New York Gov. Kathy Hochul held a rally about car insurance this week to send a message: She’s standing with the little guy.

The governor appeared at the state Capitol on Wednesday with advocates for small business owners, seniors, disabled people and firefighters — who all made the case that Hochul’s plan to reshape the state’s insurance laws will lower their rising bills, if only lawmakers would go along with it.

But none of the speakers mentioned the global giant that is the driving force behind Hochul’s insurance-reform plan: Uber, the ride-hailing service that’s poured $8 million into an ad campaign promoting the proposals, which could decrease the company’s insurance costs.

Hochul has painted her push for car-insurance reform as a righteous battle to lower New Yorkers’ bills by going up against “deeply entrenched interests” — a not-so-veiled reference to the New York State Trial Lawyers Association, a group representing 3,500 civil lawyers — that benefit from the current system.

But her proposals have pitted some of New York’s most powerful entities against each other in an all-out lobbying arms race that could be one of the most expensive at the Capitol this year.

Uber’s ad blitz in support of the governor’s plan has blanketed televisions and digital devices across the state. The state’s trial lawyers, meanwhile, are spending big on lobbyists working the halls of the Capitol to ensure lawmakers see things their way.

“We’re making sure that New Yorkers understand that there’s a fight right now in Albany that could help reduce their costs,” said Josh Gold, Uber’s senior director of public policy. “It takes some money to make sure that message is getting out there to New Yorkers throughout the state.”

At the core of the battle are the two most consequential proposals that are central to Hochul’s insurance reform package, which she included as part of the $260 billion state budget plan she unveiled in January. The governor and legislative leaders are now negotiating a final budget ahead of the April 1 start of the state’s fiscal year.

One would change the way courts award damages resulting from car wrecks, changing the system to prevent payouts to anyone found to be more than 50% responsible for the crash. As it stands, a person who is mostly responsible for a wreck can still collect damages, though their award is reduced by their percentage of fault.

The other proposal would limit what counts as a “serious injury,” when victims can seek compensation for pain and suffering and other damages that go beyond lost wages and other economic loss.

The trial lawyers group is paying three lobbying firms nearly $120,000 a month to fight the proposals, according to state records. That works out to about $1.4 million for the year. The organization has long been one of Albany’s most influential players and is known for its close relationships with top lawmakers. It is regularly among New York’s biggest spenders on lobbying.

Andrew Finkelstein, a personal injury attorney who serves as the Trial Lawyers Association’s president, said Hochul’s proposals are a gift to insurance companies that strip away crash victims’ rights.

“All that is occurring is an effort to take away New Yorkers’ rights to fair and adequate compensation when they’ve been involved in a traumatic event,” he said. “And the rights that are being taken away result in increased profits to the insurance company, and that’s it.”

Uber, meanwhile, is spending big in hopes of seeing its insurance costs reduced for the company and its drivers. The company has led similar efforts in other states, including California, where the company has spent tens of millions of dollars pushing a proposed ballot initiative to that effect.

The company’s major ad spending has been looped through an entity known as Citizens for Affordable Rates — or CAR — of which the ride-hailing company is the lone major funder, according to records from the state Board of Elections. Uber has funneled $8 million to the entity since the start of the year to pay for the ads, which highlight New York’s far-higher-than-average car insurance rates.

“If Albany wants to do something about the cost of living, it can start by lowering the cost of driving,” a narrator says in one of the ads airing across the state.

State lawmakers have been wary of some of Hochul’s insurance proposals thus far.

The Senate and Assembly, both controlled by Democrats, stripped the governor’s major insurance proposals out of their one-house budget plans, though the Senate left some anti-fraud measures that make up part of the governor’s plan.

Hochul and the plan’s supporters, meanwhile, have tried to recenter the debate away from deep-pocketed corporations. Supporters of her plan include the New York Insurance Association, a lobbying group that includes major insurers, including Allstate and Progressive.

At her rally on Wednesday, Hochul touted support from the New York State Professional Firefighters Association and the National Federation of Independent Business, which represents small businesses. Earlier in the week, Citizens for Affordable Rates — the Uber-backed group — organized a different rally at the Capitol with members of the clergy who pledged their support.

“ I’m not quite sure about Uber, Lyft or anybody else,” said the Rev. Robert Waterman, lead pastor of Antioch Baptist Church in Brooklyn. “I just know that in my community, we are suffering, right? It is us that are here to support this bill to make sure that they understand that it affects us.”

Hochul later railed against the money her plan’s opponents are spending against her plan, though she never mentioned the trial lawyers by name. When asked whom she was referring to, she said anybody who was opposed to her plan.

“It shouldn’t have to be a fight, right?” Hochul said. “It shouldn’t have to be so hard, and yet there are entrenched interests pumping money against the interests of New Yorkers that we are representing here today.”

The governor, however, said she was unbothered by Uber’s spending, which she believes is aligned with New Yorkers’ interests.

“ I think it’s disingenuous for people to say that, ‘Oh, it’s one company that stood up and therefore we’re paying attention to affordability,’” she said. “I will not stop until we have figured out every single way that I can reduce costs in the great state of New York.”

Includes reporting by Jimmy Vielkind.