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Rep. John Katko said
he will vote to impeach Donald Trump, becoming the first House Republican to formally back the president s ouster. “To allow the President of the United States to incite this attack without consequence is a direct threat to the future of our democracy,” the Syracuse-area Republican said in a statement Tuesday evening, ahead of a vote
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A new pick for state Senate Finance Committee secretary, a top Democratic staff position in state budget negotiations, has raised eyebrows among progressives concerned that the conference has poached David Friedfel, the top state policy analyst of the Citizens Budget Commission, an independent research organization that advocates conservative fiscal policy.
Friedfel will play a lead role in negotiations between the Senate, Assembly and governor’s Division of Budget, as well as in internal discussions among senators, according to longtime Albany observers. Friedfel’s appointment comes as progressives push for a spate of tax-the-rich proposals to meet a projected $63-billion four-year deficit, while centrists, including Gov. Andrew Cuomo, argue that the wealthy might flee the state if their already-large tax burden increases.
https://www.afinalwarning.com/481802.html (Natural News) Several months after Gov. Andrew Cuomo rejected calls for tax hikes and begged the rich to return to New York, the governor is now saying that the city has to increase taxes to offset an $8.7 billion deficit caused by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
New York will suffer if Congress doesn’t help, says Cuomo
On Dec. 9, Cuomo warned that New York would be forced to lay-off thousands of workers, increase taxes, fares, tolls and government borrowing with “devastating” consequences if Congress doesn’t help the state.
Democrat Cuomo also said that the state needs to raise taxes even if federal aid was approved to plug its current projected deficit bill of $30 billion for the next two years.
Capitol Confidential By Edward McKinley on December 30, 2020 at 9:48 AM
ALBANY David Friedfel, Albany County’s commissioner for the Department of Management and Budget from 2012 to 2016, is taking over as the new secretary to the state Senate Finance Committee.
“David comes to the Senate with a wealth of knowledge and experience in financial management and state budgetary affairs,” wrote Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, a Yonkers Democrat, in a memo to Senate Democrats obtained by the Times Union.
Friefel announced his departure earlier this week from his position as director of state studies for the Citizens Budget Commission, a nonpartisan nonprofit that studies the dollars and cents of New York City and state and advocates for sound fiscal policy. He worked there for the previous five years. Before that, he spent time as a budget examiner at the executive-branch Division of the Budget and as a staffer on the Assembly side with the Ways and Me