Governor Hochul considers banning people from wearing masks on the NYC subway

Gov. Kathy Hochul says she is considering at least a partial ban on masks on the New York City subway after images and videos of masked anti-Israel protesters on a train ricocheted across social media earlier this week.

At a news conference at the state Capitol on Thursday, Hochul said she has begun discussions with Mayor Eric Adams and state lawmakers about what a mask crackdown would look like and how to develop exemptions for health and religious reasons. The town hall had no immediate comment, but confirmed it was looking into the matter.

But Hochul made it clear she wants to see mask restrictions in some form, which she said would help discourage crime on public transportation.

“We will not tolerate individuals using masks to avoid responsibility for criminal or threatening behavior,” Hochul said. “My team is working on a solution, but in a subway, people should not be able to hide behind a mask to commit crimes.”

His team will need help from state lawmakers to enact a mask ban, the governor acknowledged.

For over a century, New York had a law on the books that allowed police to charge a person with loitering if they were “masked or disguised in any way by unusual or unnatural dress or alteration of the face” and that person “loiters, stays, or congregates.” in a public place with other people thus masked or disguised.

This law, originally passed in 1845, became the subject of legal wrangling in the early 2000s, when the Ku Klux Klan challenged it and ultimately lost.

But the pandemic and civil unrest that followed the death of George Floyd finally took hold.

In June 2020, three months into the pandemic and less than a month after Floyd’s death, the state legislature repealed the masking part of the loitering law, with a bill note noting that the law had “been used to criminalize protest” and had broken the rules at the time. -Government. Andrew Cuomo’s masking mandates in the pandemic era.

State lawmakers finished their 2024 session at the Capitol last week. They are not expected to return to Albany until January, although they could return before then to fill a hole in the MTA’s capital budget created by Hochul’s decision to “pause” a toll that will soon go into effect for drivers in the busiest areas. parts of Manhattan.

Hochul said she wants to think about ways to allow religious face coverings as well as surgical masks that people wear for health purposes. She also said they need to think about how to accommodate Halloween and other cultural celebrations.

“It’s time for a reset because we’re looking at this as an option,” she said. “But again, I want to work with our legislative leaders and figure out how we can solve this problem in a thoughtful way.”

Spokespeople for Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) and Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins ​​(D-Yonkers) could not immediately be reached for comment Thursday. .