Democrats will return to the state Capitol in January with historic majorities in both chambers of the New York Legislature.
Some lawmakers and advocates already are calling for passage of progressive priorities like the New York Health Act, which would provide a single-payer universal healthcare plan.
Others like Assemblymember Sarah Clark of Rochester say the Legislature should increase taxes on the rich to help offset federal cuts.
“We have to have the will to say you need to pay your fair share,” Clark told WXXI’s Connections after Election Day. “And when you make multi-millions of dollars or billions of dollars in our state, it is because of our workers. It is because of our strong middle class.”
Democrats have won at least 47 of the 63 seats in the state Senate, with one race in the Capital Region still uncalled. They have won at least 111 of the 150 seats in the Assembly. That gives the party the largest Assembly majority in history, and its largest Senate majority in more than a century. With supermajorities in both chambers, they have enough votes to override any potential vetoes from Gov. Kathy Hochul.
Sen. Shelley Mayer, D-Yonkers, who led the party’s Senate campaign efforts, said the new numbers will give the chamber more heft in budget negotiations and on other policy matters, but the diversity of the conference’s membership is a bigger benefit.
"I think our conference will flex its muscles in the budget negotiations," Mayer told the New York Public News Network, though not singling out any particular issue. "The suburbs, the city of New York, the upstate cities, the rural communities, we got to care about it all. And we're going to be able to because we're going to have such broad representation."
Both the Assembly and the Senate added tax increases on the wealthy to their budget proposals this year, but Hochul resisted. Lawmakers settled on a tax on second homes in New York City, which faced court challenges but will move ahead after an appeals court ruling last week.
Some of the legislative seats that flipped from Republican to Democrat came in areas that are traditionally moderate, according to Larry Levy, executive dean of the National Center for Suburban Studies at Hofstra University.
“If the leadership is smart, and they are smart, they'll try to find ways to bring the progressives in the city and the moderates in the suburbs together … over issues that really resonate in both areas,” Levy said.
In statements reacting to the election results, both Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie and Senate Majority Leader Andrea-Stewart Cousins said they were committed to using the majorities to improve the lives of New Yorkers.
But while Republicans will have smaller numbers in the Legislature, they plan to make their presence felt, according to Assemblymember Josh Jensen.
“I really do think that in in a functional democracy, you need to have a minority party who's willing to hold government to account,” Jensen told WXXI’s Connections, “to ask questions, demand accountability, and really make sure that important questions are being asked and that they're answered and they're answered honestly.”
An early test of how the new power dynamics play out will come early next year when Hochul releases her budget proposal. Then a few weeks after, the Assembly and Senate will propose their own spending plans.
