By Hank Russell
Bruce Blakeman, the Nassau County executive who is running against Kathy Hochul for governor, launched a digital ad campaign. In his newest ad, he calls out Hochul’s attempt to seize prime farmland for what he calls her “solar scam.”
The ad features country music star John Rich and Alexandra Fasulo, an ecopreneur, financial advocate and freelance writer. Fasulo said that the state’s Office of Renewable Energy Siting ORES “allows things in our community that no other state agency would be allowed to get away with.”
Among the things that ORES does is “allow foreign corporations to abandon their equipment in the soil at the three-foot mark. They said, ‘Oh, you’ll farm [the land] again.’ No, we won’t.”
Blakeman blasted Hochul for allowing ORES to override local zoning laws, stripping local control in order to install solar farms in upstate towns. At the same time, she’s targeting highly fertile, prime topsoils for heavy construction, which he said will permanently ruin drainage and soil structure.
“Kathy Hochul’s solar sprawl is cannibalizing our state’s most precious resource: our farmland,” Blakeman said.
According to Blakeman, New York lost 500 farms and 100,000 acres of land in 2024 and 2025; of that amount, 80% belonged to small, family-owned operations. He also said that experts are predicting that Hochul’s policies will wipe out an additional 450,000 acres of farmland by 2040.
Blakeman’s digital campaign urges New Yorkers to fight back, protect their food security, and demand the preservation of the state’s rural economy. It also highlights his plan to cut utility bills in half by eliminating Hochul’s energy mandates that he says drive up costs and exploring other energy sources like nuclear.
“We cannot sit by while Hochul allows the best soil in our state to be bulldozed for corporate profit and solar panels that don’t solve the state’s energy crisis,” Blakeman said. “I am drawing a line in the sand with a common-sense blueprint to save our farms and restore local democracy.”
In response, Hochul campaign spokesperson Ryan Radulovacki said, “As usual, Bruce Blakeman’s record is clear: While Governor Kathy Hochul is putting money back in New Yorkers’ pockets with energy rebates and tariff relief for farmers, Bruce Blakeman is against both, selling out this state and screwing over farmers all for Donald Trump and his MAGA agenda.”
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