need to move from campaigning and advocacy to governing,” said Dani Lever, a spokeswoman for Cuomo. That, Lever added, “will require them to balance the needs of the entire state” and “pass an on-time budget so we prove we are functional, don’t lose the Senate majority and they get their raises that just passed.”

Still, many members of the Democratic conference, not just the new ones, are eyeing a more openly left-leaning agenda, despite potential political peril for more moderate members in New York City’s suburbs and upstate.

Indeed, freshmen and senior senators alike seem to be embracing a more independent approach. Sen. Michael Gianaris of Queens, deputy leader of the Democratic conference, has been a vocal critic of the subsidies that the state has promised Amazon for its new headquarters in New York; Cuomo has framed the deal as a major victory for the state.

And Stewart-Cousins said in a recent interview that she would be unafraid to challenge Cuomo or any other official, no matter their position.

“I’ve always been somebody who’s very direct,” Stewart-Cousins said. " And I’ve always been somebody who is not afraid to say what needs to be said.”

Jackson said the Legislature should announce its new strength boldly.

“Everyone knows that the governor thinks that he’s in control. He’s not in control,” Jackson said. “The governor cannot pass laws by himself.”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/26/nyregion/cuomo-legislature-democrats-new-york.html" id="0d580f36-bcee-3b16-acf2-6eb2848c1e01">The New York Times</a>.

Guess Who's Accusing Cuomo of Dishonesty and Betrayal?

NEW YORK — It seemed like the political moment Gov. Andrew Cuomo had long been waiting for: Democrats in control of the state Senate and Assembly, a chance to finally embrace and implement real change.

Cuomo, progressives said, could then blame the Senate Republicans rather than having to veto the bills himself. He also blamed the Republicans for blocking some progressive legislation, such as the Act, which would have made it possible for undocumented students to receive state financial aid.

With Democratic Friends Like These, Cuomo May Not Need Enemies

<h1>ALBANY, N.Y. — The embattled Democratic primary for Queens district attorney, now enmeshed in a lengthy recount and possibly lengthier court battle, could have another nexus, 150 miles away in the state Capitol.</h1>

That is where a bill that could help requalify dozens of invalidated ballots awaits Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s signature. The measure is intended to make it more difficult to invalidate affidavit ballots, as long as the voter “substantially complied” with election law.

If signed, it could allow a surge of new votes many times greater than the 16-vote margin that now separates Melinda Katz, the establishment favorite, from Tiffany Cabán, the insurgent newcomer. And by extension, it could reshape the future of criminal justice in a borough of more than 2 million people.

Though state lawmakers passed the bill last month, they have not sent it to the governor, and Cuomo, who endorsed Katz in the primary contest, has not indicated whether he will sign it.

Supporters of Cabán, a former public defender and democratic socialist, say the bill’s delay is evidence of the political establishment conspiring to quash her candidacy. They believe that many of the affidavit ballots — given to those who show up to the polls but whose names do not appear in the books of registered voters — were cast for Cabán.

Some have also suggested that not counting these votes amounts to voter disenfranchisement.

“It’s about us doing our part to save our democracy,” Assemblyman Ron Kim, a Democrat who represents parts of northern Queens, said on Twitter. If the bill was not signed, he said, “we will all be complicit in suppressing voters.”

Those who backed Katz, the Queens borough president, say the unsigned bill is going through the normal legislative process. More than 800 bills that passed this session — including more than two dozen dealing with aspects of election law — remain unsigned.

“They’re trying to say there’s something not just about the process,” Rep. Gregory Meeks, chairman of the Queens County Democratic Party, said Tuesday at a rally on behalf of Katz. “The process is fair. Everybody knows the rules. Everybody has to play by the rules.”

Nonetheless, the stasis stands in contrast to the pro-reform platform that helped fuel a so-called blue wave for Democrats in November. The newly Democratic-led state Legislature’s first act in January was to pass sweeping changes intended to make it easier for New Yorkers to vote, and Cuomo had made voting reform one of his legislative priorities this year.

The bill in question concerns affidavit ballots, cast by voters who do not appear in the rolls. They are allowed to vote anyway if they sign an affidavit affirming that they are eligible. The Board of Elections later verifies those claims, setting aside any ballots that it deems invalid.

A ballot can be invalidated for a number of reasons, from the obvious — not being registered — to the more technical, such as leaving parts of the affidavit incomplete.

The bill, which passed almost unanimously in the Assembly and by a comfortable margin in the Senate, would allow affidavit ballots to be counted even if the affidavit was not properly filled out, as long as the voter was eligible and had “substantially complied” with election law. Leaving off one’s former address, for example, would no longer be a “fatal defect.”

More than 2,300 of the roughly 2,800 affidavit ballots cast in the primary election last month were invalidated. Of those, about 100 were disqualified for technical errors in the affidavit, such as a registered Democrat not writing the word “Democrat” in a space for party affiliation.

But the bill is but one of several legal questions swirling over the Queens race and its much-contested affidavit ballots. Separately, lawyers for both campaigns have filed lawsuits asking a judge to review the ballots. Those suits have been shelved until after the Board of Elections recount.

In light of those pending battles, there is some debate over just how much the bill would or should affect the current results.

Several officials in Albany said they were wary of introducing the law in the middle of the already tense recount process. They also worried about upsetting other races around the state, where election officials may have recently certified close results.

Michael Whyland, a spokesman for Carl Heastie, the Assembly speaker, said the pending court cases removed the urgency from the bill.

“Given that the judge has said he will be reviewing ballot issues at the conclusion of the recount,” Whyland said Wednesday, “this clearly gives the Legislature enough time to continue to go through its normal legislative review process.”

Typically, the Legislature must send the bill to Cuomo’s desk before he can sign it. Heastie, who endorsed Katz, has not sent the bill.

Cuomo, speaking to reporters Tuesday, also called for delay.

It would be “absurd” to apply the law retroactively, the governor said, adding that he was mulling it as a part of a larger assortment of election-reform bills that passed the Legislature this year.

“You would have to review all of them as an entirety,” Cuomo said. “Because are the bills compatible, do some bills complement others, do some contradict others?”

Asked about the timing for such a review, Cuomo did not offer much hope for Cabán’s supporters, calling it “a big undertaking,” saying the only deadline he was concerned about was November’s elections.

Sarah Steiner, a New York City election lawyer who is not working for either candidate, said legal precedent from prior court cases suggests that a judge reviewing the invalidated ballots would permit them, even without the law. A law would merely make revalidation more certain.

Still, she called the desire to wait understandable.

“To do it in the middle of a vote count — I think it’s confusing, and it can lead to all sorts of litigation,” she said. “And if there’s anything we don’t need in this race, it’s more confusion.”

Indeed, some Democratic leaders have argued against the bill’s enactment not only on legal grounds but also in terms of fairness, claiming that to allow the invalidated ballots after the election would amount to retroactively changing the rules.

They have suggested that Cabán’s supporters cherry-picked this bill to agitate on, when so many other bills also remain unsigned.

“You can’t go into a baseball game and say, the day of the game, ‘We want to change the rules right now because it’s to our favor,’ ” Meeks said.

Assemblyman Kevin Cahill, D-Hudson Valley, who sponsored the measure in Albany’s lower chamber, said he doubted the bill would be applied retroactively, though he stressed that “the objective is to have legitimate voters have the right to vote.”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/10/nyregion/tiffany-caban-melinda-katz.html" link="null" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.

Queens DA race could turn on bill awaiting Cuomo's signature

That is where a bill that could help requalify dozens of invalidated ballots awaits Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s signature. The measure is intended to make it more difficult to invalidate affidavit ballots, as long as the voter “substantially complied” with election law.

<h1>They say you can never go home again, but some of New York’s most infamous Democrats are hoping that’s wrong.</h1>

For six years, an ever-flexible number of Democratic state senators — sometimes five, sometimes nine, sometimes just one — gained notoriety and power by defecting from their party to work with the Republicans. Those defections helped the Republicans stay in power, despite sometimes holding a numerical minority.

Last week, the last rogue Democrat, Sen. Simcha Felder of Brooklyn, rejoined the Democratic fold, bringing all the Senate’s registered Democrats into one conference for the first time since 2013. With Felder’s re-entry, the Democrats now control 40 seats in the Senate — two short of a supermajority.

For the Democratic Party, it was the end of a dubious era in Albany, where the defections were held up as further proof of the Capitol’s reputation for dysfunction and self-interest.

It was also another step toward dominance for the state’s Democrats, who swept into power in both legislative chambers last year.

But for the defectors, homecoming has largely spelled the opposite: a precipitous fall from power, after a bruising 2018 campaign in which their colleagues called them traitors, snakes and Trump Democrats.

Six of the nine breakaway senators were kicked out of office last year, after progressive primary challengers cast them as false Democrats; all but Felder had joined the Independent Democratic Conference, a group of senators who formed their own group and collaborated with the Republicans.

Of the three who survived, one was relegated last year to leading a subcommittee, even as new members were tapped to helm powerful committees. Felder was left isolated — sitting at the end of a row, at the back of the chamber — for the entirety of this year’s session, after leaving the Republican conference but being rejected by the Democrats.

Progressive activists have already promised to once again support primary challenges against the three: Felder, David Carlucci and Diane Savino. During the session, progressive activists urged the Democratic leadership to punish Savino, Carlucci and Felder after they held onto their seats.

Though the leadership did not respond to that request, Savino’s assignment to lead a subcommittee on internet and technology was widely interpreted as a snub. (The subcommittee was later expanded into a full committee.)

Savino brushed off the idea of residual tension.

“I never take this business personally,” said Savino, who represents parts of Staten Island and Brooklyn.

“This year we may be on opposite sides, and next year we might be solid allies. For those who want to continue to carry on a campaign that they already won, that’s their problem.”

She added that she did not consider her committee assignment retribution. “The problem for Senator Stewart-Cousins is she has too many members and not as many committees,” she said, referring to the Senate Democrats’ leader, Andrea Stewart-Cousins.

Yet there have been some indications of awkwardness or lingering hard feelings. In late November, after the unexpected death of former Sen. Jose Peralta, an IDC member who was unseated in the primary, Savino wrote on Twitter that Peralta had “paid the price on Primary Day” for standing up for his district.

She attacked people who she said had let Peralta be “vilified” in the “winner-take-all game of politics,” adding an expletive.

In addition, some of the primary challengers who defeated IDC candidates last year have continued to revisit those victories as new lawmakers, citing them as proof of a mandate to take the state even further left.

Still, for lawmakers who were once courted by leaders in both parties, juggling stipends and titles that were offered as enticements, the former breakaway politicians appear to be remarkably sanguine about their new positions in Albany.

For the Democratic Party, it was the end of a dubious era in Albany, where the defections were held up as further proof of the Capitol’s reputation for dysfunction and self-interest.

Vivian Wang and Jesse McKinley

Articles written by the author

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