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Coffee Break: Mamdani Slate Sweeps Congressional Primaries in New York

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New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s slate of progressive congressional candidates swept the Democratic establishment aside in last night’s primaries, but some not so happy outcomes occurred in other races.

Mamdani’s Endorsees Sweep the Zionist NY Dem Establishment Aside

Monday I posted about the young Mayor’s bold primary bets and now we see that he and the NYC Democratic Socialists of America are playing a strong game.

This made Fox News very sad.

It also upset a couple of anonymous centrist House Dem who bravely spoke out to Axios:

Another centrist House Democrat, speaking on the condition of anonymity to offer candid analysis, called the results an “earthquake” and a “huge defeat” for Democratic leadership.

The centrist House Democrat who spoke anonymously said the results show that “appeasement doesn’t work. You have to be tough. Nancy Pelosi brought a machine gun to a knife fight. You can’t win with these guys by playing patty cake.”

A senior House Democrat, asked if their colleagues were worried about the results, said: “Yes they are.”
…
The centrist House Democrat who spoke anonymously predicted the sudden influx of democratic socialists will be a “migraine” for leadership come 2027.

“Calling it a headache is an understatement,” the lawmaker said.

“Holy sh*t,” said a second senior House Democrat.

“Buckle up.”

The polling is clear. A single issue is driving this Democratic party house cleaning: Israel.

Mamdani: The Boy Kingmaker Leads Shift Against Israel

The New York Times has proclaimed the youthful Mamdani a “kingmaker”:

Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his allies swept a series of congressional primaries in New York City on Tuesday in a remarkable show of strength for the insurgent left that sent shock waves through the Democratic Party.

Mr. Mamdani’s candidates toppled a pair of incumbents backed by the city’s political establishment, including major labor unions and the House Democratic leader. Another candidate backed by the mayor won an open House seat, and a handful of democratic socialist challengers he supported were winning down the ballot.
…
All the winning candidates share Mr. Mamdani’s progressive economic platform, and they each ran campaigns that focused intently on ending American support for Israel, a sign of how far public opinion has shifted on the issue, even in New York.
…
Mr. Mamdani has a high tolerance for political risk-taking, well beyond that of any of his modern predecessors. And, at least for now, he has the ability to transfer his high-wattage political brand onto other candidates in a way that only a few politicians in any office have been able to.

One of the races provided a particularly telling test case that debunks attempts to conflate anti-semitism and anti-zionism.

The Most Jewish District in America Goes Anti-Semitic?

The easiest win came in New York’s 10th district, the most Jewish in the country.

That fact made it easy for progressive pundits to sweep aside crybullying from the likes of former Trump attorney Michael Cohen:

The Forward (formerly the Jewish Daily Forward) had this to say about the race:

At a campaign rally last week, Mamdani compared the American Israel Public Affairs Committee to “monsters” who “move millions in dark money to accomplish a single goal — to preserve their power, so that they can turn us against one another.” The remarks drew widespread condemnation from Jewish leaders, including some Mamdani supporters.

Lander is a high-profile Jewish politician allied with Mamdani, who this election cycle threw his weight behind a slate of progressive candidates who have critiqued hardline pro-Israel money and use the terms “genocide” and “apartheid” to describe Israel’s actions in Gaza and the West Bank.

Setting out to challenge the incumbent, Lander zeroed in on Goldman’s support for U.S. military aid to Israel and his past ties to the campaign fundraising group AIPAC during the campaign.

Lander told the New York Times that criticizing AIPAC makes him “queasy” given “the antisemitic tropes at play,” but that he feels an obligation to call out its funding nonetheless as he promises to curtail U.S. military aid to Israel.

In his election night remarks, Lander spoke of his admiration of Israeli activists working to protect Palestinians in the West Bank — and about his commitment to fight antisemitism.

“In Congress, I will try to carry a fraction of the courage that they carry,” he said. “I will be one of the Jewish members of Congress most willing to stand up for Palestinian human rights. And I will stand firmly against bigotry aimed at Jews. Those are not two different jobs. They are the same job.”

Goldman had leveraged his massive personal fortune as a Levi Strauss heir and his claims to be the more labor-friendly candidate to no avail in the race.

In fact it was a bad night for establishment-friendly unions all around.

Mamdani’s other endorsements showed just how toothless centrist identity politics of other kinds has become.

‘Hurt Feelings in Communities of Color’ Really?

The NYT piece cited above also featured this quote from New York State Attorney General Letitia James:

“This is a wake-up call,” said Letitia James, the state’s progressive attorney general, who supported Mr. Mamdani’s mayoral campaign but ended up opposed to him on Tuesday.

“Obviously, there’s some hurt feelings tonight, particular in communities of color,” she said, adding, “What we have to do is sit down and work with the left-leaning part of the party and see if we can come to some sort of understanding going forward.”

James’ decision to march alongside genocidal Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich at the annual New York Israel Day Parade earlier this month made it easy for some to dismiss her feelings:

But it was the election results themselves — and the demographics of the Mamdani-backed candidates and the districts in which they won — that most thoroughly debunks James’ claim that establishment centrists represent “communities of color.”

In fact, it was Darializa Avila Chevalier, Mamdani’s endorsed candidate in the more than 75% Black and Hispanic 13th District which includes parts of Harlem and the Bronx, who endured ugly racist attacks during the campaign:

A former senior adviser for Rep. Adriano Espaillat has made racist comments about his primary challenger Darializa Avila Chevalier in Spanish-language media, City & State has learned.

Rusking Pimentel, who is currently on unpaid leave from Espaillat’s congressional office, accused Avila Chevalier, who identifies as Afro-Dominican and Muslim, of working with Mayor Zohran Mamdani to replace Dominicans in Washington Heights with Muslims and Haitians.

“Mamdani, who is also Muslim, his goal is to change the demography of Washington Heights, that Washington Heights no longer be a bastion of the Dominican community, that it rather become a bastion of the Haitian, Muslim community allied to him,” Pimentel said in Spanish on the “Entre Líneas” podcast.

It wasn’t just coded racial slurs, Espaillat was backed by a lot of ugly money as well.

The fact that Chevalier knocked off Espaillat, the influential chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, is big political doings within “communities of color” not something imposed on them by white progressive gentrifiers.

That might be less true in the “commie corridor” where Mamdani bagged his third scalp.

Brooklyn Leftists Coming for Jeffries Next?

Claire Valdez, Mamdani’s “handpicked congressional candidate in a seat spanning Brooklyn and Queens, a one-term state assemblywoman, trounced her opponent, who had the backing of the outgoing congresswoman, Nydia Velázquez.”

The demographics of New York’s 7th Congressional District certainly give charges of gentrification a little bit more validity in this race than in Chevalier’s, but I’m not thinking that was the story in this race.

The NYT credited “the strength of the mayor’s support, his political acumen and voters’ hunger for insurgency over incumbency” and noted that “along the way, Mr. Mamdani defeated candidates backed by Gov. Kathy Hochul and Representative Hakeem Jeffries in a relatively low turnout primary.”

They also declared that “The left bested (Dem House Minority Leader) Hakeem Jeffries.”

The primary results showed Mr. Mamdani’s comfort with risk — and foreshadowed a possible showdown with the top Democrat in Congress.

In endorsing challengers to longtime incumbents, the mayor directly took on Mr. Jeffries, a Brooklyn native who hopes to become the next speaker of the House and represents the Democratic establishment. Neither Ms. Valdez nor Ms. Avila Chevalier has committed to backing the congressman in his bid for speaker should Democrats win back the majority in November.

And in doubling their numbers in the House from two to four, democratic socialists are more likely to try to push the body further to the left, creating a headache for establishment Democrats.

Speaking before Ms. Avila Chevalier and Ms. Valdez’s races were called, Mr. Jeffries said that Democrats should focus less on deep-blue seats and look to more competitive territories such as New York’s Long Island suburbs.

“We’re not in the business of winning Democratic primaries and state seats that are going to be blue regardless of who wins a primary,” he told Spectrum News NY1’s Errol Louis. “In order for us to be able to take back control of the House of Representatives, we got to flip seats in tough areas.”

The crowd at Valdez’ victory party booed and chanted “You’re next” when Jeffries appeared on the big screen televisions:

Jeffries brushed it off:

Jeffries isn’t the only establishment lion on the DSA’s to-do list.

Not Just Jeffries, Will They Come for Schumer Too?

Politico dwells on the implications:

“To those who are struggling with the problems of today, I say that these are leaders who could help us resolve the problems of tomorrow,” Mamdani said of his endorsed candidates in an interview with 1010 WINS earlier on Tuesday.

It’s a sentiment Mamdani laid out last week in a campaign rally where he predicted that the party “managing decline instead of delivering material change for working people” will lose not only on Tuesday, but in the 2028 presidential election.

That’s the year Schumer is slated to run for a sixth term amid deep voter dissatisfaction. A statewide Siena University poll last month found 52 percent of voters hold an unfavorable view of him. (Only 33 percent of voters had a favorable opinion of him, the survey found.)

The longtime senator is considered a prodigious fundraiser and hard left candidates have not mounted a successful statewide election. Yet unseating the 75-year-old Schumer would be a tantalizing goal for a political left eager to notch a massive victory with national implications.

A Schumer spokesperson did not return a message seeking comment.

It wasn’t just the centrist Dem establishment who lost last night, a progressive hero took some hits too.

AOC Ain’t What She Used to Be

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who’s seeking her fifth term repping NY’s 14th Congressional district this year, kicked off the leftist insurgency in the Empire State in 2018 with a huge upset primary win over then-House Caucus Chair Joe Crowley.

But she ain’t the progressive darling she used to be.

Not only did she back Joe Biden staying in the race far later than most in 2024, but she doubled down by claiming at the Dem convention that Kamala Harris was working ‘tirelessly’ for a cease-fire in Gaza.

She didn’t do much to rehab her brand with her endorsements this year:

She also stood by her Congressional mentor Nydia Velázquez and did not join Mamdani in endorsing the eventual victor Claire Valdez.

Notus has more:

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is backing a trio of insurgent candidates in House races, including two who are challenging Democratic incumbents, while staying out of contentious state legislative primaries. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is supporting several Democratic Socialists of America candidates in competitive New York state legislative races, while so far staying out of contentious congressional primaries.
…
In a brief interview with NOTUS, Ocasio-Cortez, who has endorsed in a handful of other House races, said she and Mamdani are “in two different positions,” and “as a member of the New York delegation,” it was “important to let those processes … bear out.” She also acknowledged her “much deeper focus” in building a progressive bench downballot.
…
effectively stopped endorsing against incumbents after the 2022 cycle, committing to not do so when she was running to be the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, losing to the late Rep. Gerry Connolly. But she did reopen that door earlier this spring.

It’s not surprising, then, that Ocasio-Cortez has opted against endorsing in these races because “governing is difficult, and in order to govern, you need to rely on other people in government to help you be successful, and it requires having relationships with peers and colleagues in elected office,” said Jasmine Gripper, co-director of the New York Working Families Party.

“AOC’s maturity, and being a more senior member, [she] understands that in order to continue to advance in her career, she has to have friends and partners in government in order to continue to get things done,” Gripper continued.

There’s also an argument to be made that AOC and Mamdani coordinated their endorsements, from the excellent Peter Sterne at City and State in May:

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani endorsed a slate of five state legislative candidates on Saturday, just two days after he endorsed an insurgent challenger to Rep. Adriano Espaillat on the same night Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez released her own slate of four state legislative endorsements.

Between the two of them, Mamdani and Ocasio-Cortez have now endorsed almost all of the candidates backed by the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America – but they have mostly not endorsed the same candidates. Instead, their slates appear to be complementary. Mamdani is backing DSA’s state legislative candidates running for open seats and congressional candidates whom it would be politically difficult for AOC to endorse, while AOC is backing DSA’s challengers to Assembly incumbents whom Mamdani isn’t willing to endorse.

Time will tell if AOC’s caution will cost her. She is still in the cat bird seat to challenge Schumer for his Senate seat in 2028, but seems to be losing ground to Ro Khanna as a progressive presidential hopeful.

But before we get carried away with happy thoughts, there were some other races where the good guys definitely did not win.

The AI Bros Got Their Man

Although I exclusively focused on Mamdani and his slate in Monday’s post, I’ve previously discussed New York state Rep. Alex Bores, his run for the Democratic nomination New York’s 12th Congressional District, and the big money interests that opposed him in previous posts.

Here’s the TL;DR from the NYT earlier this month:

Super PACs tied to the nation’s leading artificial intelligence giants have transformed the closing weeks of a race for a coveted New York City House seat by unleashing staggering amounts of money to shape its outcome and a national debate over regulating the industry.

Together, groups linked to the Silicon Valley rivals OpenAI and Anthropic have already spent more than $12 million stuffing mailboxes and blanketing TV screens with costly broadcast ads — including during the Knicks N.B.A. finals games. Other groups with ties to industry players have chipped in another $4 million, with more on the way.

With less than two weeks before the June 23 Democratic primary, the A.I.-related expenditures — alongside an unrelated $10 million infusion by former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg — could end up making the contest in Manhattan one of the most expensive in congressional history.

And all of it is most likely a preview of an even bigger battle to come in the midterms this fall, when groups tied to leading technology companies have pledged to spend hundreds of millions of dollars around elections that could determine whether Congress pursues new guardrails for the industry.

“It’s a real test of whether corporate interests from California, from A.I., from crypto can control an election,” said Representative Jerrold Nadler, the liberal Democrat whose retirement from the New York House seat has prompted this spending spree in the race to replace him.

And the big bad money has passed that test, based on the results of the primary:

You’ll note the third place performance from the Kennedy heir, a political nonentity coasting on his family name and fading celebrity status.

Check how the NYT spins for Lasher and minimizes the outside money:

Mr. Lasher, 44, gambled by running a staid, old-fashioned campaign based on his résumé and government expertise at a moment when Democrats across the country are furious at the party establishment and hungry for pugnacious new stars.

But Tuesday’s results suggested that voters in one of the oldest, best-educated and wealthiest districts in the United States may still be an exception, continuing a long tradition of looking past flash and fame to elect liberal policy heavyweights.

Along the way, Mr. Lasher benefited from the support of Representative Jerrold Nadler, the district’s beloved retiring congressman and one of his former bosses. Another, former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, plowed $10 million into a super PAC supporting the candidate, helping make the race one of the most expensive in House history.

The victory makes Mr. Lasher, a liberal Democrat from the Upper West Side, the odds-on favorite in November’s election to represent the district. It encompasses most of central Manhattan and is home to Broadway, the Empire State Building and more Fortune 500 companies than any other in the country.

There was scattered applause coupled with boos when Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s face appeared on television. The announcement that Brad Lander, another House candidate in the city whom Mr. Mamdani endorsed, was winning his race was met with boos.

But they did eventually acknowledge the elephant in the race, and in fairness to Lasher (and his mentor Nadler), he didn’t solicit the flood of AI money, but they apparently found him more acceptable than the outspoken Bores:

had become the focus of an extraordinary $27 million proxy fight between competing factions of the artificial intelligence industry.

Mr. Bores, in his concession speech, focused on the millions of dollars that were spent against him by groups aligned with the leaders of large technology companies like OpenAI.

“This was a huge and unprecedented fight and we did not back down,” Mr. Bores said. “While we came up short tonight, the example set here was very much not the one they intended.”

Mr. Lasher, for his part, also sent a warning shot to A.I. companies, saying his priority around the technology would be fighting for the well-being of young people.

Note that Lasher said nothing about fighting for the well-being of people in districts very unlike his own where most of the AI data center boom is happening.

There was also a very ugly result in Maryland where an outgoing establishment lion seems likely to be replaced by a bought-and-paid for tool of the crypto, Israel and other lobbies.

Of Course Steny Hoyer Gets Replaced by a Stooge

Politico has the basics:

Maryland state Del. Adrian Boafo won the Democratic primary Tuesday to replace retiring Rep. Steny Hoyer in the 5th District, aided by $11 million from pro-crypto and pro-Israel groups.

Boafo was Hoyer’s preferred successor and his former campaign manager. The primary was marked by intraparty divisions over heavy outside spending and what may be the last intraparty fight between Hoyer and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who endorsed a rival in the race.

United Democracy Project, a super PAC associated with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, pumped $5.7 million into the race to promote Boafo, becoming the single biggest spender on the airwaves. Protect Progress, a super PAC aligned with the crypto industry, poured $5.5 million into the race, largely to benefit Boafo, a former federal lobbyist for the tech firm Oracle.

This spending in the crowded 24-candidate field drew the ire of many of Boafo’s rivals. Three of them — Harry Dunn, Rushern Baker and Quincy Bareebe — took the unusual step of jointly denouncing the interest groups’ efforts to influence the primary outcome. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), a potential 2028 presidential contender who did not endorse in the race, also accused the groups of trying to buy the seat.

Shocking accusation!

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One comment

  1. motorslug

    “centrist House Dem who bravely spoke out to Axios” – I love the adverb there!

    AOC lost any semblance of progressive respect when she utterly failed to defend Venezuela against the Guaido coup back in 2019.

    She “….recorded herself explaining her opinion about the Venezuelan crisis: “People want to make this about ideology, about capitalism, about socialism. What people don’t understand is that this is about authoritarianism vs. democracy in many different ways…” She went on to compare Venezuela to Zimbabwe as “failed states.” Her message? The Venezuelan people need “democracy.”

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