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Our only agenda is to publish the truth so you can be an informed participant in democracy. We need your help. More Info ### I would like to contribute One Time Monthly Yearly Join Now ![](\\" ![](\\" Bill Cassidy stated on February 7, 2021 in remarks on NBC\'s \"Meet the Press\": “New York, for all of their complaining, Gov. Cuomo\'s complaining, has only had a 1.5% decrease in revenue” due to the coronavirus pandemic. ![\\"true\\"](\\" mostly-false/6a6ef6075c162fdccf5eb960e683dcd1.jpg.\\") ![\\"barely- true\\"](\\" false.jpg\\") * Economy * State Budget * New York * Coronavirus * Bill Cassidy ![\\"Sen.](\\" Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., appears on NBC\'s \"Meet the Press\" on Feb. 7, 2021. ![\\"John](\\" By John Pullano February 26, 2021 # How much did New York’s revenue suffer in the pandemic year? #### If Your Time is short • New York State saw its revenue decline by 1.5% during calendar year 2020. But its fiscal year runs from April to March. • The calendar year figure that Cassidy cited includes nearly three months of 2020 with relatively normal, pre-pandemic economic activity, distorting the budget picture. • State budget officials have already projected larger revenue declines over the full fiscal year. See the sources for this fact-check How has New York state fared in collecting revenue during the coronavirus pandemic and the resulting economic turmoil? Not so badly, according to Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., who said recently that New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has been exaggerating the fiscal hit to his state. In a Feb. 7 interview with NBC’s Chuck Todd on \"Meet the Press on Feb. 7, Cassidy was asked about what actions the Senate needs to take to help state and local governments experiencing fiscal shortfalls in the wake of the pandemic. Cassidy acknowledged that some states have faced budgetary difficulties, but said others have not, including Democratic-run states such as New York. \"New York, for all of their complaining, Gov. Cuomo\'s complaining, has only had a 1.5% decrease in revenue,\" Cassidy said. The remarks came amid skirmishing between the parties over President Joe Biden’s proposed $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan. The bill is designed to boost the response to the coronavirus pandemic and aid the economic recovery. Biden’s proposal envisioned $350 billion in state and local government aid, but many Republicans have been skeptical of aiding cities and states without more conditions. ![](\\" New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo speaks at the opening of a mass COVID-19 vaccination site in Queens, N.Y., on Feb. 24, 2021. (AP) Has New York’s fiscal hit really been that modest? Ty Bofferding, Cassidy’s director of communications, pointed to a report by the financial institution J.P. Morgan that showed that in the calendar year 2020, New York had an aggregate tax revenue decline of 1.5% compared with 2019. While Cuomo’s administration did not dispute the 1.5% figure, they argue that the calendar year figures are less useful for tracking the pandemic’s budgetary impact than the fiscal year figures, which run from April 1 through March 31. In 2020, January, February and part of March occurred before the pandemic hit. #### Featured Fact-check ![](\\" Instagram_logo_2016.svg/322c808c00e73c217d17772ddd5a0eb5.jpg\\") ![](\\" Instagram_logo_2016.svg/8b142c91ebe468a84a192e6df2b7b994.jpg\\") Instagram posts stated on August 13, 2024 in an Instagram post Kamala Harris voted in favor of passing a law in 2022 to tax tips. ![\\"true\\"](\\" false/33efdb6633e5e2fdc2d4e2f63383a1e0.jpg.\\") ![\\"false\\"](\\" false.jpg\\") By Sofia Ahmed • August 15, 2024 \"Comparing calendar years, as the chart the senator is referencing does, fails to recognize the impact of the pandemic on state revenues,\" said Freeman Klopott, a spokesman for the New York state Division of the Budget. \"Almost the entirety of the first quarter of the calendar year 2020 was un- impacted by the pandemic and growing robustly.\" In other words, the state argues, the calendar-year totals undercount the fiscal harm from the pandemic. \"Unlike the federal government, New York State must balance its budget, and it must do it on a fiscal year basis,\" Klopott said. \"We can’t change the timing.\" The J.P. Morgan report, which focused on advice to investors in municipal bonds, cautioned that its conclusions are \"based on the current data, and are not indicative of future revenues, particularly given the uncertainties on the progress of the pandemic.\" Meanwhile, New York state has projected a significantly larger revenue shortfall for the full fiscal year. A baseline budget from January 2020 projected state revenue of $87.9 billion for the year ending March 31, 2021, said Laura Schultz, executive director of research at the State University of New York’s Rockefeller Institute of Government. But by April 2020, after the impact of the pandemic started to become clear, the state revised its projection to $77.7 billion. That would be an 11.6% decline from the earlier projection, and a 6.2% drop from what was collected in the previous fiscal year. Those numbers are significantly larger than the 1.5% decrease, though final revenue figures won’t be available until after the end of the fiscal year. Our ruling Cassidy said that \"New York, for all of their complaining, Gov. Cuomo\'s complaining, has only had a 1.5% decrease in revenue\" due to the pandemic. New York state saw revenue decline by 1.5% in calendar year 2020. However, the state’s budget is based on a fiscal year that runs from April 1 to March 31, and the calendar year figure Cassidy cited includes nearly three months of relatively normal, pre-pandemic economic activity. This makes it a misleading indicator of the pandemic’s budgetary impact. In fact, state budget officials have already projected larger revenue declines for the full fiscal year. We rate the statement Mostly False. #### Read About Our Process The Principles of the Truth-O-Meter ### Our Sources NBC News, Meet the Press Interview with Sen. Bill Cassidy, February 07, 2021 J.P. Morgan, \"Municipal Markets Weekly,\" Jan. 29, 2021 PolitiFact, COVID-19 aid for states and localities: How dire is the need?, February 11, 2021 PolitiFact, \"What’s in Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan?\" Jan. 15, 2021 Email interview with Freeman Klopott, New York State Division of the Budget press officer, Feb. 16, 2021 Email interview with Ty Bofferding, director of communications for Sen. Bill Cassidy, Feb. 11, 2021 Email interview with Laura Schultz, executive director of research at the Rockefeller Institute, February 18, 2021 ## Browse the Truth-O-Meter ### More by John Pullano ![](\\" ![](\\" Lorraine Lewandrowski stated on February 24, 2021 in a hearing of the New York Senate Agriculture Committee: It’s not currently “legal for a New York state student to have a glass of fresh whole milk.” ![\\"true\\"](\\" ![\\"true\\"](\\" By John Pullano • June 7, 2021 ![](\\" ![](\\" Nicholas Langworthy stated on March 17, 2021 in a mass email: Residents of New York state “pay the highest taxes in the nation.” ![\\"mostly-true\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"mostly-true\\"](\\" mostly-true.jpg\\") By Landon Allison • April 12, 2021 ![](\\" ![](\\" Bill Cassidy stated on February 7, 2021 in remarks on NBC\'s \"Meet the Press\": “New York, for all of their complaining, Gov. Cuomo\'s complaining, has only had a 1.5% decrease in revenue” due to the coronavirus pandemic. ![\\"barely-true\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"barely-true\\"](\\" barely-true.jpg\\") By John Pullano • February 26, 2021 ![](\\" ![](\\" Stefan Mychajliw stated on January 29, 2021 in a press release: \"The (Erie Co., N.Y.) health commissioner makes more than the governor, the vice president of the United States, and has a salary that is comparable to Dr. Anthony Fauci.” ![\\"mostly-true\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"mostly-true\\"](\\" mostly-true.jpg\\") By John Pullano • February 5, 2021 ![](\\" ![](\\" James Tedisco stated on January 5, 2021 in a news release: “New York leads the nation in out-migration of residents, with 126,000 people leaving last year and over one million in the past decade.” ![\\"half-true\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"half-true\\"](\\" true.jpg\\") By Landon Allison • January 26, 2021 ![](\\" ![](\\" Robert Ortt stated on July 20, 2020 in a news release: Says Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Democratic lawmakers are “granting free tuition to illegal immigrants while closing Excelsior Scholarship applications to citizen students.” ![\\"barely-true\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"barely-true\\"](\\" barely-true.jpg\\") By John Pullano • August 20, 2020 ![](\\" ![](\\" Monica Wallace stated on June 8, 2020 in a newspaper interview: Significantly more people died of Covid-19 in two months than died of overdoses all of last year or the year before. ![\\"true\\"](\\" ![\\"true\\"](\\" By John Pullano • June 18, 2020 ![](\\" ![](\\" Kirsten Gillibrand stated on April 21, 2020 in a tweet: “Immigrants make up a majority of essential workers in places like New York City.” ![\\"mostly-true\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"mostly-true\\"](\\" mostly-true.jpg\\") By Jaren Holmes • May 7, 2020 ![](\\" ![](\\" Andrew Cuomo stated on April 11, 2020 in a briefing: Says that under the law, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio “can’t open” the city’s schools. ![\\"half-true\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"half-true\\"](\\" true.jpg\\") By Rachel Kimmel • April 30, 2020 ### How much did New York’s revenue suffer in the pandemic year? * ![](\\" ![](\\" Kari Lake stated on August 8, 2024 in on social media platform X: Ruben Gallego wants to “cut your Social Security.” ![\\"false\\"](\\" ![\\"false\\"](\\" By Sabine Martin • August 29, 2024 * ![](\\" ![](\\" Threads posts stated on August 27, 2024 in a Threads post: Charlie Kirk X post about iPhone storage reveals his top app is Grindr. ![\\"pants-fire\\"](\\" th.jpg\\") ![\\"pants-fire\\"](\\" pants-fire.jpg\\") By Jeff Cercone • August 29, 2024 * ![](\\" ![](\\" Donald Trump stated on July 26, 2024 in remarks at Turning Point USA summit: Kamala Harris “wants to forcibly compel doctors and nurses against their will to give chemical castration drugs to young children.” ![\\"false\\"](\\" ![\\"false\\"](\\" By Grace Abels • August 29, 2024 * ![](\\" ![](\\" J.D. Vance stated on August 25, 2024 in an interview on NBC\'s \"Meet the Press\": “Anything that you lose on the tariff from the perspective of the consumer, you gain in higher wages, so you\'re ultimately much better off.” ![\\"false\\"](\\" ![\\"false\\"](\\" By Louis Jacobson • August 29, 2024 * ![](\\" ![](\\" Dave McCormick stated on August 25, 2024 in a TV ad: Sen. Bob Casey “voted to sell American oil to China.” ![\\"false\\"](\\" ![\\"false\\"](\\" By Caleb McCullough • August 28, 2024 * ![](\\" ![](\\" Mike Rogers stated on August 16, 2024 in a blog post: Rep. 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New York for all of their complaining Gov Cuomo's complaining has only had a 15 decrease in revenue due to the coronavirus pandemic