Political support for Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul is gaining strength as she calls for Governor Cuomo to resign over allegations of sexual harassment.
In a turn of poetic justice, Hochul would become the first female governor of the state and the 57th general position.
Hochul, 62, has remained out of public view since she was elected alongside Cuomo from her second term. In fact, she was not mentioned at all in her public schedules last spring during the height of the pandemic, and her book on the COVID-19 crisis did not include her.
But on Friday he took the lead against the vaccine alongside the NAACP president in his hometown of Buffalo, in what could be seen as an opposition to Cuomo’s appearance at the Javits Center on Monday, flanked by black clergy. Hochul posed for the cameras inside Catholic Health, flexing the biceps muscle in the Rosie the Riveter.
Moving away from the tradition – and a sign that perhaps it is already distancing itself from Cuomo – the media were informed of the appearance through Hochul’s press office. Typically, the governor’s office sends schedules for both.
The 59 lawmakers who issued a statement Thursday urging Cuomo to step down – following allegations that he came under an assistant’s blouse last year at the governor’s mansion and palpated it – expressed his support for Hochul.
“We have a lieutenant governor who can step in and lead the rest of the term, and that’s the best thing for New Yorkers at this critical time,” they wrote.
Mayoral candidate and Brooklyn District President Eric Adams echoed the sentiment in a statement: “I trust Lieutenant Governor Hochul to manage the budget process and have our Attorney General conduct a thorough investigation.”
Fordham law professor Zephyr Teachout, who filed a lawsuit against Cuomo and Hochul in 2014, pushed Hochul in a statement asking Cuomo to step down.
“Cuomo should resign and Kathy Hochul, against whom I campaigned and voted against in the primaries … should be the governor,” she tweeted Friday afternoon. “He cannot be trusted. He lies, harasses and expels talent. It has betrayed the confidence of the people of New York. “
A spokesman for Blasio’s mayor, who publicly supported Hochul when he first ran with Cuomo in 2014, also addressed the prospects for Hochul to become a state leader.
“Andrew Cuomo has multiple allegations of sexual assault and sexual harassment … Kathy Hochul doesn’t,” Bill Neidhardt said.
Hochul has done it he said he supports an independent investigation of Cuomo by state Attorney General Letitia James, but stopped asking Cuomo to retire.
The potential succession would be similar to that of the former governor. Elliot Spitzer’s resignation in 2008 amid a prostitution scandal. After-Lt. Governor David Paterson intervened for the rest of his term, a job that certainly meant a big leap from being second in command.
He once joked that his job as a government lieutenant required him to “wake up very early and call the governor’s private line. If he answers, go back to sleep, your job is done.
Hochul was first elected to office in the 1980s as a member of the Hamburg city council. She was elected congressman for District 26, comprising Buffalo, in 2011.
Hochul met her husband, Bill, a former U.S. attorney in the western district of New York City, working as an intern in the Assembly while attending Syracuse University.
Hochul has defended women’s issues – leading the state’s “Enough Is Enough” campaign against sexual assault on college campuses – and talked about her familiarity with navigating testosterone-filled political waters.
“I know what it’s like to be the only woman in a room. And for these people to talk about you and think it doesn’t matter. This has been most of my career as an elected official for over 25 years, ”Hochul told NY1 in November.
“So it makes it harder for you, but it also makes you want to lend a hand to the next generation of young women and engage them so they want to participate as well.”