New York lawmakers now have the highest salary after giving themselves a $32,000 raise

The New York legislature voted last week to give itself a $32,000 pay raise, making them the highest paid lawmakers in the nation.

The Senate voted 33 to 23 with the Assembly 81 to 52, giving the salary boost effective Jan. 1, 2023, the Washington Examiner reported.

While the legislature is controlled by the Democratic majority, seven Democrats defected and voted against the pay hike.

“We’re just going to work hard and about to come back into session in January to continue trying to do the best we can for families in New York,” Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said after the vote.

New York Republicans were very critical of the pay hike, saying that state residents should get priority.

“Today’s ‘Special Session’ was called for the solitary purpose of making New York lawmakers the highest paid state legislators in the nation,” Republican state Sen. Anthony Palumbo said, according to the Examiner.

He added, “This is at a time when families and businesses are struggling to make ends meet due to historic inflation and high food and energy costs. Instead of pay raises, lawmakers’ focus should have been on reducing these burdens and making needed changes to our broken criminal justice system.”

“They were thinking, ‘It’s not going to be well received, want to time it around Christmas so it will be drowned out with other negative news over a congressional spending bill,’” Palumbo said.