Governor Hochul Announces Inflation Refund Checks Up to $400 Coming This Fall To 8.2M New Yorkers

Governor Kathy Hochul today announced that inflation refund checks up to $400 will be sent this fall to 8.2 million households across New York State. Checks will be mailed directly to eligible New Yorkers starting in October and will continue through November. There is no need to apply, sign up or do anything to receive a check. Governor Hochul secured and enacted this initiative in the FY 2026 State Budget as part of her ongoing commitment to putting money back in the pockets of New Yorkers. The State Budget also enacted the Governor’s initiatives to cut taxes for the middle class to their lowest levels in 70 years, expand New York’s Child Tax Credit to up to $1,000 per child, and ensure universal free school meals to save families around $1,600 per child.

“Starting in October, over 8 million New Yorkers will get an inflation refund because it’s simple — this is your money and we’re putting it back in your pockets,” Governor Hochul said. “I’ll never stop fighting to help your family address the rising cost of living — and that’s why I also delivered on my promise to cut taxes for the middle class, expand the child tax credit and ensure free school meals for every student.”

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ICE sent into frenzy to return longtime Trump golf employee mistakenly deported to Mexico



A longtime former employee at one of President Donald Trump's golf clubs was mistakenly deported to Mexico, The New York Times reported — sending U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement into a mad scramble to correct the error and bring him home.

"Alejandro Juarez stepped off a plane in Texas and stood on a bridge over the Rio Grande, staring at the same border that he had crossed illegally from Mexico 22 years earlier," reported Luis Ferré-Sadurní and Hamed Aleaziz. "As U.S. immigration officials unshackled restraints bound to his arms and legs, Mr. Juarez, 39, pleaded with them. He told them he was never given a chance to contest his deportation in front of an immigration judge after being detained in New York City five days before."

As it turned out, the Department of Homeland Security had mistakenly put him on a deportation flight instead of sending him to a detention facility in Arizona ahead of his immigration hearing, to which he was entitled.

"Their actions probably violated federal immigration laws, which entitle most immigrants facing deportation to a hearing before a judge — a hearing Mr. Juarez never had," said the report. "ICE officials raced to decipher his whereabouts, exchanging bewildered emails and contacting detention facilities to pinpoint his location, according to internal ICE documents obtained by The New York Times. It is unclear how many other immigrants like Mr. Juarez have been erroneously removed, in part because ICE has not in the past tracked such cases."

Juarez "had worked for more than a decade at a Trump Organization golf club in New York," noted the report, and suddenly found himself expelled from the United States.

Similar administrative mistakes have happened on other occasions, most notably with Salvadoran migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was deported from his family in Maryland to the infamous CECOT megaprison in his home country, despite a court order prohibiting his removal there. After months of denying they had jurisdiction to repatriate him, the Trump administration finally did so, but then immediately hit him with flimsy gang charges, and started shopping around for any other country that would accept him, including several in Africa.

Stephen Miller – Do ICE officers have ‘federal immunity’ as White House official Stephen Miller said?

“To all ICE officers, you have federal immunity in the conduct of your duties.”