Gov. Kathy Hochul isn’t saying bye to President Biden — unlike her lieutenant governor.
Hochul doubled down Thursday on her support for Biden and downplayed the apparent rift with Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado, who a day earlier sent political shockwaves across New York and beyond by calling for the 81-year-old president to drop his re-election bid.
“It’s not a surprise that there are various voices that emerge with different opinions within the Democratic Party,” Hochul said during an unrelated news conference. “I stand firmly with the President.”
Delgado is one of an increasing number of Democrats who’ve taken their private anxieties over Biden’s electability public after his doddering debate performance June 27 against former President Donald Trump.
One source described Delgado’s call for a new Democratic presidential nominee as “just weird,” given its break with Hochul’s steadfast support for Biden.
Hochul said Thursday that Delgado gave her a heads up on his move. She also brushed off a report by City & State New York that she was “furious” with her lieutenant governor.
“Do I look furious?” she rhetorically said to a staffer during the news conference. “Well, there is your answer.”
At least one prominent New York Democrat expressed something other than bafflement or condemnation toward the Hochul-Delgado drama.
Former Gov. David Paterson said Hochul’s move to let Delgado speak his mind about Biden was “masterful” considering the lieutenant governor rarely gets the spotlight.
But he was quick to point out that other governors, himself included, weren’t nearly as lenient.
“If you had done that, your new office would be at a seaport or on the Canadian border somewhere and your staff would be cut and your office itself would be constructed of cardboard,” he told The Post.
Paterson noted that former Gov. Eliot Spitzer, also a Democrat, once gave him some leeway when he was lieutenant governor on a disagreement the two had about legislation trying to address police use-of-force.
But he acknowledged that was far different than calling for the party’s national standard bearer not to run for re-election.
“It’s not even in the ballpark,” he said.
Hochul argued that focusing on Biden’s age distracted from the “existential threat of Donald Trump” becoming president again.
In attempt to re-focus the conversation from Biden’s fitness for office, she hauled out a summary of Project 2025 — a controversial policy blueprint for a second Trump administration that includes calls for sweeping abortion and immigration restrictions — and contended it will cause nightmares.
Private meetings with Biden, including right after the debate, leave no doubt he’s fit to serve, Hochul said.
“I’ve seen him have these conversations, they’re engaged, they’re thoughtful, they show that he is in command,” said Hochul, who last saw Biden in Washington DC on July 3.
“I saw nothing to be concerned about in terms of his ability to make sure that we are victorious against Donald Trump in November.”