Mayor Zohran Mamdani chats with Gov. Kathy Hochul as they arrive at Staten Island University Hospital Community Park on Monday, April 27, 2026. Luiz C. Ribeiro for NY Post Hello 911, I’d like to report a crime.
That’s the hard and honest truth about the fiscal shenanigans being foisted on New Yorkers by Gov. Hochul and Mayor Mamdani.
Like Wimpy, the classic cartoon character who perpetually promised that “I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today,” the governor and mayor are sticking New York taxpayers with huge debts for years to come.
Despite their cheery promises about all the free goodies they’ll deliver, their logic is as flawed as their motives are sinister.
Mamdani gets big chunks of his socialist agenda funded by statewide taxpayers who had no say in his election.
And Hochul hands him the money as a massive down payment for what she hopes will be his supporters’ votes in November.
The naked buying of votes with public money is a trick perfected by Tammany Hall.
Hochul is obviously an admirer, and started her re-election campaign earlier this year by kicking in billions to Gotham as soon as Mamdani took office.
With Tuesday’s huge boost, she is paying top dollar, as the total she has committed to the city through various ways approaches $7 billion — to help Mamdani and herself.
The price tag is outrageous, but the logic is sound.
Hochul knows that a huge Democratic turnout in the city is crucial for any Dem hoping to win a statewide election.
Because recent GOP candidates have been unable to top 30% of the vote in the increasingly blue five boroughs, no Republican has won a statewide election since George Pataki captured his third term as governor in 2002.
But the weak link in the scam unfolding before us is that neither the city nor state can afford the enormous cost of the burdens being imposed.
The net effect is that both Gotham and Albany will be stuck with increased spending levels as well as enormous debts and borrowing costs for a generation.
Hochul’s help to Mamdani through various channels effectively commits both entities to staggeringly high taxation rates for the foreseeable future.
Not just the current officials, but their successors will be saddled with the costs of what has happened since Mamdani’s election last year and Hochul’s decision to go all in by helping to fund his radical agenda.
The Big Lie that both the mayor and governor are selling is that they are helping to tackle the rapidly rising costs of living in the city and state.
In truth, by handing out buckets of taxpayers’ money, they are wildly exacerbating the already sky-high taxing and spending that have made life in New York wildly unaffordable.
They are right that there is an affordability crisis, but they are dead wrong in thinking that more of the same policies that got us here will now suddenly solve it.
In fact, they are ensuring that the affordability crisis will remain and grow ever more dire.
Consider two recent examples of where the money is going.
Mamdani wants to build a city-owned grocery store in each borough, and has picked a site in Manhattan for the first one.
His office said construction would cost $30 million — four times higher than private ventures, The Post reports.
He also promised free, city-owned daycare centers for city workers.
The first site, in lower Manhattan, will be renovated at a cost of $10 million before it opens in the fall.
The annual cost to the city for each of 40 children expected to enroll is about $57,500, officials say.
On the other hand, the average cost of privately owned daycare facilities in the city comes in at less than half that price per child.
Even city Comptroller Mark Levine, a Democrat and reliable ally of both officials, threw some cold water on Mamdani’s budget plan as soon as it was announced Tuesday.
He noted in a statement that the city is banking on more than $5 billion in one-time saving measures and short-term pension moves without addressing the fact that City Hall “continues to spend more than we take in, even in a year of record revenues.”
He also cites concern over vague promises to lower the soaring costs in special-education and rental-assistance programs.
And he says there is no plan for addressing “deeper structural imbalances” that already show the city will face staggering gaps of multiple billions between revenues and spending in the next several years.
His view reflects the overriding fact that neither the state nor city budget achieves any significant, real-life savings.
Delaying programs, such as reducing mandated class size in the city, only puts off the cost and pain until another day unless the policies are changed.
Then there’s the pied-à-terre tax, which Hochul got through Albany and which Mamdani cites as proof he is fulfilling his vow to “tax the rich.”
If bigger and more expensive programs were the way to nirvana, the state and city already would be there.
The budget Mamdani sent to the City Council for adoption Tuesday came in at a whopping$124.7 billion.
Hochul’s latest version, which is now before the Legislature, is $270 billion.
Ten years ago the adopted state total was a mere $153 billion.
The enormous increases are staggering and a testament to out- of-control spending.
Rather than turn the city and state into appealing destinations for businesses and residents, the size and cost of government help explain why both the city and state are seeing out-migration of residents to lower-cost destinations.
In addition to the cost of living, the quality of life continues to slide downhill.
As a value proposition, New York is increasingly not worth the sky-high price to many fed-up residents.
In theory, the discontent should be dry tinder for a fire-breathing Republican.
Fittingly, Bruce Blakeman, the Nassau County executive and Hochul’s fall opponent, issued a blistering statement about her bailout for Mamdani, calling it “The Largest Daylight Robbery in NY History.”
He promised that “when I’m Governor, the stealing stops. I’ll cut your taxes, slash your utility bills in half, and put your hard-earned money back where it belongs — in your pocket, not Mamdani’s.”
It’s a powerful message, but polls indicate that not enough people are hearing it.
A recent survey found that 64% of registered state voters said they did not know anything or much about Blakeman and his campaign.
There’s obviously plenty of time between now and the election for him to fix that.
However, that also means Hochul has months to keep trying to buy four more years in Albany.
