B-Roll, Video, Audio, Photos & Rush Transcript: Keeping New Yorkers Safe: Governor Hochul Announces Nation-Leading Proposals to Crack Down on 3D-Printed Guns and Other Illegal Firearms

Earlier today, as part of her 2026 State of the State agenda, Governor Kathy Hochul unveiled proposals to strengthen New York’s nation leading gun laws by cracking down on 3D-printed and illegal firearms. The new legislation would establish criminal penalties for the manufacture of 3D-printed firearms and order minimum safety standards to be established for 3D printer manufacturers to block the production of firearms and firearm components. The proposed legislation would also require gun manufacturers to design their pistols so they cannot be quickly and easily modified into illegal machine guns, and require police departments and sheriffs’ offices to report recoveries of all 3D printed guns to the state. These proposals build on Governor Hochul’s historic efforts to get guns off the streets, reduce firearm deaths, and end the scourge of gun violence in New York State — which are delivering dramatic results. In 2025, shootings statewide fell to their lowest levels on record and were down 60 percent from when Governor Hochul took office in 2021.

B-ROLL: B-Roll is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

VIDEO: The event is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

AUDIO: The Governor's remarks are available in audio form here.

PHOTOS: The Governor's Flickr page has photos of the event here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

 Good morning, everyone, and first of all, it's so great to be here at the West Hill Community Center, a place of refuge from the streets, a place that children can gather safely, and that is what we want our kids to be doing — being kids, not victims of crimes in our streets.

And so, I want to thank our Mayor for opening up this event and for her already established leadership in a city that I cherish. This is my hometown now. I've been here a long time, since about 2014. I think that counts me as a resident, right? But this city is extraordinary and I believe in its potential and I believe in its leaders. And I'm really excited to start off this year with a brand new mayor here as well.

I also want to thank all the people who are part of Everytown and Moms Demand Action — give them a round of applause. We have Angela Ferrell-Zabala. You will be hearing from Angela in a couple minutes. I know our District Attorneys were recognized, but you're going to be, and I so appreciate our District Attorneys, those who've traveled here from the city and I know you've got a lot of work to do. I've been to many of your offices and I'm grateful for what you're doing every day, keeping us safe. But I wanted to give a special shout out to District Attorney Alvin Bragg. You'll be hearing from him, but he is one of the reasons we're here today. He came up with an idea and said, “Why can't we do more on ghost guns?” And I want to thank him as well as our other District Attorneys. I see Darcel Clark here and Eric Gonzalez, and I thank them for being here. And our District Attorney from Rensselaer County and others.

It's really important. It's really important that we sit here together along with our elected leaders and to talk about the challenges we're facing. And I thank our leaders in the Assembly and the Senate who've been recognized. We're doing an extraordinary job in driving crime down. I want to say that over again, but shame on us. Shame on us if we rest on those laurels and say we're done. You'll never hear the words “mission accomplished” out of these lips because there's always one more victim who should have been home, perhaps with his or her parents that night, or a mom or dad home with the kids. And it's tragic to know that, as the Mayor mentioned, there's real human stories behind, behind these statistics.

So, we talk about the fact that we're able to drive down crime. It is a good story. When I first became Governor four years ago, the state was in a panic. We had seen extraordinarily high rates of shootings and murders and car thefts and retail thefts, and it just seemed like the lid came off of everything and you can trace it, perhaps, to the chaos of the pandemic. It was unsettling. It took people out of their norms, and kids were not in school. They were sitting at home, and we've had some cases where we had a young man radicalized at home and went and murdered 10 of my neighbors in Buffalo. And we've had individual street crime — a lot was happening at that time and I can't forget that. That's why I can't say we're okay right now. We're doing so much better — so much better. But you need to know how vigilant we're going to continue to be. Every one of us from Moms Demand Action — they know that many of them are doing this in honor of a loved one, perhaps a child or two. Imagine the tragedy of losing two children to gun violence. That's not supposed to happen in life, my friends. That's not supposed to happen. Yes, it may be part of God's plan, but it sure isn't our plan. These babies should be still with us today, and I grieve along with you and all the moms who've harnessed their grief, be part of an organization that is driving change in a profound way. And I'm forever grateful, and I only wish that there were other states that had the same force of energy, or perhaps there is that or energy, but not the elected officials listening to that and responding to that because we should be able to eradicate gun violence across the entire nation.

There is no way that we should not have national laws that follow what we're doing here in the State of New York, even universal background checks. How shocking is it that the federal government cannot require that you ensure that everybody who is able to own a gun legally, and yes, there are laws that protect gun ownership, legal gun ownership, but they don't even have to be checked for a record to know that they've already have a history. My gosh. And I'm digressing 100 percent, because I remember Sandy Hook and the pressure on this nation to have universal background checks and Congress didn't have the spine to get it done, and I find that unforgivable. But thank God we have the State of New York — yes, indeed.

And I'm going to continue focusing on public safety. I'm hardwired to do it. I can't stop it because I so believe in the mission. And I thank all of those who dedicate their lives and our District Attorneys on the front lines and our police departments, and the men and women in uniform on the streets every single day, putting themselves in harm's way because they have this special belief that they're here to protect the lives of their neighbors. That is a powerful calling. Those who are in law enforcement, I thank them every day.

And I'll tell you, we're ready to do our part at the state level, and I have champions right here in Albany and all over the state who have joined us here today, who believe in the cause. And I'm here today to outline a part of our public safety agenda that I'll be officially announcing more officially than today, in our State of the State. And I welcome you to come. It's going to be a good show.

But the fastest growing gun safety threat in our nation — is ghost guns. Think about that. No one could even have imagined this just a few years ago. What do you talk about ghost guns? We don't believe in ghosts. What do you mean ghost guns? But they are so real.

But we'll take a quick look back on what we've done with our intentional efforts, and I said as I mentioned, we had a horrific time just four years ago, but we also had laws that needed to be changed. And illegal guns are coming up through this Iron Pipeline, right? Remember this? Where are the guns coming from? Because we're not making them in New York. Definitely not making them here. But they're coming up from Georgia and Virginia, some coming up 95, others coming up I-81 people buying them at gun shows in Pennsylvania, loading up their trunks and coming up to Syracuse and heading over to Albany or Buffalo or taking another turn and heading over to the Bronx. That's where they were coming from. So, we had a focus on that and I'm proud I have a Superintendent of State Police here and I thank him and his effort. And my State Police, they're exceptional. We said, “What about involving the other states? Why don't they help us out? Because we can help them as well.” So, we have the first ever Interstate Gun Interdiction Task Force, and we now have 12 states in one territory that are part of regular meanings and intelligence sharing, where we're starting to squeeze that pipeline and shut it down. That's real progress.

We also had silos in law enforcement. And I know about this. My husband was a United States Attorney for a little while. My son's a prosecutor now — and like the federal government is over here and the states over here and the county and the locals are also — but you're all trying to do the same thing, right? Same team. We brought it together. We have our crime analysis centers. We share information with everybody. We'll continue to bring state resources to you locally. I've been to so many local police departments all over the state. I was just here in Albany talking about license plates readers and drone technology and computers in the cars. We can provide that. It wasn't like I'm only taking care of the State Police because I'm the state. No, we have a responsibility to each other because we're all working toward the same objective here. So, we stopped all those crazy silos.

But also we hunkered down. We decided to add more money to fighting gun violence. Yes, money was required. And also you heard the mayor say $3 billion. I thank our legislators for investing $3 billion with me. We have the strongest gun laws in the nation. Now, let's talk about a couple that I'm really proud of. The Red Flag Law: Every state in America should pass the same Red Flag Law that we have here in the State of New York because it is saving lives — keeping guns away from people who would do harm to themselves or to others.

This is about preventing crime. I know many people are in the business of solving crimes, but how about preventing on the front end? And common sense legal reforms to keep repeat offenders off our streets and stop criminals from walking free on technicalities, which is what was happening — unbelievable, especially when I saw that 90 percent of domestic violence cases were being dismissed on technicalities. You know what that's like?

When you're a victim of domestic violence and you finally come forward and have the courage to tell a police officer, then you have to tell a district attorney your story, and you're willing to go through the pain and open the wounds again that someone you loved and trusted betrayed you, and hurt you or hurt your children. And then you find out it goes to court. It's like, “Oh, I'm sorry. We have to throw out the case because we have this information right here, but we should have had the duplicate of it over here in a digital form and you didn't provide it so we're throwing out your case.” That's just cruelty. And we stopped that here in the State of New York. No longer will those cases be thrown out, and I thank our DAs for that.

So, our 11 Crime Analysis Centers — I visited them. We’re continuing to add technology. But, guess what? And you heard. Crime is down, and Albany down 60 percent. It could have gone up 60 percent, my friends. To go down 60 percent just in the four years I've been in office. Statewide shootings are down 60 percent compared with 2021. I was just in New York City with the Commissioner of Police talking about extraordinary numbers for New York City even.

New York State is the third safest state in America. Now it's the third safest state in America. A large state like ours, and we have a fraction of the crimes that cities much smaller than ours have and it's extraordinary. But, as I mentioned, these are real lives, and so I'm proud of that. But one area, there's a real threat out there, and you just have to say to the criminals who think that you're getting a handle on them — they're always a couple steps ahead, aren't they? These are clever people who spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to beat the system.

So if we're going to keep getting guns off the streets in traditional ways through the Iron Pipeline, they're creating the “Plastic Pipeline” in their own homes — that's what ghost guns are all about. And it's an emerging threat. It's getting worse. And if we don't do something now, it's going to undo all of our progress because we're getting the guns off the streets we can find, but those are almost impossible with them being made in your kitchen for God's sake.

These are homemade killing machines — 3D-printed guns and assembled with parts that you can just go buy online. You think there's a background check there? Heck no. No one's checking to make sure that you don't have a record, that you're not going to do harm. You're going to kill the person that you live with.

And so they've become the latest weapon of choice for criminals who now can't buy a gun legally because we've taken all the good steps we have. We outlawed ghost guns way back when I first was Governor, 2021. They're gone, right? Except they're not now. With an hour of free time and a 3D printer, anyone can turn a spool of plastic into an untraceable, lethal weapon. And the scale is staggering. Everytown, and I appreciate all the data collection they do for us, tracks 3D-printed gun recoveries in 20 cities. They recently reported a 1,000 percent increase over the last five years. Let me be clear: We'll not allow do-it-yourself gun traffickers to convert their homes into unsanctioned firearm factories. That's ending here in the State of New York. It's ending here.

So, what I'm proposing: We will require all 3D printers sold in the State of New York to include software that blocks the production of guns and their components. You cannot sell one of those in the State of New York when we pass these laws. We will also make it a crime to sell or distribute the digital instructions for making a 3D-printed gun as well. And this law will strengthen criminal penalties and give law enforcement more tools, including wiretaps, to dismantle these networks. 3D printers have a legitimate purpose. They can be taught to make prosthetics. I've seen this. They can teach math and science. There is a good, but they should not be producing deadly weapons en masse. And that's what's going to stop here.

And there's another dangerous device as well that you can produce with a 3D printer, and it's easy to find online. I'm talking about these little Lego-sized switches that are used to convert handguns into machine guns capable of firing 1,200 rounds a minute. Can you imagine what that could do to a neighborhood? Or walking into a community center like this, or on a street corner? You can destroy a community — 1,200 rounds per minute?

Now, some of these gun companies knowingly sell these convertible pistols to put profit over people's lives. You're not doing that in New York anymore. You are not going to get away with that. I'm advancing legislation that'll require gun manufacturers to design their weapons, design their own weapons so they cannot be modified into these illegal machine guns. We're putting that on you, gun manufacturers. We're telling you, you cannot do that here in New York.

And they're on notice — the gun manufacturers are on notice. And I encourage them to work with us, just like the tech companies had to work with us. A lot of people know we're going to do whatever it takes to protect our kids, and our families and our communities. So, you want to get around that? You have got to get through us — and me, in particular.

So, you will not make a mockery of our gun laws. You will not put people's lives in jeopardy just to increase your own profits. That's not happening. So, I'm going to say this, my friends: We've come a long way to battle gun violence, and we're not done. And we're going to always stay steps ahead of the criminals, and we're never going to get complacent. We're going to take these 3D printed guns, and do-it-yourself machine guns, and go after them with the same force and focus that we've done in other areas of crime where we've had success — the retail thefts, the car thieves that are going after gun cars that are no longer able to do it, our gun traffickers.

I'm going to leave no stone unturned in my quest to make this not the number three safest state, but the number one safest state in America — because that's who we are. And I want kids raised without anxiety and fear. So we'll get it done.

Are you with me to get this done? Are you with me? Are you with me to get this done? We can do this, right? We can do this. Thank you. Thank you, everyone.

And the leader of the effort who’s going to help get this done is our Executive Director of Moms Demand Action. Come on up here, Angela Ferrell-Zabala. Give her your attention because she's got a powerful voice to listen to Angela.