Oswego County TodayKirsten’s New York Minute!

NEW YORK – Following is a weekly newsletter from U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand:

Welcome to Kirsten’s New York Minute!

Here’s what she’s been up to this week:

1. Getting illegal guns off our streets

Last year, key provisions of Kirsten’s anti-gun trafficking legislation were signed into law as part of a bipartisan gun safety package. Her Hadiya Pendleton and Nyasia Pryear-Yard Gun Trafficking and Crime Prevention Act made trafficking guns across state lines a federal crime and made it easier for prosecutors to go after illegal dealers.

Kirsten’s bill got results. According to the Department of Justice, it has already resulted in dozens of alleged gun traffickers charged and hundreds of illegal guns taken off our streets in communities across the country, including Brooklyn and the Bronx.

2. Fighting for small businesses…

At the height of the pandemic, thousands of small businesses and nonprofits did the right thing and kept their employees on payroll. Congress established the Employee Retention Credit (ERC) to reimburse them, but years later, hundreds of thousands of them still haven’t received the money they’re owed from the IRS.

Kirsten is demanding that the IRS get hard-working small business owners their overdue refunds and speed up its processing to fix this problem.

Read more.

3. …and getting results.

When a Brooklyn restaurant owner reached out to Kirsten’s office about his overdue Employee Retention Credit claims, the office contacted the IRS directly on his behalf. And as a result, the owner received more than $73,000 in refunds.

Individual casework is Kirsten’s top priority. If you need help with a federal agency, contact her here.

4. Curbing student hunger

College students aren’t eligible for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits unless they meet very specific exemptions. That means that thousands of young people across New York may not know where their next meal is coming from.

Kirsten joined students and anti-hunger advocates at Baruch College to announce the Enhance Access to SNAP (EATS) Act, which would expand SNAP eligibility to as many as 290,000 college students in New York and millions more nationwide.

Read more.

5. $$$ ? firefighters

Every year, Kirsten announces millions in federal funding for fire departments across New York State. She visited the Williston Park and East Williston Fire Departments on Long Island to meet with firefighters and check out the new gear they bought with that money.

6. Speaking at Sunday services

Kirsten and NAACP New York State Conference President Hazel Dukes attended morning services at First Baptist Cathedral of Westbury and Union Baptist Church in Hempstead.

7. Remembering Buffalo

Kirsten took time to honor the victims of the tragic Tops supermarket shooting in Buffalo, which took the lives of ten Buffalo residents on May 14, 2022.

8. Joe + Kirsten denounce default

Kirsten joined President Biden at SUNY Westchester Community College to call on House Republicans to work with Democrats to avoid a catastrophic default on the nation’s debt.