New York’s workers' rights and community justice organizations are preparing for a second Donald Trump presidency. Twenty-seven coalitions, including Long Island Jobs with Justice and Long Island Progressive Coalition (LIPC), signed a letter to Gov. Kathy Hochul urging her administration to implement sweeping labor and immigration protections and strengthen social welfare.
“The letter is really centered around the needs of the people of New York, the working class, and what we’re seeing is that Trump has made it very clear he’s vindictive,” said Joe Sackman, LIPC’s chief of staff. “He’s willing to punish the people who he thinks are his enemy. New York is probably going to be a big target for him.”
The coalition of the signatory organizations said, “[Republicans in Washington] will attack working people, and immigrants and queer people and people of color at every opportunity – unless they’re met with principled, clear and forceful opposition.”
The letter outlines nine key areas where the organizations want to see state action: raising the statewide minimum wage, increasing social benefits, Implementing and enforcing labor protection, implementing universal childcare, enacting the New York Climate Change Superfund Act, creating “permanently affordable” housing, fighting for fair pay for home care workers, passing New York for All, and increasing government revenue.
Sackman predicts “major cuts” to New York’s budget under Trump.
“It's federal money that comes in for permanent programs like Medicaid, Head Start, SNAP [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program], Title One funding to schools, NYCHA [New York City Housing Authority],” he said. “If we don't have the money that is promised to be there for the federal government, then it's going to create a lot of suffering.”
President-elect Trump campaigned for tax cuts that amount to nearly $4 trillion over a decade, which, if implemented, could cause a significant deficit in the government budget. For his tax plans to be coded into law, it necessitates cutting back on government spending like in federal programs or social welfare. According to a Wall Street Journal report, Trump’s proposed elimination of income tax on social security benefits can actually result in the Social Security Fund becoming insolvent one year earlier than anticipated in 2032.
The letter also urges the governor and legislature to defend people of color and immigrants by implementing policies like New York for All to support them in light of Trump’s mass deportation and denaturalization proposals. The New York act would prohibit state and local officers from enforcing federal immigration laws, and working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Sackman said New York and Long Island in particular can’t afford to lose immigrants.
“They contribute billions of dollars into our economy by their labor force,” Sackman said. “If you were to remove these people, steal them away from us, from our communities, you're going to really cause an economic disaster on top of humanitarian disaster.”
According to a recent report by the American Immigration Council, immigrant households paid nearly $600 billion in taxes in 2022. They also fill critical jobs in sectors like agriculture, construction, and healthcare and play a key role in safeguarding the existence of Medicaid and Social Security.
“If you take a million people out of our economy, say overnight, inflation is going to increase,” Sackman said. “There will be unemployment. Small businesses will suffer. The price of goods is going to go up.”
He said mass deportations are also impractical.
“Trump says he wants to build houses and things like this. Governor Hochul says we need to build more housing, right? Well, a large number of the workers who do that work are people who are probably undocumented,” Sackman said.
The LIPC said they'll continue to push local and statewide elected officials to adopt some of the previously outlined measures. Sackman said it’s important to increase civic engagement and public education on these issues now more than ever.
“If we're not going to prepare for [a second Trump administration], we're going to suffer for it, and that's poor leadership if New York doesn't step up and do what needs to be done to protect its citizens from these heinous policies,” Sackman said.
