Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman took a break from the gubernatorial campaign trail to unveil his $4.6 billion budget proposal for 2027. Blakeman, the GOP gubernatorial candidate taking on incumbent Gov. Kathy Hochul in November, filed the nearly $5 billion budget on Tuesday evening — aiming to keep property taxes flat while adding…
Page F2From§Eachthe milkman edition — 17 September 2026
Blakeman backs guest-worker program for undocumented immigrants, budgets more cops the next day with no tax hike.
As it ran on the front
Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman released a poll on September 8 showing him four points behind Governor Kathy Hochul — campaign-commissioned, four points, close enough to keep the trail interesting. Five days later, on September 13, he stood in front of drivers and promised to end what he called Hochul's "war on drivers," pledging to kill the state's 2022 mandate that new cars sold in New York be zero-emission by 2035. The pitch there: government has no business telling you what to buy.
The next day, September 14, he stood in front of a different room and made a different pitch. Blakeman is campaigning on a "guest worker" program for undocumented laborers — specifically, people who have lived in the U.S. seven years and haven't committed a crime. The pitch there: government should make room for the people it can't currently employ on the books.…
…(cont) One day after that, September 15, he filed his 2027 budget with the county legislature — $4.6 billion, 36 new positions the county is calling more cops, property taxes held flat. The wire caught up to it the next evening. Nothing in the filing says where the new hires' salaries come from, hon; filing a budget is not the same act as funding one, and the record only tells us the number Blakeman proposed, not the number he'll defend when the legislature votes.
Line the three rooms up and the arithmetic doesn't reconcile; nothing in the filing says it has to. Drivers get deregulation, at no dollar cost noted anywhere in the record. The guest-worker pitch prices its relief in years, not dollars — seven of residency, one clean record, paid by the applicant, not the county. The cops are funded by a flat tax rate and a proposal that still has to clear a vote before it's a budget at all.
That's three audiences, three separate deals, filed within the same week by the same official under the same letterhead. The poll from September 8 explains the pace: four points down is close enough to keep making promises, not close enough to stop.
“Three rooms, three sales pitches, same guy — that's not confusion, that's the trick. Tell the driver you're killing the rules, tell the immigrant you're the reasonable one, tell the taxpayer you found more cops for nothing, and count on none of them comparing notes. Somebody's paying for those 36 new badges, and Blakeman hasn't said who.”
“Look, a flat tax rate with more police on the street is called fiscal management — that's not a trick, that's a budget. And the guest-worker piece only covers people who've been here seven years with a clean record, which is about as careful an immigration position as you'll find on either side. Did I just call a guest-worker program for undocumented immigrants a conservative talking point? That's not — let me get back to you on that.”
The receipts
· GOP’s Bruce Blakeman backs ‘guest worker’ program for illegal migrants — but there’s a catch from the morgue, 14 Sep 2026
· Bruce Blakeman poll claims he’s within 4 points of toppling Hochul in NY governor’s race from the morgue, 8 Sep 2026
· GOP’s Bruce Blakeman promises to end Hochul’s ‘war on drivers’ by killing Dem’s NY green mandates from the morgue, 13 Sep 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.