Governor Hochul: “This Budget is about you and your parents. And when I proposed my Budget back in January, I said, ‘Your family is my fight.’ And I wanted to make sure I could fight for your moms and dads to have more money back in their pockets.”

Hochul: “Everything's getting so much more expensive — your sneakers, your clothes, your backpacks, and it's been hard. It's hard for them to pay the bills, so I knew that if I could focus on families, help your parents… it's all going to add up to about $5,000.”

Earlier today, Governor Hochul signed the FY 2026 Budget into 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 will have photos of the event here.

B-ROLL of the Governor's visit to Johnson City Middle School stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

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

?You're getting a real lesson in government. You are the first students, I'm going to guess in the history of the state, to ever be there for the signing of the New York State Budget. And I wanted you here because this Budget is about you and your parents. And when I proposed my Budget back in January, I said, “Your family is my fight.” And I wanted to make sure I could fight for your moms and dads to have more money back in their pockets.

Everything's getting so much more expensive — your sneakers, your, your clothes, your backpacks, and it's been hard. It's hard for them to pay the bills, so I knew that if I could focus on families, help your parents out — the inflation rebate will help thousands of families here in this area. Every child that's under the age of four. Anybody have little siblings under the age of four? Anybody? Okay, that's $1,000 for your family. Anybody over age four here? Yes, you all are. That's $500 for your parents, for each one of you and your siblings. Okay. Add it up. That's money back for your parents, but also covers the complete cost of school breakfast and lunches, so mom and dad don't have to pay for that. And also a tax cut for your parents. So it's all going to add up to about $5,000.

So when you go home today, as part of the Mother's Day present, say, “Mom, I just heard from the Governor say, ‘We're gonna get $5,000 back in our pockets.’” Does that sound like a nice gift? Yeah. All right. All right. You can help take credit for it because you're here to witness this signing.

But also this cell phone ban is so important for your health. The health of all the students that are coming behind you who should never even know you could have a cell phone in school. You are the first. You are the ones that went ahead of everybody else, and I want to thank your leadership for that as well. But every student in the state of New York, starting in September, will have the opportunity of having a distraction free school experience where they can learn and study instead of looking at memes, look at their math, and get things done in school and be more productive and it'll benefit them overall.

So I wanted to say I delivered on my promise. I'm going to continue keeping my promises. And you are here to witness this. So what we do is we have the bill that was passed by the Legislature late last night, says Senate, the Assembly, and now what is it looking for? The Governor's signature. And here we have the bill, and now is when you get to applaud the signing of the bill you're here to watch.