Kathy Hochul, next New York governor: 'I'm ready for this'

Kathy Hochul, the next governor of New York, said Wednesday that she is "fully prepared" for the job as she becomes the first woman to hold the office.

Hochul will replace Governor Andrew Cuomo in just under two weeks, following his resignation Tuesday amid a sexual harassment scandal.

Cuomo, a Democrat, resigned in the wake of New York Attorney General Letitia James' report last week that found he sexually harassed 11 women. He denied the allegations but apologized for "offending" the women and blamed "generational" and "cultural shifts".

Hochul, a 62-year-old mother of two from Buffalo, New York, is relatively unknown to many New Yorkers. But the centrist Democrat has decades of experience in politics. She represented New York's 26th District in Congress in 2011 and 2012.

In a speech in Albany on Wednesday reintroducing herself to New Yorkers, Hochul said: "I'm ready for this. It's not something that we expected or asked for, but I'm fully prepared to assume the responsibilities as the 57th governor of the state of New York." 

Hochul said the White House had tried to reach out to her but she was traveling. She did speak with former Democratic presidential nominee and senator Hillary Clinton, US senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer, and state Assembly leaders. 

Hochul has been lieutenant governor since 2015. Cuomo picked her because of her close ties to voters in western New York. 

During her speech Wednesday, Hochul said she had a "vision" for New York, adding, "I will fight like hell for you every single day." 

She will spend the next two weeks putting her cabinet together and was quick to distance herself from Cuomo and his staff.

She said no one named in the attorney general's report on Cuomo who did anything "unethical" will remain in her administration. 

"It's very clear that the governor and I have not been close, physically or otherwise. So, I've been traveling the state and do not spend much time in his presence. ... At the end of my term, whenever it ends, no one will ever describe my administration as a toxic work environment."

She will pick a lieutenant governor in the next two weeks and said she wants her choice to be "diverse" and "inclusive".

Speaking to reporters, she said her immediate focus is on tackling the coronavirus pandemic. 

She also praised her own work to raise the minimum wage, create affordable housing, and tackle opioid abuse — which she said had touched her own family — and clean energy. 

Hochul has backed New York's SAFE act, a gun-control law.  She also supported the state's Green Light Law, which permits undocumented immigrants to get driver's licenses.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who had a famously difficult relationship with Cuomo, described Hochul as "a very reasonable person".

Senator Gillibrand said Hochul will be an "extraordinary governor". 

US Congressman Brian Higgins, a Democrat for Buffalo, expects Hochul to govern differently from Cuomo. 

"Kathy is perceptive, but does not suffer fools," he told The Buffalo News newspaper.

A 1980 graduate of Syracuse University, Hochul went on to earn a law degree from Catholic University of America in 1984. 

She swapped private practice for politics — working as an aide to former US representative John J. LaFalce and the late former US senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

She worked in local politics as a member of the Hamburg town board for 14 years and then was clerk of Erie County.

In 2011, she won a seat in her conservative district after Republican congressman Christopher Lee resigned because he sent a woman a shirtless photo of himself that was posted online. 

Hochul served on the House Armed Services Committee and House Homeland Security Committee before losing a re-election bid in 2012 to Republican Chris Collins, who would later resign in an insider trading scandal.

Known as an advocate for women facing domestic and sexual violence, Hochul led Cuomo's "Enough is Enough" campaign, which fought sexual assault on college campuses. 

The granddaughter and daughter of steelworkers who "fled poverty in Ireland", she grew up in Hamburg. She is one of six children from an Irish Catholic background. 

After her father got a college degree, he managed an information center. Her mother ran a shelter for women who had survived domestic violence.

Hochul is married to William J. Hochul Jr, a former US attorney in western New York who now works for Delaware North, a concessions and gambling giant in Buffalo. He is expected to keep his job when his wife becomes governor.

Cuomo, in his resignation speech, expressed confidence in the lieutenant governor's ability.

"Kathy Hochul, my lieutenant governor, is smart and competent," he said.