Monday Morning Memo – April 13

Good morning from home…and Happy Dyngus Day! 

With state leaders caught in social distancing and post-budget limbo, some controversy erupted earlier this week regarding uncertainty around whether or not the Legislature would return to session. Governor Andrew Cuomo declared that legislative session was “effectively over”, prompting a quick response from Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, who tweeted, “As always, the Assembly stands ready to protect and provide for the well-being of all New Yorkers. Last week we established a system for remote voting and we are on call to perform our constitutional duties as a co-equal branch of government. The Assembly is in recess (session is not over) at the call of the Speaker.”

“We have three branches, bro,” Senator Gustavo Rivera (D—Bronx) said, “Absolutely there is going to be a legislative session.”

Senators James Skoufis and Gustavo Rivera, Assemblymember Ron Kim and Susan Lerner, Executive Director of Common Cause/NY, as well as other groups and individuals, such as Tenants PAC, Drug Policy Alliance and Fordham law professor Zephyr Teachout are urging the NYS Legislature to stay in remote session and address issues relating to the COVID-19 crisis, such as absentee voting, balancing the Legislature’s power in the budget, health care reform, antibody immunity testing for the informal work sector, housing reform, and marijuana, among other issues. Teachout tweeted, “New York’s small businesses are getting destroyed. When is the state legislature and NYC city council going to hold hearings on what is happening and what to do about it?”

After passing the budget, the legislature was not scheduled to return to session until April 20 and, if the same schedule is kept, will conclude on June 2, a few weeks earlier than other years to fit the new political calendar of a June primary.

Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio once again have differing opinions on who has authority to implement certain COVID-19 policies; following de Blasio’s announcement that New York City’s schools would be closed through the end of the academic year Cuomo insisted, “there has been no decision on [closing New York City] schools” and that the decision whether or not to close schools, “is my legal authority in this situation.”

Although the $177 billion state budget included a raft of legislation on criminal justice, environmental protection, public health regulation, campaign finance reform, women’s reproductive rights, election administration, gun control, and more, many policy priorities pushed by Cuomo or by legislators were left out of the budget. Gig economy protections, marijuana legalization, and rent relief are among the top priority policies which dropped off the table and it remains to be seen whether they will be taken up in the coming months by Democratic lawmakers, especially those displeased with the lack of progressive policy in the budget.

Managing the public health crisis and jumpstarting New York’s economy, however, are the current focus of State’s leadership. Cuomo has tapped several former aides to develop a statewide “NYS Forward” plan to examine how to unwind the NY on PAUSE restrictions. The team includes Steven M. Cohen, general counsel and chief administrator of the holding company MacAndrews & Forbes; Bill Mulrow, senior advisory director at private-equity firm, Blackstone; and Lawrence Schwartz, chief strategy officer at OTG, an airport concessions company. All three men previously held senior roles in Mr. Cuomo’s administration and political campaigns.

Governor Cuomo continues to call for massive increases in federal aid for New York State—a recurring theme in each of his daily coronavirus briefings for the past few weeks—arguing that federal support, including enhanced Medicaid funding, has fallen woefully short and that previous funding packages did not recognize New York’s position as the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak and fell short of his expectations. Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, a Republican who chairs the National Governors Association, issued a joint statement with Governor Cuomo, who serves as the association’s vice chair, seeking $500 billion in aid from Congress to help states that have been “leading the on-the-ground response to the national COVID-19 pandemic”. 

Less than three weeks after the CARES Act was passed, Congressional Leaders and the Administration acknowledged that the $2 trillion-plus emergency rescue spending plan will not be enough to prop up the economy during the coronavirus crisis, and continue work on a Phase Four coronavirus response package, with Senate Republicans and Senate Democrats each introducing their own versions this week.

Democratic leaders in the House and Senate were pushing for the quick passage of an interim emergency bill worth $500 billion to tide the economy over before the passage of a more extensive “CARES 2 Act, while Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell tried to move a $250 billion small business package, mainly focused on shoring up the Paycheck Protection Program.

On Thursday, both bills failed to get the support necessary to proceed, and Phase Four coronavirus package negotiations will continue among Congressional leaders. Washington has already started talking about a Phase Five package. Stay tuned!

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