Republican Bruce Blakeman on Friday ripped Gov. Kathy Hochul for New York students’ dismal test scores under her watch — vowing to place STEM initiatives at the heart of public education if he wins in November.
“You’ve got to elevate our kids. Kathy Hochul has no clue how to do that,” Blakeman said during a campaign stop in The Bronx.
“She’s had an opportunity for the last five years, and the test scores have gone down, down, down,” he railed. “It’s not acceptable.”
Blakeman, the Nassau County executive, also hammered Hochul for her infamous 2024 claim that “young black kids in the Bronx” don’t know what a computer is — insisting youngsters in the borough “know more about a computer” than the governor will “ever know.”
“She doesn’t know what is going on our communities. She doesn’t even know what’s going on in our school system,” he said.
“The fact is we have to support our children’s education and not put them down. We have to elevate them.”
Blakeman was joined by Bronx community leader and educator Sheikh Musa Drammeh, who highlighted New York’s bleak 17th-place national education ranking in US News & World Report — and questioned how that was possible when the state spends more per pupil than any other in the country.
The nearly $40,000-per-pupil spending in 2025 didn’t translate to equally soaring results, Blakeman and Drammeh noted.
Instead, New York 4th graders scored 22nd in the nation for reading while 8th graders scored 24th, according to the gold standard National Assessment of Educational Progress exam.
Fourth graders also scored 38th in math and 8th graders scored 27th.
“It’s not the teachers’ fault. It’s the fault of the curriculum, the Board of Regents, the Chancellor of Education and Kathy Hochul,” Blakeman said.
The Long Island pol said New York public schools should be zeroing in on science, technology, engineering and math — known under the acronym STEM — and said he’d make those subjects the core of the state’s curriculum if he wins the gubernatorial race on November 3.
“That is the future of America. That is the future of New York State. That is the future of New York City. And it’s the future of our children and grandchildren,” Blakeman said, adding that he’d work closely with Drammeh to help roll out such education initiatives in the Bronx.
Blakeman making the announcement in the Bronx also appeared to be a highly deliberate — in addition to highlighting Hochul’s inflammatory computer comment throughout the campaign, he has been making a concerted effort to pitch himself to voters in the Boogie Down.
The borough largely voted Democrat in the 2024 presidential election, but it also had the sharpest swing right from 2020 to 2024 across the entire state. The Bronx went 69% for Joe Biden in 2020 in his winning race against Donald Trump, then just 22% for Kamala Harris in 2024, when she lost to Trump, thanks in large part to Latino voters, Politico reported.
Blakeman was polling about 10 points behind Hochul earlier this week, though it’s unclear if his lauded showing in their sole debate on Tuesday could move the needle.
With the election less than three weeks away, Blakeman has been frantically trying to get his message out to voters, urging them not to elect the incumbent Democrat governor to a second, full, four-year term.
“We have to concentrate on the things that will give our kids a better future,” he said. “We need to lay the foundation and create the foundation for them to be successful in their future life here in New York.”
A Hochul campaign spokesperson slammed Blakeman over his friendship with Trump in response.
“While Governor Hochul passed universal free school meals, a bell-to-bell cell phone ban in schools that’s transforming classrooms and helping kids learn, and a path to universal childcare, Blakeman sent childcare in Nassau into a death spiral and said nothing when Trump gutted funding for New York’s schools,” the rep said in a statement. “The governor has stood up for New York students, Blakeman has only stood up for Trump.”
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