Hochul went grocery shopping at an Albany supermarket. Here's what happened

And a new Siena poll has bad news for Hochul but with a few bright spots.

Good afternoon — it’s Tuesday and National Lager Day.

In today’s CapCon:

• Gov. Kathy Hochul went shopping at a grocery store in Albany Monday. Here’s how that went, what I noticed and what she said.

• A new Siena College poll out Tuesday showed a mix bag for Hochul, politically, ahead of the 2026 race for governor.

• Assembly Speaker Carl E. Heastie was selected to lead his party in the Assembly for a sixth time.

• The Assembly has scheduled a hearing for next week in Albany.

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(Lori Van Buren/Times Union)

🛒 Hochul also thinks eggs are too expensive. Here’s what else she said at an Albany grocery store Tuesday.

Gov. Kathy Hochul emerged from a side door leading to the parking lot of a Market 32 grocery store in Albany and met Sally McKenna for the first time Tuesday morning.

“She’s real,” McKenna later told me when I asked about her impression of Hochul. “I really liked her.”

I asked McKenna how she felt about Hochul because a poll released by Siena College Tuesday found that many people do not: 57% of voters said they would prefer to vote for someone else in 2026 while a third said they support Hochul.

Back to Hochul’s stroll through the grocery store, where I heard one older man say, “Why?” under his breath as he watched her walk by with McKenna, whose shopping cart was already full.

(Lori Van Buren/Times Union)

I’ll be honest. I went to this event because I wanted to see how Hochul would act in a grocery store.

Hochul is paid an annual salary of $250,000 as governor. She owns at least one home in Buffalo and has an apartment in New York City but she also has free, all-inclusive housing at the Executive Mansion in Albany. There is a chef.

She and her husband brought home $1.9 million in 2023, her tax filings showed.

So I’ll admit that I was surprised to see her do a few things while shopping with McKenna that I wouldn’t expect from someone with that kind of wealth.