Hochul budget chief swats down tax hike push from Mamdanis DSA allies

The Empire State will enjoy an $8 billion revenue surplus heading into next year — even as the far-left keeps up its demands for tax hikes on wealthy residents.Gov.Kathy Hochul’s budget director Blake Washington downplayed the calls for new taxes Tuesday, as he revealed the substantial surplus in tax revenues flowing into state coffers.“It’s hard to talk about new taxes when revenues are performing the way they are,” Washington said on the Capital Pressroom radio show.Hochul, following her resounding re-election to a second term last week, is already under pressure from Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s Democratic Socialists of America allies to “tax the rich.”State lawmakers are likely to push Hochul for higher taxes on the wealthy to pay for priority programs such as universal childcare — as she faces larger super majorities of fellow Democrats in both the state Senate and Assembly come January.While she did not raise taxes this year, Hochul gave Mamdani the authority to enact a pied-à-terre tax on luxury second homes in New York City and last week teased new taxes to fund her and Mamdani’s free childcare programs.At a Manhattan press conference on Tuesday about artificial intelligence, Hochul said the $8 billion surplus was a one-time “windfall” that can’t be depended on beyond this year for spending programs — and did not close the door on tax increases.“It’s always nice to receive this windfall, but I’m not counting on it for next year, the year after.

That would be very imprudent on our part,” Hochul said.“So, we take it, we pay down our debt, we bolster up our reserves, and then we can look at … what is left.There’ll be nowhere near eight billion dollars by the time we do what we need to do.”Hochul’s budget division reported the larger-than-anticipated tax revenues — attributed in part to strong financial performance in the Wall Street financial services industry — in it’s mid-year budget plan, amending projections ...