Lawmakers Leave Albany Without Advancing Survivor Justice Measures

ALBANY, NY (06/08/2026) (readMedia)-- After an historically late budget agreement with Governor Hochul, the Legislature's late-session crunch squeezed out several commonsense, critically important measures to protect survivors of sexual abuse in New York. The missed opportunity comes after a year that brought us the Epstein files and immigration crackdowns targeting trafficking survivors; Adult Survivors Act and Child Victims Act cases against the City and State dismissed over technicalities; another Harvey Weinstein trial; and Andrew Cuomo's attempted return to politics. However, after multiple years of survivor justice reforms, lawmakers stalled on several long-overdue survivor protections that address persistent gaps in the law.

Among these bills that Albany failed to get past the finish line were:

• A8635B/S9848 (Rosenthal/Salazar), which would protect hundreds of cases brought by survivors under the Adult Survivors Act (ASA) or Child Victims Act (CVA) now in jeopardy, removing an unfair barrier that requires them to list the specific time, date, and location of their abuse when suing a public entity or individual.
• A8519/S7789 (Cruz/Fernandez), which would ensure that individuals bringing civil claims in trafficking cases are not required to disclose their immigration status.
• A9417/S9894 (Steck/Kreuger), which replicates New York's Rape Shield Law protections in civil proceedings, protecting survivors from attacks, such as questions related to what they were wearing and past sexual encounters, as they seek justice.
• A bill that would protect survivors of sexual assault, harassment, and discrimination from retaliatory defamation lawsuits used to silence them.

The survivor justice coalition is grateful to Assemblymembers Rosenthal, Cruz, Steck, and González-Rojas, and Senators Salazar, Fernandez, and Kreuger for championing these reforms.

"Justice for survivors is too often delayed, denied, or made unnecessarily difficult, and every year that these reforms are postponed, survivors pay the price," said Emily Miles, Executive Director of the New York City Alliance Against Sexual Assault. "New York has led the nation in expanding survivors' rights before, and we cannot afford to lose that momentum. Survivors deserve a legal system that treats them with dignity, safeguards their access to justice, and recognizes the realities of trauma."