Climate Activists Arrested Protesting Climate Budget Deal

On Tuesday, May 5, Climate Defiance organized a last-minute protest against Governor Hochul’s push to gut the climate law. While the Chair of the Assembly Ways and Means Committee says that a budget deal has been struck, no official details have yet been released. It is understood that lawmakers have agreed to push back by several years the deadline to issue regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to relax the rules related to methane emissions. Hochul's energy agenda has become very similar to Trump's pro-fossil fuel push. The group initially blocked the entrance in front of Hochul’s 2nd-floor office and held a teach-in. Later, a group moved to block the second-floor elevator, which finally got the state police to arrest them and charge them with misdemeanors. We hear from Aviv Kresch of Climate Defiance, Assemblymember Claire Valdez, Pete Sikora of NY Communities for Change, Michael Greenberg of Climate Defiance, Jonathan Westin of the Climate Organizing Hub, Assembly candidate Lydia Green, Eric Weltman of Food and Water Watch, and Topher Dean. By Mark Dunlea for Hudson Mohawk Magazine.