Governor Andrew Cuomo greeted the New Year and his third term with a familiar message: New York on his watch will welcome immigrants, defend minorities and women, build public infrastructure and improve the business climate.

And perhaps most of all, Cuomo said Tuesday in an inaugural address on Ellis Island, state government will do everything it can to counter the messages and policies of the country’s most prominent New Yorker, President Donald Trump.

“When they write the history books and ask what did we do - in the face of anger and division, when people were disillusioned,” Cuomo said, “let New York's answer be that in this defining moment we brought healing and light and hope and progress and action.”

Third terms have bedeviled the three New York governors who have won them in the past six decades: George Pataki, Nelson Rockefeller and Cuomo’s father, Mario Cuomo.

The younger Cuomo is determined not to repeat those failures.

He goes into the term with something his predecessors lacked: strong, friendly majorities in both the State Senate and Assembly.

“Our new legislature is now governed by Democrats,” he said. “We will not repeat the mistakes of the past.”

He said New York will “show the nation the way forward and upward” by passing “the most progressive agenda” in state history. This “justice agenda,” he said, would include ending the cash bail system, creating a “green New Deal,” passing an Equal Rights Amendment and Reproductive Health Act, tightening firearms regulations, repairing the transportation system, reforming campaign finance and allowing early voting.