NL: Governor Hochul, yes or no? Do you think someone who's committed murder or rape in this country, in that they're here illegally, should have tools at their disposal to avoid deportation?
KH: As the governor, it’s my primary responsibility is to protect the people of New York. Those crimes are abhorrent.
NL: Whatever response you prepared to give today dwarfs in comparison to your actions as governor. I would like to remind you of someone named Gianfranco Torres Navarro, an illegal alien and suspected leader of a violent Peruvian gang. He was tied to 23 murders in Peru and came to this country illegally across the southern border. He had his victims’ faces tattooed on his body, and he was hiding in plain sight in Endicott, New York for an extended period of time where ICE could not locate him. And why did it take so long to find him?
Because policies like your Green Light Law, which blocks ICE and US Border Patrol from accessing critical DMV databases. In fact, it threatens the badges and threatens to charge with felonies any officer that shares that DMV data with federal agents. These agents rely on data to be able to know who they're pulling over on the side of the road. They're taking their lives into their hands every time they're trying to, you know, keep our street safe. The really sick irony here is that your government in New York, my home state freely shares that same DMV data with the government of Canada at our bridges in you and my hometown, but it doesn't share that data with your American federal government. Why governor?
KH: You're misstating the Green Light Law because we are able to cooperate with federal authorities when there's a crime involved.
NL: Why do you shield the database, Governor?
KH: Anything they want from us related to investigating a crime is available.
NL: This is data that's needed in real time to enforce the laws on the streets. They can't subpoena these records from your government. I've had these conversations with my county sheriffs. All across the state of New York State, state police, they want to work with the federal officials. They want to clean up these messes, but they can't because they were being threatened by you and our Attorney General, that they'll take away their badge and end their careers.
KH: There have been countless, countless instances where we've cooperated with federal law enforcement, happens on a daily basis. And so, your characterization is just incorrect of how we provide information to people who ask for it.
NL: You share the database in its entirety with Canada, but you don't share it with the federal government. It’s beyond belief. I mean, this is denial and excuses. Governor you know damn well that. The New York State Sheriff's Association, the State Association of Chiefs of Police, have both condemned the Green Light Law. Sheriffs from Erie County, Niagara County, Monroe, Albany, Broome, Duchess, and Oneida Counties. Multiple parties represented here, not just Republicans, have warned that your law ties their hands. It puts officers’ lives in danger, and it shields criminals from accountability. When you refuse to work with law enforcement, when you refuse to hand over data that can protect communities and save lives, you are actively aiding the illegal alien criminals who have crossed our borders and committed violent crimes, and the consequences are not hypothetical.
Your bail reform law is the reason that Laken Riley is dead. He should have been in jail in New York, and he wasn't. He went to Georgia. He fled our state. Because he should have been in prison. These are tragic and real circumstances. In Buffalo, a Venezuelan illegal immigrant hacked his wife to death with an ax. In Syracuse, an Ecuadorian national strangled, a young woman on her birthday and dumped her body in a park. In Irondequoit, in Monroe County, a Dominican National slaughtered his, an entire family, including two toddlers, and he set their house on fire.
Governor Hochul, you took an oath to serve the citizens of the state of New York, and you've allowed violent criminals who came here illegally to hide in plain sight and to avoid federal officials because of your support for the Green Light Law. I mean, this is an abomination. This is not keeping New Yorkers safe.
KH: We turn over the information you're referring to all the time, you're misstating, the, the laws and its purpose. We cooperate all the time.
NL: As much as I want to believe you, governor, I believe the cops more. I believe the cops that I know and I trust in our, in our same hometown that are out there in the streets every single day. Your laws put lives in danger. Your laws have led to people being murdered.
KH: My job is to protect the people of New York, and I fight hard every single day.
NL: You're doing a very lousy job of it, Governor.
KH: Murder rates are down to historic lows, and we're working hard to make sure one crime is one too many. I take this very seriously, but we do cooperate when anytime they need help with law enforcement and you're just refusing the facts… I can't help you.
NL: I trust the professionals. You and I aren't police officers. I trust the people out in the field that wear a badge that are honorable, decent, hardworking people, and you, you have a, a record of disrespect to law enforcement. Just like you disrespected every corrections officer in the State of New York. You have a lot of gall to come here and criticize the President for using the National Guard to actually bring law and order to the streets of our country. When you sent those same National Guard officers to become corrections officers, after you destroyed the lives of so many of the hardworking corrections officers of the state, when you broke their union.
###
