Gov. Kathy Hochul is once again on the defensive after comments made during a visit to a Buffalo church drew criticism from some who labeled her remarks racially insensitive. “Checks are coming out soon. Watch the mail, OK?” Hochul told the congregation at True Bethel Baptist Church on Sept. 7, “Don’t spend it all in one day. Get something you really need, OK? Don’t stop by the liquor store, OK? Buy something for the kids — buy them some food.”
Bishop Darius Pridgen, the church’s pastor and a former Buffalo Common Council president, argued critics were misinterpreting her intent. “I was surprised to hear that there were some people who took the governor’s comments as racist,” he said.
“Kathy Hochul being at True Bethel is like family coming home. The crowd was very appreciative of her being there, of the remarks she made, because they were in context to the sermon I preached that morning.”
Pridgen explained that his sermon, titled “Before You Crash Out,” centered on avoiding destructive decisions. “She was commenting on not crashing out and not making bad decisions, which I had just preached,” he added, according to Politico
.Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes, who is a member of the church, also defended Hochul. “I know that she’s Irish, and if you understand the history of a lot of people who are Irish, they have significant issues with alcohol abuse,” she said. “So I don’t think it was intended to be racist at all.”
Still, the exchange adds to a string of missteps Hochul has faced with Black communities. Last year, she was criticized after saying, “We have young Black kids growing up in the Bronx who don’t even know what the word computer is.”
The backlash then was swift, with Bronx leaders calling the remark “harmful, deeply mis
informed and genuinely appalling.”Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado, who is challenging Hochul in the Democratic primary, said her recent statements reflect a troubling pattern. “That’s a pattern — and it’s racist,” he argued. “It reduces whole communities to harmful stereotypes and strips away the dignity of parents and children alike. Words matter, especially when they come from the highest office in our state.”
Hochul apologized at a press conference Sept. 8. “I wasn’t making any generalization about any particular community at all,” she said. “My intention is never to offend anybody in that context, and I regret that that is the takeaway for some people.”
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