{"id":133909,"date":"2026-02-15T03:03:05","date_gmt":"2026-02-15T03:03:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/133909\/"},"modified":"2026-02-15T03:03:05","modified_gmt":"2026-02-15T03:03:05","slug":"back-in-albany-mamdani-says-tax-the-rich","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/133909\/","title":{"rendered":"Back in Albany, Mamdani says \u2018tax the rich\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s second trip to Albany this week sounded a lot like his first \u2013 including a call to tax the rich.<\/p>\n

Mamdani appeared before a packed room in the Legislative Office Building in Albany Saturday at the 55th annual conference of the New York State Association of Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic, and Asian Legislators, better known as Caucus Weekend. At a forum alongside mayors from across the state, Mamdani\u2019s message echoed his testimony Wednesday at Tin Cup Day, where he spotlighted the city\u2019s budget deficit.<\/p>\n

He explained that his administration has inherited \u201cthe greatest fiscal crisis we\u2019ve seen since before the Great Recession,\u201d referencing what he said is the city\u2019s $7 billion gap<\/a> to close \u2013 a gap that he\u2019d said was $12.6 billion<\/a> just two weeks earlier, before making revisions.<\/p>\n

Mamdani said one way to address this would be taxing the rich. \u201cI’ll always say, I believe the state should increase taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers,\u201d he said, garnering cheers and applause from the audience.<\/p>\n

Mamdani campaigned on raising taxes on corporations in the city and a 2% increase on income tax for city residents making over $1 million, but he needs the state government to authorize the hikes. The mayor\u2019s comments came after The New York Times reported Mamdani is planning to skip a Feb. 25 tax the rich rally<\/a> in Albany, out of deference to Gov. Kathy Hochul, who\u2019s firmly opposed to raising taxes as she seeks reelection.<\/p>\n

Mamdani has stayed close to the governor and endorsed her for reelection, and it isn\u2019t clear just how hard he\u2019ll push to raise taxes in this year\u2019s state budget. To that end, Mamdani said another proposal for addressing the city\u2019s budget gap was improving the relationship between the city and the state.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are looking for a partnership with the state in making sure the city can be on a firm financial [footing] because we know that working people did not create this crisis,\u201d Mamdani said. \u201cSo I’m looking forward to a new era, a new relationship between the city and the state, not one of pettiness that we’ve seen for so long.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mamdani also spoke on the housing crisis and threats from the federal government including ICE detainments before departing early from the panel to head back to New York City. Before the panel, he delivered remarks at luncheons for CUNY, Harlem seniors and labor unions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Although Saturday was his first appearance at Caucus Weekend as mayor, Mamdani is not a stranger to the conference. He was a member of the association during his tenure as an\u00a0Assembly member for western Queens, and is friendly with many of his former colleagues. The mayor called hirsute Assembly Member Brian Cunningham \u201can inspiration for many, especially if you want to know how to grow the best beard in the conference.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s second trip to Albany this week sounded a lot like his first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133910,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[57145,15660,47044,426,9,24,47790,55,54,56,82],"class_list":["post-133909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-caucus","tag-corporate-taxes","tag-income-taxes","tag-kathy-hochul","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-budget","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}