New York’s Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul tried to walk back her suggestion that Republicans should leave the state because they don’t share her values.
At a campaign rally on Monday, held for a fellow Democrat in a special congressional election, Hochul thundered “And we are here to say that the era of Trump, and Zeldin and Molinaro, just jump on a bus and head down to Florida where you belong, ok? Get out of town. Get out of town. Because you do not represent our values. You are not New Yorkers. You are not New Yorkers.”
Hochul was referring to former President Donald Trump, GOP Congressman Lee Zeldin, who is her gubernatorial opponent in November, and Republican Marc Molinaro, who was running against the Democrat Hochul was campaigning for.
The governor’s conservative critics, including Zeldin, immediately denounced her comments. Zeldin called it a “psycho demand” to urge all Republicans to leave New York.
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On Friday, Hochul sought to clarify her comments.
“I referred to three individuals: Donald Trump, County Executive Molinaro, and Congressman Lee Zeldin. I spoke about three people whose views we believe are extreme. They supported the overturning of a presidential election,” she told reporters.
But here’s the problem with that follow-up.
In her original remarks, Hochul had said, “We come from a long line of people who fought for women’s rights that happened here first. We fought for environmental justice that happened here first. We fought for labor rights that happened here first. We fought for LGBTQ rights that happened here first.”
So presumably, in Hochul’s view, any New Yorkers who object, for example, to the Green New Deal, radical LGBT activism, or Big Labor telling businesses how they must operate – which are basic Republican positions – would be free to also “get out of town” because they “do not represent our values” and thus “are not New Yorkers.”
Yet, as the New York Post wrote in an editorial last week, “it’s Hochul’s views that are out of line with what Empire Staters actually want.”
The Post pointed out that over the past decade, under Hochul and her Democratic predecessor, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, 1.5 million people have fled New York state.
Everyday New Yorkers, the Post noted, want a crackdown on crime, they worry about an unemployment rate that is above the national jobless number, they fear what radical green energy policies mean for their electric bills, and they are wary of Hochul’s COVID-19 lockdowns.
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“Her critics are eminently commonsensical,” the Post argued.
“They aim to fight crime by empowering cops and prosecutors and to stop strangling businesses with high taxes and soaring energy costs. If wanting safe streets and a humming economy makes people into fake New Yorkers, the Empire State must be full of frauds.”
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Free Press.
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