NYC-DSA Statement on preliminary city budget

Governor Hochul: Which side are you on?

Mayor Mamdani’s preliminary budget makes it clear that Gov. Hochul and the State legislature have two options: Tax The Rich to make New York affordable, or declare war on the affordability agenda in order to shield the bank accounts of the billionaire Epstein class. If Hochul upholds the status quo and chooses the latter, small homeowners and tenants alike will feel the squeeze from Hochul’s Homeowner Tax while multimillionaires reap $12 billion dollars from federal tax cuts. 

In his budget announcement, Mayor Mamdani refused false austerity. At a moment when the wealthiest are enjoying historic tax breaks and the working class faces a growing cost of living crisis, Gov. Hochul is strangling the affordability agenda to benefit her millionaire donors. This budget is a choice between austerity and devastating cuts to working- and middle-class households or funding an affordable and abundant future for all. 
NYC-DSA is committed to fighting for taxes on the rich to fund affordability for working class people. Join our Albany Takeover on Wednesday, Feb. 25, get involved in our Tax the Rich campaign, and help elect our slate of insurgent state legislators, who will fight in Albany to fund the affordability agenda, and who will not accept donations from the same billionaires making life unaffordable and funding fascism. The onus is on Gov. Hochul to respond: Will you do the right thing or will you keep coddling your billionaire donors and leave the working class to shoulder the costs?