Earlier today ( January 24 2024 ), Governor Kathy Hochul delivered remarks at Planned Parenthood Empire State Acts’ 2024 Day of Action in Albany.
Thank you. I’d like to call up our Lieutenant Governor because we are in solidarity, Antonio Delgado. Let’s give him a round of applause. Thanks for being here. You can stay. You can go sit down. You want to sit down? Whatever makes you happy, LG. I know how hard you work.
I am so proud to be here once again, standing with the warriors of the State of New York in pursuit of justice and women’s rights. You are on the front line. You’re the ones that are marching and using your voices and sending messages all over the country in support of women who do not have the same rights that we have here in New York.
What’s really heartbreaking is that we used to celebrate and acknowledge the anniversary of Roe v. Wade. Gather here in a celebration and say, “Yes, yes.” New York was not just after Roe v. Wade, we were three years ahead of the nation ensuring that these rights are protected. So yes, we’ve gathered for many, many years and talking about how we can continue to support the women of our State. But now, after that dark, dark day in June of 2022, the world was turned upside down.
For the first time, the march toward progress and further rights in our nation took many steps backwards. We’ve never seen that before. And we didn’t just take that. We stood up. We gathered together. And I want to thank the leaders of the Legislature – our Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, and Carl Heastie our Speaker, for banding together with their conferences, coming together and saying that we will make sure that we that every woman in New York knows that her rights are protected now and forever.
That is without question.
We put money toward our health care providers, $35 million to help abortion providers be able to handle the influx of more people coming from other States. We made sure that insurance companies covered your right to an abortion so you didn’t have to worry about your own expenses.
And we protected the providers from other States that might be trying to prosecute them if they’re taking care of a woman who came to New York. We took those steps, but we also knew there was one more thing we needed to do. And I called an extraordinary session, and what an extraordinary session it was. Our leaders stood up, banding together and saying, we need to make sure that no future Governors, no future Legislatures can ever strip away these rights that we have here in the great State of New York.
And that is why the right to an abortion will be enshrined forever after this November’s election, because it’s on the ballot.
And I have called on the Governors of other States to do the same. Because if they have the courage, individually, 50 States to enshrine these rights, we can thwart what the Supreme Court is trying to do to our nation. We can set them backwards by showing that the power rests with the people and the power occurs at the ballot box.
In places like New York and every other place where abortion rights have been on the ballot since the Dobbs decision, the rights have moved forward. Women’s rights were protected. The voters selected the right to an abortion for women, and it is now enshrined in their constitution. That’s what we want to make sure happens all across the nation.
So we’ll stand up. We’ll continue to march. We’ll be their allies and make sure that we are protected here in New York, but also be there for our sisters across the nation, like little Katie Cox, a 31-year-old mom trying to have her third child. And what that woman went through on the national stage was abhorrent to me. That she was driven from her own State of Texas to have to go somewhere else for a right that was hers up until a couple years ago.
That’s what we’re fighting for. That’s what we’re fighting for. And our advocate you just heard from, what a heartbreaking story. This is America in 2024. We have these rights and we’re going to take them back starting right here in the great State of New York. Thank you everybody. Let’s march on. Let’s keep the fight going.
Let’s keep up the fight.
Albany New York. January 24 2024
Source: 2024 Day of Action | Governor Kathy Hochul (ny.gov) – Big New York News BigNY.com
