Blakeman pitches tax cuts, bashes Hochul on labor

In an interview with The Chief, Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman outlined his proposals to lower taxes and utility bills, defended the state’s current minimum wage and pledged tougher penalties for those who assault public-sector workers. Blakeman, who is challenging incumbent Governor Kathy Hochul, touted his record on collective bargaining and has received endorsements from several labor organizations, including Steamfitters Local 638, Transport Workers Union Locals 106 and 252, the New York State Correctional Officers & Police Benevolent Association and multiple police and court officers’ unions.

The Chief also reached out to Hochul’s office to request an interview but received no response.

The Chief: You’ve proposed cutting state income taxes for New Yorkers earning less than $50,000 a year. With housing, food and transportation costs putting pressure on working families, what else should the state do to help workers keep up with the cost of living?

Bruce Blakeman: Kathy Hochul has made our state unaffordable. We are the highest-tax state in America. Our budget is twice the size of Florida’s, and there are four million more people in Florida.

It’s one more tax after another, and I am going to cut taxes. Your first $100,000: no income tax, no state income tax. If you’re a joint filer, $50,000 with no state income tax if you’re a single filer. That will save the average taxpayer between $2,000 and $7,000.

Utility bills are 70 percent higher than the national average. Kathy Hochul has approved 48 utility rate hikes. We are one of the most expensive states as far as energy is concerned.

I will cut our utility bills in half, just like Pennsylvania cut their utility bills to be half of ours, by investing in the natural gas that we have an over-100-year supply of here in New York State and by ending the subsidies for foreign corporations to build energy projects that produce very little energy and are very expensive, like solar farms in upstate New York and wind turbines in the middle of the ocean.

In addition, hundreds of thousands of jobs left New York just last year.

That’s over a million jobs that have left New York since Kathy Hochul became governor. I want to create more jobs and have better-paying jobs with better benefits by increasing economic activity and inviting businesses to come here rather than running them out of the state.

By putting money in people’s pockets, cutting taxes, cutting utility bills and creating better jobs, it’ll make it more affordable for every New Yorker.

The Chief: You’ve also called for creating better-paying jobs and increasing employment. Do you support raising the state’s minimum wage, or do you believe it is sufficient as it stands?

Bruce Blakeman: No, I think that minimum wage right now is where it needs to be. Increasing the minimum wage would be a job killer for entry-level jobs.

Minimum wage is for people who are in entry-level jobs, people who have part-time jobs, people who are going to school or learning a trade, who need a job to fill in, like working at Burger King. If you make it too expensive, businesses will find a way to eliminate these jobs, such as using robotics and other technology.

Just the other day, I wanted to get a cup of coffee, and I had to make my order on a computer and not give it to an individual, a human being. So that’s what businesses are doing now.

I think the minimum wage is where it should be. We should not increase it. Increasing it will kill more entry-level jobs for people who need a part-time job, a temporary job, or someone who is just starting off at 16 or 17 years of age, a couple of bucks.

The Chief: More and more, The Chief has been covering the use of artificial intelligence by corporations, including algorithms and chatbots that can deceive consumers or shortchange workers. How would you approach AI regulation as governor?

Bruce Blakeman: Artificial intelligence is the fastest-growing business in the world, and I think it needs to have reasonable regulations.

The fact that there is a revolution in the way that we do business through artificial intelligence doesn’t have to be a job killer. We need to adapt to it. We need to understand it. We need to regulate it. In many instances, I think that it will enhance business.

But in the short term, I have the same concerns everybody else does about how far we let AI go, how we regulate it, and whether it can be used in a destructive way. I know there are a lot of positive uses for it, but there are also dangers as well. So there need to be guardrails.

The Chief: You’ve highlighted public safety and declining crime rates in Nassau County during your tenure. In New York City, overall, in 2026, crime has also fallen, but assaults on public-sector workers, including transit employees and police officers, have increased. What is your public-safety agenda, and what would you do as governor to reduce violence against public workers?

Bruce Blakeman: I’ll comment on that in a second. Let me just talk about unions for one moment.

My record with respect to unions that I deal with on a regular basis has been stellar.

When I came into office, we had four unions that didn’t have contracts. We had a longevity controversy that had been going on for 10 years. I settled the longevity issue, and I got contracts that were approved by all of the unions that hadn’t had contracts for three or four years.

I’m a big believer in collective bargaining. The negotiation process is a good way to resolve contractual issues.

And Kathy Hochul is the most anti-labor governor in the history of America. She fired 2,000 corrections officers. She has had nurses come in from out of state to break picket lines of nurses here in New York.

The Chief: You’ve criticized Hochul’s handling of labor disputes, including the nurses’ strike and the Long Island Rail Road negotiations. How would you have approached those situations differently?

Bruce Blakeman: She has a terrible record with respect to labor, and I have a very good record with respect to labor.

Now, on public safety, I think we need stricter laws. I don’t buy that crime has gone down because violent crime has increased. Crime in the subway is out of control. Seven murders already. That’s twice as many as we had last year.

I believe that we need to change the laws that make it easier for criminals to operate and that we should increase penalties for people who assault public-sector workers, because that is completely unacceptable. I don’t want the people who work for me to be put in danger.