Hochul’s Perverse Priority

Crime is soaring statewide; New York is still a long way from recovering its preCOVID jobs and faces an exodus of high earners and top firms can work just as well in no-income-tax Florida. Yet Gov. Hochul is laser-focused on . . . protecting abortion rights in a state that already fully guarantees them.

Hochul’s big ideas include writing abortion rights into the state Constitution and setting aside $35 million to financially support abortion providers if the Supreme Court strikes down Roe v. Wade.

Yet New York providers won’t need help, since nothing will change in this state, whatever the high court does.

Oh, Hochul & Co. are also eyeing a state constitutional amendment to protect gay marriage, supposedly fearing that the Supremes might reverse that decision, too. (Huh? “Righty” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the last decision expanding gay rights; Chief Justice John Roberts voted for it, too.)

Yes, Hochul has primary and general elections to win this year. But any need for political pandering (and endless fund-raisers) is no excuse for dodging her duties. She already lost her best chance to start turning New York around when she caved to Legislature’s tax- and spending-hiking budget without winning serious fixes to the criminal-justice “reforms” that are fueling crime statewide.

But she should be still pushing for basics like the city’s affordable-housing tax break, along with whatever she can get on crime.

Most New Yorkers want a governor who’ll fight for them, not one pandering on an issue that’s irrelevant in their state.