Good morning. It’s Friday. Today we’ll look at some of the major bills approved by the State Legislature in an end-of-the-session flurry. And we’ll see why Harvey Weinstein, perhaps the original #MeToo abuser, will be staying in prison.
Credit…Hans Pennink/Associated Press
It may seem surprising that as the legislative session wrapped up, New York lawmakers focused on strengthening the state’s gun control measures and abortion protections. New York already has some of the toughest gun restrictions in the United States, and the rights afforded by Roe v. Wade have been enshrined in state law since 2019.
But Democrats, who control both the State Senate and the Assembly, felt pressure to take additional steps as Republican-controlled legislatures elsewhere work to loosen gun restrictions, ban abortion and erode voting rights, my colleagues Luis Ferré-Sadurni and Grace Ashford report.
“It’s clear that in the federal level, they’re in a state of paralysis,” said Assemblywoman Linda B. Rosenthal, a Democrat from Manhattan. “But there is still more to be done to ensure against every outlandish idea that every other state might have.”
Still, Carl Heastie, the Assembly speaker, said that “a real call to action by the federal government has to happen as well.”
Other Democratic priorities, like beefed-up protections against evictions, stalled. And Heastie himself came under pressure from fellow Democrats as time ticked down to pass several bills in another area where New York seeks to lead the country: climate and the environment. Last-ditch efforts to push them through were still going on early Friday.
Guns: Requiring new permits, and banning body armor for most civilians
New York became the first state to enact gun-related legislation following shootings in Buffalo and Texas that left a total of 31 people dead.
One bill raises the minimum age to buy a semiautomatic rifle to 21 (the Buffalo gunman was 18). Other measures will bar most civilians from buying bullet-resistant body vests (the Buffalo shooter wore one) and revise the state’s so-called red flag laws.
Another measure paves the way for the “microstamping” of shell cases with a unique alphanumeric code to help authorities identify the gun a bullet came from.
New York, which already bans military-style assault rifles, will also now require new users of long guns to obtain a permit. That means a background check and a safety course are necessary before buying a semiautomatic rifle.
Preparing for an influx of women from other states seeking abortions
Faced with a looming Supreme Court decision that could strike down Roe v. Wade, Democratic leaders united behind a bill package meant to protect abortion service providers.
One bill will sharply limit the ability of New York law enforcement authorities to cooperate with criminal or civil cases in states where abortion has been restricted. Others are meant to ensure doctors have access to malpractice insurance and aren’t hit with professional misconduct charges for serving patients from states where abortion is a crime.
One climate bill returned from the dead. Otherswere down to the wire.
A growing segment of state Democrats say New York is behind schedule in passing new laws needed to avert the worst impacts of climate change and to reach the ambitious goals set out in a 2019 climate law to phase out fossil fuels. A surge of public pressure late Thursday helped push through a first-in-the-nation bill to slow the development of cryptocurrency hubs, which had earlier stalled in the Senate. And after midnight in the Assembly, proponents were still pressing a similar campaign to force a vote on a bill to let the state’s power authority build publicly owned renewable-energy projects alongside private companies. But Heastie, the speaker, stood firm in blocking a bill to stop fossil-fuel hookups in new buildings, which gas utilities oppose.
Reinforcing voting-rights protections that have slipped nationally
The John Lewis Voting Rights Act that passed on Thursday invokes a similarly named federal bill that would restore parts of the Voting Rights Acts of 1965, which has been gutted by the Supreme Court.
New York’s measure restores court supervision of election processes in areas with records of discrimination, requires more translation of election materials to languages other than English and protects voters from obstruction or intimidation.
A bid to catch up on backlogged repairs in public housing
Lawmakers approved a bill to unlock several billion dollars for the New York City Housing Authority, which, my colleague Mihir Zaveri reports, needs a staggering $40 billion for repairs and renovations to the nation’s largest public housing system. The measure lets the authority lease 25,000 apartments to a new entity that can borrow the money, preserving tenants’ rights.
Weather
Expect more showers and areas of fog in the early morning, but the clouds will part for a mostly sunny day near 80. The evening is partly cloudy, with temperatures dropping around the low 60s.
ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING
In effect until Monday (Shavuot).
The latest New York news
Crime and a lawsuit settlement
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Buffalo shooting: The man accused of carrying out a racist massacre at a Buffalo supermarket was arraigned on more than two dozen charges, including murder and domestic terrorism motivated by hate — believed to be the first time that such a law has been leveled against a defendant in New York.
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Avenatti sentenced: A Manhattan judge sentenced the lawyer Michael Avenatti, who was convicted of diverting payments to himself and is already imprisoned in another case, to four years in prison.
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Undercover bathroom patrols: The Port Authority Police Department has agreed to end the plainclothes bathroom patrols for good, according to a settlement reached this week.
More local news
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Nightlife law:Mayor Eric Adams proposed changing the city’s zoning regulations to allow New Yorkers to dance more easily in bars and restaurants.
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Free college money: Nearly every kindergartner attending public school in the city received $100 for college through a city program. Now, parents and guardians have the chance to claim up to $200 more.
Arts & Culture
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Celebrate Pride: Pride is almost back to normal this year, with in-person festivals and a 100th birthday celebration for Judy Garland. Here’s a selection of events and festivities.
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Postpartum care (for a hefty price): The newly opened Boram Postnatal Retreat in Manhattan offers new mothers able to pay up to $1,400 a night the support and pampering that too few receive.
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The New York Issue: For the Times Magazine, our writers wrote about how waves of migration remade the city, asked people why they moved to the city, interviewed strangers living together to navigate the housing crisis and spoke to locals helping refugees fleeing from Ukraine and Afghanistan.
In one of the original #MeToo cases, Weinstein’s conviction stands
Even as a clamor rises over the verdict in the civil case of Johnny Depp and Amber Heard, which some people see as a blow to the movement to increase accountability for sexual harassers and abusers, a New York appeals court has upheld the criminal conviction that, perhaps more than any other, came to symbolize the #MeToo era.
On Thursday, the court upheld Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 conviction on felony sex crimes. This, my colleague Jonah E. Bromwich reports, increases the likelihood that Weinstein, a disgraced movie producer, will serve a significant portion of his 23-year sentence.
The court rejected Weinstein’s central argument: The jury should not have heard from three women who testified that the producer had assaulted them in alleged incidents for which he was never charged.
But Judge Angela M. Mazzarelli wrote in the unanimous opinion that women had provided “useful information” that showed Weinstein’s pattern of behavior. They demonstrated, the judge said, that Weinstein did not see his victims as “romantic partners or friends” and that “his goal at all times was to position the women in such a way that he could have sex with them, and that whether the women consented or not was irrelevant to him.”
The Manhattan district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, said the appeals court had upheld “a monumental conviction that changed the way prosecutors and courts approach complex prosecutions of sexual predators.”
But a lawyer for Weinstein, Barry Kamins, said he would appeal to the decision to New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals. It is not automatic that the court will take the case.
Reports of Weinstein having sexually abused women appeared in The New York Times in fall 2017, leading dozens of others to speak about their own experiences and eventually igniting what became known as the #MeToo movement, a global repudiation of sexual misconduct by powerful men.
In 2020, a jury found Weinstein guilty of two felonies: a criminal sexual act in the first degree and third-degree rape. He was acquitted of two charges of predatory sexual assault. He is awaiting trial in Los Angeles on charges including forcible rape and forcible oral copulation.
METROPOLITAN diary
The metropolis is quiet
Dear Diary:
The metropolis is quiet now
The raucous daytime voices are stilled
One speeding car on the boulevard
The last reveler returning home
A magic time this is before dawn
The click of one’s shoes on the pavement
A sound heard rarely and only then
The market stalls packed and put away
Coffee brews at the all-night Starbucks
Cappuccino in a real cup please
A seat by the window to observe
The vanguard of the citizenry
The subway’s web begins tingling now
Peripheral people are coming
Keepers of the keys open their shops
As the eastern sky shows clouds tinged red
One sees movement behind the storefronts
Preparation for the flood to come
The city awakes, stretches and yawns
Soon the trains will deliver the crush
There is still time to breathe fresher air
Walk slowly down the empty sidewalk
And be beguiled by this new facet
Of the wondrous city by the sea.
— Ted Bishop
Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.
Glad we could get together here. See you on Monday — A.B.
P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.
Melissa Guerrero, Jeff Boda and Ed Shanahan contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at [email protected].
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