Will Barclay, Assembly Minority Leader, reacts to Governor Hochul's 2025 State of the State, January 14th, 2025

Barclay reacted to the Governor's speech, saying that Hochul echoed initiatives the Republican party has been pushing for the last few years in the State legislature, mostly the Child Tax Credit. (The Governor proposed to triple the Child Tax Credit, to $1000) "Welcome to the party, Governor, because these are issues that she talked about in her State of the State that Republican Assembly members have been talking about for some time, the two biggest things, affordability and crime," Barclay said. "She talked about a middle class tax cut, great. She talked about the inflation rebate, which, I'm not against that, because it does give money back to the taxpayers, but it seems a little inefficient to tax people and then give their money back to them, and it's only a one-shot deal." Barclay said he also agrees with the Governor's push to expand involuntary commitment, and enhance Kendra's Law. But, was disappointed on the absence of discussion regarding criminal justice reform. "You know, one thing she didn't mention, because she's partly responsible for these policies getting put in place, is bail reform, is raise the age, is the parole reform that she's talking about, or that she signed bills to let more people out on parole. So I think those issues need to be addressed alongside with a whole host of issues on criminal justice," he says. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices