Gov. Kathy Hochul and Democratic leaders in the state Legislature didn’t have much to say Tuesday about reports from sources that Hochul ordered lawmakers to kill a bill that would have allowed the governor to delay special elections until Election Day.

Officially, the bill was an effort to make elections more efficient by consolidating races and encouraging increased turnout, but Republicans were quick to call the move a power grab.

“How do I say this? People were willing to put it on hold for the moment,” said Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, who did, however, indicate that it was the governor who wanted the flexibility the bill would provide. Until she apparently didn’t.

“It began with her, and if she’s interested in holding it, it’s fine,” she said.

After struggling to get off the ground earlier last week, the bill was introduced late Friday before being abruptly pulled on Monday. Stewart-Cousins refused to directly point fingers when asked if the directive came from Hochul, and if it had anything to do with her negotiations with President Donald Trump over his desire to kill congestion pricing.

The story is that Hochul wanted the bill killed, either as leverage in her conversations with Trump or because she feared potential political backlash.

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Publicly, the governor showed no interest in acknowledging either scenario.

“I didn’t say that,” she said when pressed by reporters.

She also distanced herself from the process of drafting and introducing legislation, despite openly working directly with the legislature to advance other priorities, such as legislation to tackle addictive algorithms last year.

“When bills are introduced and they are passed, and they get on the pile on my desk with 800-1,000 bills, depending on the year, that’s when I pay attention to them,” she said.

Republicans came out swinging Monday, accusing Democrats of not being genuine in their concerns about Trump’s impact on democracy if they were willing to delay a special election for up to 11 months.

“They should be ashamed that the people who run these chambers are putting this bill forward to deprive 800,000 people of representation,” Senate Minority Leader Rob Ortt said of NY-21 voters.

Hochul had little patience for that argument, pointing to Republican opposition to measures Democrats claim will make voting more accessible. 

“All I know is every time there is an election bill that comes up, whether it’s early voting, whether it’s the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, or the odd-even bill, they act like this is going to be the end of democracy and society as we know it,” she said.

Republicans have used an inverted script, accusing Democrats of caring about those priorities but neglecting those who would be left without a representative if a special election was delayed. They also hit Democrats for not introducing such legislation prior to Democrat Tom Suozzi’s victory in a 2024 special election in the 3rd Congressional District.

Stewart-Cousins acknowledged that the idea of such a bill was not discussed until recent weeks.