If Cuomo resigns, could Kathy Hochul thrive as governor?

Kathy Hochul hasn't made many headlines in her six years as lieutenant governor – but she's made unlikely friends in unlikely places, from the Town of Arcade to the borough of Brooklyn.

In Arcade, Republican Supervisor Douglas Berwanger credits Hochul with winning Wyoming County a $20 million state health care grant and for maintaining a presence in a rural swath of the state where many Democrats fear to tread.

And in Brooklyn, Bishop Orlando Findlayter of the New Hope Christian Fellowship credits Hochul with setting up a job fair in his community.

Findlayter endorsed Hochul over fellow Brooklynite Jumaane Williams in a 2018 Democratic primary, thinking, in part: "God forbid something happens and Andrew Cuomo is no longer governor. ... Who would step in and run the state? I thought Kathy Hochul was better prepared to do it."

Suddenly, Findlayter's scenario could become reality. Cuomo finds himself staring down multiple controversies, including allegations of sexual harassment that have prompted calls for his resignation. And while Cuomo has said he won't quit, politicos now wonder if Hochul, 62, could end up as the state's first female governor.

If that happens, it is clear that Gov. Kathy Hochul would be the temperamental opposite of the temperamental Cuomo, who has kept Hochul at a bit of a distance. Hochul's personal warmth serves as her political fuel, an asset that's allowed her to forge deep political ties across the state while pushing the governor's message.

But is that enough? If Cuomo resigns, could Hochul thrive as governor of a pandemic-wracked state driven by downstate voters and dominated by ambitious downstate politicians? 

"I think, for her, it's going to be challenging, given the environment and given the reality of how little time there is before the next election cycle," said Dottie Gallagher, president of the Buffalo Niagara Partnership, who otherwise praises Hochul's commitment to Western New York and good government and her willingness to listen. "But I know there's nobody that's going to work harder at it than she will."

On the road

Cuomo picked Hochul to be his second-term running mate in 2014. And ever since, Hochul has been cutting ribbons and giving speeches and visiting corners of the state that the governor is too busy to visit.

For the sixth straight year, she visited all 62 New York counties last year, this time logging more than 500 interviews, largely to promote Cuomo's record in handling the coronavirus pandemic. In prior years, she served as the chief sales agent for many other Cuomo priorities, from raising the minimum wage to enacting paid family leave to bolstering child care.

Cuomo hasn't always been equally supportive of Hochul. With Hochul facing a tough primary against Williams, Cuomo's forces tried to push her off the Democratic ticket and into a race for her old congressional seat in 2018, but she refused to budge and ended up winning her primary.

But that episode illustrates a well-known fact in Albany. Hochul isn't exactly Cuomo's right-hand woman.

While Hochul appeared at Cuomo's side at his Covid-19 events in Buffalo, "I honestly don't remember seeing her at any briefing" on the pandemic in Albany, said Bill Hammond, senior fellow for health policy at the Empire Center for Public Policy. "It hadn't struck me as weird because I've just gotten accustomed to the role of the lieutenant governor is to do public events, but not necessarily to be involved in the room where it happened."

That fact could either help or hurt Hochul now that the Cuomo administration is engulfed in controversy over its decision to withhold data regarding the scope of Covid-19 nursing home deaths.

Given that Hochul has never been part of Cuomo's inner circle – including when the decision was made to return Covid-19-positive patients to their nursing homes – "she could say with a lot of credibility: 'that wasn't my call,' " said Hammond, who filed the lawsuit that pried loose the actual data on nursing home residents who died in hospitals and other facilities.

Then again, some could deem Hochul guilty by association, said New York political consultant Hank Sheinkopf.

"I think the issue will be: 'How did she not know?' " Sheinkopf said.

A look at Hochul's Twitter feed shows how.

She's been busy doing other things: meeting via video calls with young participants in the Model UN, touting workforce development funding, meeting with residents of communities across the state and taking voters behind the scenes via the #howshedoesit hashtag. There, you can see Hochul riding her bike, toasting ice wine marshmallows, throwing an ax at the annual Adirondack challenge and, most notably of all, packing her suitcase.

The friends she's made

Hochul beams her way through every public event and takes pride in her travels.

"This is relationship building," she said in a December interview.

Hochul's relationships with Berwanger and Findlayter stand as proof of that.

Berwanger, the Arcade supervisor, met Hochul in 2011, early in her 19-month tenure in Congress.

"She never forgot Wyoming County or the town of Arcade," Berwanger said.

Hochul and her husband, former U.S. Attorney William C. Hochul who is now an executive with Delaware North, appear annually at Arcade's Maple Weekend and always carve out time for a pancake breakfast with Berwanger. He said that in 2016, when the state was divvying up federal health care grants, Hochul and State Sen. Patrick Gallivan, a Republican, made sure that the Wyoming County Community Health System got $20 million.

"You know, I'm proud to call her my friend," Berwanger said. "Obviously, I'm a Republican and she's a Democrat but I'm one of those kinds of people who likes to reach out to the people who can do the job."

Findlayter, the Brooklyn minister, tells a similar tale. He met Hochul during her first race for lieutenant governor, when she had dinner with a group of New York clergy.

"She was so personable," Findlayter said. "All of the clergy left that meeting saying: 'Let's do everything we can to help her.' "

Hochul has kept in touch ever since, Findlayter said. Not only did Hochul help arrange that job fair; she also appeared on Findlayter's Thursday night Facebook Live show.

"For me, the big thing is that she comes back to the community, not only to say thank you, but to really work with community leaders," Findlayter said.

Hochul has also built a deep reservoir of support with women's rights advocates by traveling to dozens of college campuses in support of the state's "Enough Is Enough" legislation combating sexual assault.

"It seems clear to me that she's prioritized this," said Stephanie Nilva, executive director of Day One, a New York nonprofit that combats youth dating abuse and domestic violence. 

Hochul has also prioritized the personal touch throughout her political career. Assembly Majority Leader Crystal D. Peoples-Stokes recalled that when she ran for Congress in 1998, Hochul, a Hamburg town board member at the time, went out of her way to help.

Peoples-Stokes said Hochul has now been doing the same sort of thing statewide, to her own political benefit.

“When you help people, they help you back,” she said.

The trouble she'd face

Hochul has traveled thousands of miles to get herself well-liked, but several sources said her likeability would likely get her only so far in the governor's mansion.

That's because if she were to become governor, she'd face a number of troubles.

Hochul might take charge amid the worst pandemic in a century, with the state government facing a federal investigation into its Covid-19 nursing home policies. State sources said there's no sign that Hochul has prepared for a possible transition – something, they said, that would be sure to provoke the current governor's wrath.

On top of that, Hochul would enter the executive mansion with less than two years left in the current governor's term, giving her little time to build a track record. 

Meanwhile, downstate rivals would be lurking. Sheinkopf, the New York political consultant, said Attorney General Letitia James is seen as a possible gubernatorial candidate, as is Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli. 

Any rivals would likely take aim at Hochul's record as Erie County clerk and a member of Congress, when she stood significantly to the right of where most Democratic voters are in left-leaning New York.

In 2008 she opposed giving driver's licenses to undocumented immigrants. That is an issue that is likely to resurface if Hochul were to run for governor, said David Swarts, who preceded Hochul as county clerk.

"People should have the opportunity to grow and change positions," Swarts said. "I think Kathy will have to develop a message to explain that growth and that change."

Similarly, rivals may accuse her of mishandling the 200-person clerk's office, as her successor, now-Rep. Chris Jacobs, did in 2012 when he coped with a huge backlog of unprocessed documents left over from Hochul's tenure.

And of course, the biggest obstacle Hochul would face would be her status as an upstate resident.

“The playing field for any statewide candidate of either party is heavily tilted downstate,” said former State Attorney General Dennis C. Vacco, one of the last Republicans elected statewide. “That’s where the votes are, that’s where the money is, that’s where the media is.”

No one from Buffalo has been elected governor since Grover Cleveland in 1882, and no one from upstate has served in the executive mansion in a century.

Given that history, Albany is rife with speculation that if Hochul were to succeed Cuomo, downstate Democratic leaders would push her to not run for reelection.

Then again, Brooklyn's Jumaane Williams tried to push Hochul out of her current job in 2018, and he failed, just as Hochul predicted he would.

“People who have written me off saying it can’t be done because I’m from Buffalo will be proven wrong,” she said a few weeks before the primary. “I’m working with an underdog mentality, but I’ve done that with all 11 of my elections.”