NY candidates pressed by WFP to support $40 billion tax hike, voting rights for asylum-seekers
New York’s Working Families Party is pressing state candidates seeking its endorsement to support $40 billion in tax hikes, allowing asylum-seekers to vote and more legalized drug-injection centers.
The lefty party — which has close ties to labor unions and the Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez-aligned Democratic Socialists of America — also prods hopefuls to oppose the expansion and funding of charter schools popular with urban parents.
Democratic candidates running for state senate and assembly typically try to get onto the WFP ballot line to burnish their progressive credentials to win primary elections — and also to help score more votes in competitive general contests against a Republican opponent.
The WFP, headed by then-Director Sochie Nnaemeka, last year endorsed the Democratic slate for statewide office, including Gov. Kathy Hochul.
Moderate Democrats recoiled at the latest WFP platform Monday when contacted by The Post.
“I’m certainly not seeking their endorsement. Raising taxes by $40 billion is too far to the left. I’m not comfortable with that position,” said state Assembyman Michael Benedetto, a Bronx Democrat.
Benedetto also said that giving non-citizens the right to vote is a “bad idea.
“Voting is one of the most cherished rights we have as Americans,” he said.
State Democratic Party chief Jay Jacobs said his party’s candidates can’t run on promoting massive tax hikes in the more conservative areas of the state, including his home turf of Long Island, where he is also the Nassau County Dem leader.
“It’s becomes a problem to run on those type of issues as Democrats running in the suburbs and upstate,” Jacobs said.
Candidates filling out the nearly 100-question WFP survey are asked if they support raising state income and corporate taxes by up to $40 billion.
“The Invest in Our New York platform proposes key progressive tax reforms which would raise about $40 billion annually,” the WFP says. “These reforms would raise taxes on New York’s richest through a progressive income tax, an increased corporate tax, and a set of reforms targeting other forms of wealth. Will you fight to pass progressive tax reforms in the legislature?”
As the migrant crisis gripping New York City and urban areas across the country continues to grow, the WFP also prods candidates to give illegal or undocumented residents and other non-citizens or migrants seeking asylum the right to vote.
Undocumented residents were given the right to obtain a New York driver’s license in 2019.
“Will you stand up for the right of all non-citizens, including undocumented New Yorkers, to vote in local and state elections, so they have a voice in the communities they live in and the schools their children go to?,” candidates are asked.
A New York City law allowing non-citizens the right to vote was struck down as unconstitutional last year, though it is being reviewed on appeal.
The WFP also asks if a candidate would back legislation or support using federal funds to provide health insurance coverage to more 250,000 residents who are non-citizens or undocumented.
Meanwhile, the party supports more spending — but not on charter schools.
“Will you oppose increased state aid to privately-run charter schools and oppose steps to facilitate the expansion of charter schools in New York, such as requiring NYC to pay rent for new or expanding charter schools?” it asks.
The city’s privately managed, publicly funded charter schools, which typically have a longer school day and year than traditional public schools, are opposed by the teachers’ union in large part because the charter-school staffers are non-union.
The WFP questionnaire also asks for the backing of controversial legal drug-injection sites — called overdose prevention centers — where addicts can shoot up drugs under government-sanctioned medical supervision. There are two sites in New York City.
The centers are where addicts can bring their own drugs and use clean needles to shoot up under the watch of medical professionals.
Supporters said the program helps curb overdoses while opponents slam it as condoning and encouraging illegal drug use.
