Senator Oberacker Calls Out Smokescreen "Termination" Bill

ALBANY, 03/03/21 -- State Senator Peter Oberacker (R/C – Schenevus) today condemned a bill authored by the majorities in the legislature to purportedly “terminate” Governor Cuomo’s emergency executive powers.

“Every single legislative session day since I was elected, I have voted to rescind the governor’s emergency powers,” said Senator Oberacker. “Between the nursing home crisis, chaos surrounding the vaccine distribution, and now sexual harassment charges, not to mention a looming state budget deadline, it is clear, the governor should no longer run the state by fiat. 

“Now the Democrat majority is advancing a bill they claim will end the governor’s emergency powers, but in fact it allows them to go on indefinitely.  Perhaps when they were writing the bill ‘terminate’ autocorrected to ‘extend forever’.  The bill is a complete smokescreen and an attempt to deceive the public.  I will not support the bill when it comes to the floor of the senate and I urge others to take a defiant stance as well.”   

Instead of immediately revoking the governor’s emergency powers, as Republican members of the Senate and Assembly have repeatedly called for, this bill -- which has been given the governor’s stamp of approval --would: 

• Remove the current expiration date of the governor’s emergency powers, currently set to expire on April 30, 2021 -- instead, that expiration date is now gone; and

• Allow the governor to extend or modify the nearly 100 executive orders he has instituted since the start of the pandemic, as long as certain Democrats are allowed to review and comment. This proposal allows him to do so with little more than a courtesy call to the legislature because those comments will be accepted even after an order takes effect. 

Republicans in the Senate and Assembly have advanced legislation multiple times to fully repeal the governor’s authority, reinstitute legislative checks and balances, and get back to work. The bill that’s been proposed is barely a fraction of what’s necessary.

“Today marked one year since the governor took over the state.  It is far past time for his one-man rule to end and for legislators to start making decisions that reflect local needs and concerns to restart our economy and help our state recover,” Senator Oberacker concluded.

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