Four Things New York Lawmakers Must Do Before Trump Takes Office

The Trump Administration promises to target women, immigrants, people of color, LGBTQ people, and protesters while undermining the rule of law, just as he did during his first term. But this time around, Trump and his enablers will be more focused, strategic, and relentless in their efforts to destroy our rights and democratic norms. The policies contained in Project 2025 –created by many former Trump officials – offer some harrowing examples of what is likely on the horizon. To meet this moment, New York lawmakers must mount a proactive, smart, and comprehensive defense against what is coming.

There is no time to waste. Our rights depend on lawmakers acting quickly and boldly to shore up our protections before Trump takes office on January 20, 2025.

Protect Immigrant New Yorkers

Immigrants helped build New York. A second Trump Administration poses an unprecedented threat to our immigrant communities. Trump has proudly pledged to arrest immigrants, vastly expand immigration detention centers, and carry out the largest mass deportation program in our nation’s history. State and local authorities will be a centerpiece of Trump’s deportation agenda. Immigration authorities have long relied on collusion with local police and other government actors to gather information, detain, and deport people. This is already happening across New York, and it is allowed because of loopholes in our law. Trump is hellbent on making sure this collusion increases under his presidency.

The legislature must act to protect immigrants. Before Trump takes office, the legislature must pass the New York For All Act, which would bring New York in line with states like Illinois, Washington, and California that refuse to use their resources for federal immigration enforcement. The legislature must also pass the Dignity Not Detention Act to keep local jails from renting out cell space to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for profit. Finally, the legislature must pass the Access to Representation Act to ensure New Yorkers facing deportation have a lawyer by their side, and the Clemency Justice Act to reduce the chances that criminal convictions create negative immigration consequences.

Protect Reproductive Freedom and LGBTQ Rights

A Trump presidency presents an existential threat to reproductive freedom and LGBTQ rights. Trump and his allies have made clear that overturning Roe v. Wade was just the beginning—their ultimate aim is to eliminate access to abortion across the country and erase transgender people from public life. To do this, Trump and his allies will attempt to weaponize defunct Victorian-era laws; rescind FDA approval for medication abortion; drastically cut federal funding for reproductive health care and gender affirming care; roll back privacy protections, and misuse federal law enforcement and surveillance capabilities against those who provide, seek, receive, and support abortion care and gender-affirming care.

New York must do everything in our power to protect our communities. First, we must ensure we are adequately funding the delivery system for abortion care in New York. Second, we must increase privacy protections for health information—including electronic health records and commercial health data. To do this, the state must pass legislation that gives New Yorkers control over our commercial health data and our electronic health records to make sure these records do not fall into the wrong hands and are not used against us. Third, New York must make it harder for the federal government or other states to investigate, prosecute, and punish people for providing, seeking, or facilitating reproductive health care or gender affirming care. This includes ensuring that  New York protects all health care providers who offer gender-affirming or reproductive health care.

Protect Privacy and Guard Against Surveillance

Project 2025 outlines chilling plans to expand the use of unchecked and emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence. It also pushes for further data collection and information sharing through government entities and private data brokers to advance Trump’s draconian law enforcement and deportation agendas. These efforts paint a dystopian picture in which technology undermines our fundamental rights.

All our privacy and civil liberties remain at risk unless and until the New York legislature passes necessary protections to catch up with 21st century technologies. New York must pass the Digital Fairness Act to protect our personal information and ensure algorithms do not undermine anti-discrimination laws. Lawmakers must also create safeguards for Digital IDs, ban biometric surveillance, and limit law enforcement technologies such as license plate readers and drones. State leaders must update our warrant protections to be in line with current technology by passing the Electronic Communications Privacy Act and by prohibiting the use of reverse location and keyword search warrants.

In addition, Albany must stop partnering with federal authorities to conduct abusive surveillance operations by terminating state and federal data sharing arrangements. They must also end or drastically curtail our participation in joint federal, state, and local task forces and fusion centers.

Protect Protest

Trump’s hostility toward peaceful political protesters—at least those who don’t align with him—is hardly a secret. He’s called for their imprisonment, suggested they be beaten, and reportedly implored the military to use force against them. He once even told the chairman of the joint chiefs to “just shoot them.” New York lawmakers preparing for a second Trump Administration must be ready to respond to similar calls for police brutality, counter-protester violence, and military crackdowns, with a forceful, principled defense of peaceful political assembly.

Lawmakers must shore up basic First Amendment guarantees by codifying affirmative protections for protesters. Lawmakers should advance measures to eliminate law enforcement access to military weapons and armored vehicles, to restrict police use of drones, and to restrict the use of chemical and acoustic weapons and crowd-control munitions.