A slate of progressive Democratic candidates for Congress backed by Vermont’s independent U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani swept their primary elections Tuesday.
The victories, in one case over a five-term incumbent, showed that the wave of support on which Mamdani was elected last year, also with Sanders’ backing, could be a boon to other candidates, too. All of the Democrats — Brad Lander, Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier — are expected to easily win office in this fall’s general election.
Mamdani has previously said he modeled his 2025 campaign on Sanders’ run for mayor of Burlington in 1981. At a rally last week in New York City, the mayor introduced Sanders to a large crowd as, “My mentor. Your mentor. Our mentor.”
“A year ago, it was not the end of a political movement,” Mamdani said Tuesday night at a celebration party for Valdez. “It was the beginning.”
Sanders and Mamdani, who both describe themselves as democratic socialists, threw their support behind candidates in competitive House primary matchups who did not have support from Democratic Party leaders in Congress. All three of the candidates were unafraid to push for ambitious economic policies and to criticize Israel and U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East.
Lander, a former New York City comptroller, dethroned Democratic U.S. Rep. Dan Goldman with two-thirds of the vote. Valdez, a first-term member of the New York State Assembly, defeated Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso in an open race, winning 56% of the vote. And with 49% of the vote in her race, first-time candidate Avila Chevalier, a doctoral student and community organizer, unseated 10-year Democratic U.S. Rep. Adriano Espaillat, chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
Sanders was quick to celebrate Wednesday with a call to keep his and Mamdani’s political momentum going.
“The American people — in New York and all across this country — are sick and tired of status quo politics. They’re sick and tired of a rigged economy. And they’re sick and tired of billionaires and their super PACs buying elections,” Sanders said in a social media post Wednesday. “Let’s organize and continue winning elections.”
He was referring, at least partly, to a late infusion of money in one of the New York City races tied to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC. Avila Chevalier, Lander and Valdez have been sharp critics of AIPAC and its support for many Democratic members of Congress, as are Sanders and Mamdani.
The latter were adamant, during the rally last week, that their brand of left-wing politics is the playbook Democrats need to follow across the country to win back control of at least the U.S. House in this year’s midterms.
Sanders pointed to raising taxes on billionaires and slashing U.S. military spending in order to provide universal access to free childcare, offer tuition-free public higher education and reduce healthcare costs nationwide, among other proposals.
“The policies and the politics of the Democratic establishment are no longer good enough,” he said at last week’s rally. “In this dangerous and unprecedented moment in American history, tinkering around the edges just won’t work.”
Tuesday’s primaries could pose headaches for Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, whose preferred candidates did not win, said Matthew Dickinson, a political science professor at Middlebury College. Republican candidates will undoubtedly use Tuesday’s results to paint the Democratic Party as having been taken over by its leftmost wing, Dickinson said.
“And the message coming out of there could hurt other Democrats who are running in less progressive districts against potent Republican opponents,” he said.
The arm of the Republican Party focused on U.S. House campaigns wasted little time making that point Wednesday, calling the results in New York City “the night the Democrat establishment officially surrendered to Zohran Mamdani.”
“Every House Democrat, in safe and competitive districts alike, will now answer to the radicals calling the shots,” said Mike Marinella, a spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, in a statement.
Dickinson noted that primaries tend to be dominated by the most ideological members of a given political party, so it’s hard to say whether their support is representative of a broader electorate.
“The Democratic Party’s got to be concerned about overinterpreting what works in the boroughs of New York,” he said. “Will that work in, you know, the suburbs of Des Moines — or someplace like that?”
