Sparring over crime, abortion and the US Capitol riot took center stage on Tuesday as New York Governor Kathy Hochul faced her Republican challenger, US Representative Lee Zeldin, in the campaign’s only televised gubernatorial debate.
Hochul blasted Zeldin’s past support for abortion restrictions and for former US president Donald Trump, while Zeldin vowed to repeal liberal criminal justice reforms and criticized Hochul’s push to send millions to abortion providers to expand access for a predicted surge in out-of-state patients.
Hochul labeled Zeldin an “election denier” and “climate change denier” as she tried to link him to Trump, who enjoyed little support in New York.
Photo: AP
“In Lee Zeldin’s world, you overthrow the results of elections you don’t agree with,” Hochul said.
Zeldin voted against certifying the 2020 presidential election results in Arizona and Pennsylvania.
When asked by a debate moderator if he would vote against certifying the results again, Zeldin did not directly say yes or no.
He instead said he wanted to focus on the future and fight to institute voter ID laws to protect election integrity.
Hochul also asked Zeldin: “Is Donald Trump a great president? Yes or no?”
Zeldin praised Trump’s record on policies from Israel to the US border policy to COVID-19 pandemic containment.
When a moderator asked Zeldin if he would accept the results of the election if he lost, Zeldin said: “Well, first off, losing is not an option. Secondly, playing along with your hypothetical question, of course.”
Hochul, the state’s former lieutenant governor who took office after her predecessor, Andrew Cuomo, resigned to avoid a likely impeachment, has enjoyed a strong lead over Zeldin in much of the polling this year.
However, Zeldin remains a contender, enjoying support in wide swaths of upstate New York. Some recent polling suggests the gap between the candidates could be narrowing.
The Long Island Republican has spent much of the year railing against a streak of shootings and other violent crimes, including a series of unprovoked attacks on New York City subways. Two teenagers were also injured in a drive-by shooting outside his home earlier this month.
Zeldin on Tuesday charged Hochul with failing to take seriously the concerns of New Yorkers about crimes on subways, and hate crimes against Jewish and Asian-American communities.
He also argued that liberal opposition to natural gas extraction and new pipelines in New York is hurting the state’s economy.
“You’re poorer and less safe because of Kathy Hochul and extreme policies,” Zeldin said. “You deserve better.”
New York was among the first states to scale back the use of cash bail for criminal defendants starting in 2020.
Both before and after the reforms, only a small fraction of the people released while awaiting trial — less than 1 percent — were rearrested for violent felonies.
Hochul has noted that other cities and states without similar cash bail laws have seen spikes of crime since 2020.
A Chinese scientist was arrested while arriving in the US at Detroit airport, the second case in days involving the alleged smuggling of biological material, authorities said on Monday. The scientist is accused of shipping biological material months ago to staff at a laboratory at the University of Michigan. The FBI, in a court filing, described it as material related to certain worms and requires a government permit. “The guidelines for importing biological materials into the US for research purposes are stringent, but clear, and actions like this undermine the legitimate work of other visiting scholars,” said John Nowak, who leads field
Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg was deported from Israel yesterday, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, the day after the Israeli navy prevented her and a group of fellow pro-Palestinian activists from sailing to Gaza. Thunberg, 22, was put on a flight to France, the ministry said, adding that she would travel on to Sweden from there. Three other people who had been aboard the charity vessel also agreed to immediate repatriation. Eight other crew members are contesting their deportation order, Israeli rights group Adalah, which advised them, said in a statement. They are being held at a detention center ahead of a
‘THE RED LINE’: Colombian President Gustavo Petro promised a thorough probe into the attack on the senator, who had announced his presidential bid in March Colombian Senator Miguel Uribe Turbay, a possible candidate in the country’s presidential election next year, was shot and wounded at a campaign rally in Bogota on Saturday, authorities said. His conservative Democratic Center party released a statement calling it “an unacceptable act of violence.” The attack took place in a park in the Fontibon neighborhood when armed assailants shot him from behind, said the right-wing Democratic Center, which was the party of former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe. The men are not related. Images circulating on social media showed Uribe Turbay, 39, covered in blood being held by several people. The Santa Fe Foundation
NUCLEAR WARNING: Elites are carelessly fomenting fear and tensions between nuclear powers, perhaps because they have access to shelters, Tulsi Gabbard said After a trip to Hiroshima, US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday warned that “warmongers” were pushing the world to the brink of nuclear war. Gabbard did not specify her concerns. Gabbard posted on social media a video of grisly footage from the world’s first nuclear attack and of her staring reflectively at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial. On Aug. 6, 1945, the US obliterated Hiroshima, killing 140,000 people in the explosion and by the end of the year from the uranium bomb’s effects. Three days later, a US plane dropped a plutonium bomb on Nagasaki, leaving abut 74,000 people dead by the
RSS