In New York, The Democrats Go Completely Crazy

Yesterday was primary election day in New York. I previewed it in my prior post, “Socialism: On The March, Or Not So Much?” There were no Republican primaries in New York City, and very few statewide. This was almost entirely a day for intramural contests among the Democrats. It was the Far Left versus the Crazy Insane Left. In almost every race, Crazy Insane prevailed.

The most important races involved federal congressional seats within the City — Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx. Mayor Zohran Mamdani and the Democratic Socialists of America had endorsed candidates in three of the races: Brad Lander over incumbent Dan Goldman in NY-10 (my district), Darializa Avila Chevalier over incumbent Adriano Espaillat in NY-13 (uptown Manhattan and West Bronx), and Claire Valdez over Antonio Reynoso for an open seat in NY-7 (Northern Brooklyn and Southwest Queens). The Mamdani/DSA candidate prevailed in all three races. All these are deep blue seats with little prospect of a successful Republican challenge in November — so these people are highly likely to become members of Congress come January.

Here is a picture of (l to r) Valdez, Lander, Mamdani and Avila Chevalier at a campaign rally in Brooklyn a few days ago.

Less well publicized were primaries for various races for the State Assembly and Senate. The DSA endorsed candidates in ten races, either challenging incumbents or vying for open seats. Of those, eight won, one lost, and one race remains too close to call (but the DSA candidate is ahead). New York Focus has a roundup:

In New York City, Senate candidate Aber Kawas and Assembly contenders Christian Celeste Tate, David Orkin, Eon Huntley, Illapa Sairitupac, Samantha Kattan all defeated their opponents by double digits. In Buffalo, Assembly candidate Adam Bojak appears likely to become dsa’s first legislator from Western New York. And in Syracuse, Maurice Brown’s challenge against a 28-year incumbent Assemblymember was too close to call on Tuesday night.

The sole incumbent Assemblyman to beat back a DSA challenger was Conrad Blackburn of Harlem.

In the New York Focus piece, they quote a guy named Jeff Leb, who has been running a super PAC supporting incumbents against DSA challengers: “DSA has momentum, they’re running their largest slate in New York, and they think they’ve figured out the playbook.”

So what kind of positions and policies do these people stand for? John Fund, writing in the American Spectator today, has a run-down on some of the craziness. Consider Avila Chevalier:

[Avila Chevalier] has called for abolishing police, prisons, and borders. As recently as last week, she refused to back down on those views when given an opportunity: “All deportations are wrong,” she says, even for those convicted of a crime.  She co-founded Columbia University Apartheid Divest, the militant student group behind the violent 2024 occupation of Columbia after the Hamas attacks in Gaza the year before. CUAD is explicitly anti-Enlightenment: “We are Westerners fighting for the eradication of Western Civilization. We stand in full solidarity with every movement for liberation in the Global South. Our intifada is an Internationalist one…”  Chevalier called the United States “a f—— disgrace,” and referred to the US as “occupied” Native American land. She’s written favorably about communism and seizing “all properties from landlords.” She has criticized Bernie Sanders and AOC for being too pro-Israel, and is known as a key leader in the “left of AOC” faction of Democratic Socialists of America.

Avila Chevalier’s incumbent opponent, Adriano Espaillat, is the Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, and a reliable left-wing member. He has, however, generally been at least a lukewarm supporter of Israel (for example, he has come out in favor of the so-called “two-state solution”).

And here are a couple of quotes (via Fund) from Aber Kawas, who won the primary for an open State Senate seat in Queens:

Aber Kawas [is] a Muslim activist, who won the Democratic nomination to represent 317,000 people in Queens as a state senator. She has bitterly criticized the US “system of capitalism, racism, white supremacy and Islamophobia” because it expects apologies for “a terror attack that a couple people did when there is no apology or reparations for genocide and for slavery etc.” She finds that “kind of reprehensible.”  

A unifying theme of all the DSA candidates was hatred of Israel and of Jews in general. I watched some of the victory speeches of Lander and of Avila Chevalier, and both featured repeated chants from the crowd of “Free, Free Palestine!”

Here is an interesting chart taken from the New York Times, analyzing the results of the Espaillat/Avila Chevalier race.

This was a relatively close race overall, with Avila Chevalier prevailing by about 4 points (49-45). The district is centered on Harlem and the South Bronx, but contains substantial upscale and gentrified areas. Note that Avila Chevalier won by significant margins in the precincts dominated by the young, the college educated, and the higher income, while Espaillat ran ahead (by smaller margins) among the poor, the black and the Hispanic. Jeff Maurer, writing at his Substack, comments:

[A]s always, there is strong evidence that this so-called workers’ revolution is mostly a movement of rich, white college kids.

So what kind of omen are these results with respect to the upcoming midterm elections? Even though the Democratic Party leadership backed all the losing candidates, I entirely expect that they will get behind all of the DSA crazies, and not say a negative word about any of them for the general election. The Republican should have near limitless amounts of material for their advertising. I’d like to think that moderate Democrats would be horrified by what their party is becoming, and would flee from being associated with this kind of insanity. But reasonable people disagree about this.

Maurer (himself a Democrat) thinks that these results will prove to be a negative for his team:

These three — especially Chevalier — are a glorious gift to Republican flaks. What Michael Jordan was to Nike, Chevalier is to anyone whose job is to portray Democrats as radical, anti-America lunatics. And that is because she is a radical, anti-America lunatic; I hope normie Democrats loudly denounce her bullshit instead of trying to sanewash it. I would also remind Democrats that considerations about party unity and maintaining a big tent don’t really apply when the core thesis of the person you’re dealing with is that you, personally, are a corrupt monster who is abetting genocide.

I hope he is right. However, I never cease to be amazed at the ability of Democrats to forgive absolutely anything from the far left in the quest to destroy Trump.