New York Democrats just passed a bill that rips the words “mother” and “father” out of state law.
Fox News host Maria Bartiromo heard about it on air and did not hold back.
And what she said next left no doubt about how millions of ordinary Americans feel about what Albany is doing to the family.
Albany Sends “Gestating Parent” Bill to Hochul’s Desk
The New York Democrat-controlled Legislature passed Senate Bill S9316, legislation that strips the words “mother,” “father,” and “paternity” from sections of state family law and replaces them with clinical substitutes. Under the new bill, targeting state child custody and parental laws, “mother” becomes “gestating parent,” “father” becomes “non-gestating parent,” and “paternity” becomes “parentage.”
It passed in the state Senate recently after progressing through the Assembly in March. The bill now sits on Governor Kathy Hochul’s desk, and she is not exactly rushing to take a position on it.
Asked about the bill at a news conference, Hochul said she was not familiar with the proposal but promised to review it. Her response was notably noncommittal. “I have until the end of the year to review them and make a decision, so I won’t be commenting on pending legislation.”
That kind of answer tells you everything. If this were a bill she was proud of, she would have said so.
Bartiromo Fires Back
The bill came up during a recent episode of Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures, when Representative Claudia Tenney (R-NY) brought it to Bartiromo’s attention. The host did not need long to form an opinion.
“I saw that, Oh my God!” Bartiromo exclaimed after Tenney brought up the bill. “THAT’S DISGUSTING! THAT IS DISGUSTING!”
She kept going.
“What a mother goes through, what a woman goes through to have a child, and to raise that child, and parents — that now we have to take that away from them, calling them mother and father?”
Bartiromo said the bill is one more reason native New Yorkers are packing up and heading to states like Florida, places “where there’s freedom and common sense,” because the Democrats are so “off the rails.”
Hard to argue with that. New York has been hemorrhaging residents for years, and Albany keeps finding new ways to remind people why.
Republicans Pile On
Bartiromo was not the only one with something to say. Tenney had already weighed in publicly before the broadcast, and her words were sharp.
Representative Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., reacted to the bill on X, saying, “The party that can’t define a woman is now rewriting New York law to erase mothers and fathers. Only in Albany could ‘mom’ and ‘dad’ become too controversial.”
Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman called it “insanity” and did not mince words about where he stands.
“In Kathy Hochul’s New York, ‘mom’ is now defined as ‘gestating parent,'” Blakeman wrote. “Not when I’m Governor! I’ll stand up for moms and dads against this insanity.”
He also wrote, “This bill is a continuation of Hochul’s war on families, and I won’t stop fighting until we take New York back.”
What Albany Is Actually Doing Here
Democrats who drafted the legislation claimed the language swap promotes “inclusivity.” The bill aims to make custody law more inclusive for LGBTQ+ parents and families who use assisted reproduction or surrogacy. Supporters say no parental rights actually change — just the words used in statute.
But words are not nothing. Every mother who has ever sat in a New York family court, fought for custody of her children, or signed a legal document recognizing her role in her child’s life has done so under a law that called her exactly what she is: a mother. Albany just voted to erase that.
And nobody asked them to. The bill reflects a broader pattern in blue-state governance: progressive lawmakers using their supermajorities to advance cultural priorities that most voters never asked for and many actively oppose. The people of New York did not elect their state legislature to scrub the word “mother” from the law books. They elected them to fix the subway, keep the streets safe, and hold the line on taxes. Instead, Albany spent its legislative session on this.
There is a reason Bartiromo’s reaction resonated. She did not deliver a policy analysis. She said what any normal person watching would say out loud at their kitchen table. And that reaction — unfiltered, immediate, a little incredulous — is exactly what most Americans feel when they see their institutions treating basic family language like a problem to be solved.
The bill now waits on Hochul’s desk. The legislation sits on Governor Kathy Hochul’s desk, where she has until the end of the year to sign or veto it, and so far, she is not saying which way she will go. That silence is its own kind of answer. A governor who wanted to protect families from this kind of ideological overreach would have already said so.
But Hochul governs a state where the Democrat Party has a stranglehold on the legislature, and the activists who push bills like this one are the same people who fund campaigns and turn out primary voters. So she waits. She reviews. She declines to comment on pending legislation.
Meanwhile, New York families are left to wonder whether the state that raised them still speaks their language — or whether Albany has decided that “mother” and “father” are words too old-fashioned to survive in the new New York.
Sources: Mediaite, Fox News, FOX 5 New York, New York Post, Bizpac Review