Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul convened a roundtable of survivors of domestic violences, advocates and local district attorneys to discuss New York State’s commitment and investments in combating domestic violence and supporting survivors. Governor Hochul proposed record-level funding in her Fiscal Year 2026 Executive Budget that will expand access to domestic violence prevention and sexual assault prevention programs, improve the medical and law enforcement response to intimate partner abuse and sexual violence, and better support survivors of domestic violence. In order to further support survivors — and deliver the justice they rightfully deserve — the Governor is pushing for essential changes to the state’s discovery process to ensure their abusers are held accountable to the fullest extent of the law.

VIDEO: The event is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

AUDIO: The Governor's remarks are available in audio form here.

PHOTOS: The Governor's Flickr page has photos of the event here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

 Thank you again everyone. I appreciate this. We just finished a very meaningful, impactful conversation with the people whose lives are so intertwined with our victims of domestic violence. I'm referring to our district attorneys and I want to thank the District Attorneys and incoming president of DAASNY, the statewide association, and Rensselaer County District Attorney Mary Pat Donnelley, has joined us. The District Attorney from Westchester County Susan Cacace and also right here in Albany, District Attorney Lee Kindlon, as well as the advocates, and Bea Hansen, who runs their Office of Victim Services.

These are tough conversations to have. Anyone who knows a victim or themselves are a victim because of something that happened to their family member or someone who sat there and held the hands of victims as they came into the district attorney's office, only to have to tell them later that, “I'm sorry, your case has been dismissed on a technicality,” and have to really deal with the emotional trauma where someone is yet victimized, not once, but twice. So, all of them have lived this, and I wanted to reach out to them as we're having conversations, important conversations about how we can talk about.

In the past there was a great need to change the laws that were definitely skewed toward the prosecutors back in 2019. The pendulum was way over here, but now we've seen in practicality, the pendulum has swung way over here, where there are so many cases that are now being dismissed, and especially in the area of domestic violence.

And as I mentioned, this is particularly cruel. I think back to my mother's own story, what she witnessed as a child and carried that trauma with her entire life. But she decided to use that pain and harness it to alleviate the pain of others, and that stuck with me. That became my family's life journey as well as we tried to reach out. I can't tell you how many times I would help victims or watch their children when they were heading into court with my mother. Literally holding their hand to give them courage to stand up to someone who at one time, perhaps pledged love and devotion to them who now became their tormentor, trapping them in their home, a place intended for refuge and compassion, that became sometimes a torture chamber.

That's what is going on in our state, and we can no longer turn a blind eye to their cries for help. And when they finally take that step and say, “I'm going to get help, I'm not going to let my children live a life of seeing this hatred and this pain and violence, I'm going to take them out of it.” That is a courageous, courageous step that many cannot take financially or emotionally, but those who do come forward to tell their stories to the police and to district attorneys who want nothing more than to bring them justice and have them find out because of the law that was changed, where the standard is now so low for a case to be thrown out. Literally on technicalities, and that's all we're talking about, to see the statistics of how many cases and also domestic violence convictions going from 31 percent, which is still not very high, down to 6 percent as a result.

Once this gets out there, who is going to step forward and say, I'm going to put myself through this pain and bring this case, you know who gets away with it then the perpetrators, the violent offenders, and that is wrong. That is why we're taking these steps here and having important conversations in these halls as we speak, and their voices are so important to me, and I'm grateful to them for being part of this journey. One that should not be difficult, should not be difficult to decide who we're standing with.

Again, we'll always make sure that defendants get all the rights they're entitled to under our system. It's a founding premise of our democracy and our constitution. We believe in that. But why not have people stand up for the victims as well? That's all we're trying to do here. And the choice between fair and speedy trials, which are important objectives, but also letting dangerous abusers off the hook is a false choice. That is what is being portrayed here. We can and must do both. And I will simply harken back to the 2019 reforms. We did not make those historic changes in order to let abusers walk free. But that, my friends, is exactly what is happening.

So, we have legislation that specifically when it comes to victims of domestic violence, expanding the scope of automatic redaction, changing the timing requirements, but also misunderstanding, these are human beings. These are people whose cries for help have led them out of their home into a public space subjected to ridicule and abuse from the abuser, even in a courtroom. But when they're willing to do that and we turn our backs on them, we must look at ourselves and say, “Is this a society we want to have to continue here in the State of New York?” I say, no. And that's why I'm fighting hard, fighting very hard to make these necessary changes.