Progressive challengers backed by Mamdani sweep three NY Democratic primaries

Progressive challengers endorsed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani swept three Democratic congressional primaries June 23, ousting two incumbents and capturing an open seat after the candidates' positions on Israel's military campaign in Gaza emerged as a major issue. Democratic strategists on both sides of the contest said the results could represent the beginning of a major shift in the Democratic Party’s direction.

All three winners are democratic socialists who campaigned against U.S. support for Israel and the influence of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in U.S. politics.

Former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander defeated Rep. Dan Goldman in the 10th Congressional District with roughly 65% of the vote to Goldman's 35%. In the 13th Congressional District, community organizer Darializa Avila Chevalier defeated five-term incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat, chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, by about 49% to 46%. In the open 7th Congressional District, state Assemblymember Claire Valdez won with about 57% of the vote, defeating Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, who had the backing of retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez.

Lander, who describes himself as a "liberal Zionist," criticized Goldman for not supporting legislation to block arms sales to Israel and for declining to call the war in Gaza a genocide. Avila Chevalier attacked Espaillat for accepting AIPAC donations. Valdez criticized her chief rival for being slow to use the word "genocide" in reference to Israel’s actions in Gaza and tied him to AIPAC's super PAC, United Democracy Project. 

Mamdani’s role 

Central to all three campaigns was Mamdani, whose endorsements carried remarkable weight. He is known for having broken with Democratic Party leaders on Israel, gaining the praise of anti-establishment supporters for his willingness to describe Israel's conduct in Gaza as a genocide. Leaders such as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries have declined to use that language, helping define the political brand Mamdani brought to the June 23 contests.

In the days before the vote, Mamdani found himself defending comments about AIPAC that Rep. Josh Gottheimer and other Democrats claimed were alarming. 

Gottheimer reposted Mamdani’s remarks on X, writing “Swap ‘AIPAC’ for ‘Jews’ and it’s the oldest antisemitic conspiracy theory in the books. That’s not criticizing a lobby. That’s laundering antisemitism from your podium as Mayor of a city with more than a million Jews.” 

Asked about the remarks, Mamdani said he wanted to be “very clear” that "we're talking about a status quo where children are being killed on a daily basis. More than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military since the so-called ceasefire. Even an Al Jazeera journalist, Ahmed Wishah, was killed this past Saturday by an Israeli strike."

Mamdani went on to describe AIPAC as an organization that "has been supportive of the status quo, that has fought any attempt to actually deliver safety to people not just in Palestine but, frankly, throughout much of the region."

"And it is a status quo of immorality," he said. "It is one that I will not accept. And when it comes to the way in which they defend the status quo, oftentimes they defend it through direct contributions, as we are seeing right now in New York 13. Oftentimes they also support the status quo through dark money, by funneling money that would have previously come directly from AIPAC through other organizations whose contributors' identities are only made clear after an election. And I think it is important that when we ask ourselves how such death and destruction is happening overseas, we also name those who allow it to take place."

Jon Paul Lupo, a Democratic strategist in New York and former adviser to former Mayor Bill de Blasio, told Politico that Israel’s actions in Gaza have become a major part of domestic election contests. "In a Democratic primary, the people who are against the war in Gaza have a massive political advantage in 2026," he said.

The results reflected what some strategists described as a shift in Democratic voters' attitudes toward Israel. As CNN Senior Analyst Harry Enten pointed out after New York’s primary elections, Democratic sympathy toward Palestinians over Israelis has shifted by 47 percentage points over the past two and a half years, according to recent polling. In the same polling, 53% of Democrats said an AIPAC endorsement made them less likely to vote for a candidate, up from 34% in 2024.

These trends, which are most pronounced among younger voters, also show up in polling of America’s Jews. A September 2025 Washington Post poll found 61% of American Jews said Israel was guilty of war crimes in Gaza. Thirty-nine percent agreed that Israel had committed a genocide, while 59% also believed Israel was failing to allow enough food aid into Gaza.

The Israel divide on display 

In his victory speech, Lander called on Democrats to reckon with divisions within the party over Israel.

"Our party needs to admit that Joe Biden's 'hug Bibi' strategy was a catastrophic mistake," Lander said, referring to former President Joe Biden's alignment with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, attack. "I believe it made us complicit in genocide. Bombs we paid for killed more than seventy thousand Palestinians, most of them women and children. Tanks we paid for left a million people homeless."

At Valdez's victory party in Brooklyn, the crowd erupted in chants directed at AIPAC as Goldman's concession speech played on television screens. Avila Chevalier told supporters: "We know how scared we made AIPAC."

Goldman, speaking to reporters after conceding, acknowledged the war played an "outsized role" in the race. He accused Lander of using "dangerous antisemitic tropes" to win and warned that such rhetoric threatened to alienate Jewish voters the party has long counted as a core constituency. Lander is himself Jewish, and New York’s 10th Congressional District – in which voters chose Lander over Goldman – is one of the most Jewish-populated districts in the nation.

"Jews have given back so much to this country," Goldman said. "As history has taught us, antisemitic tropes and stereotypes, some of which I heard personally on this campaign, will ultimately be the undoing of our democracy if we all don't lean in and speak out, even if it's not politically expedient."

Democratic strategists weigh in 

"This signals a substantial shift in policy toward Israel," Basil Smikle, a veteran New York-based Democratic strategist, told Politico. "This is something that Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries are going to have to wrestle with not just in New York, but nationally. They're going to have to figure out a way to maintain an older coalition that includes a lot of Jewish leaders and voters that were very supportive of Israel, and find a way to work with a younger generation and younger elected officials that don't have those ties."

AIPAC said in a statement that it was "disappointed that some of our endorsed candidates did not prevail," while commending pro-Israel incumbents who won less competitive contests across New York, Maryland, and Utah.

The progressive sweep was not uniform across all New York-area races. Micah Lasher won the primary to succeed retiring Rep. Jerry Nadler and has said he would not support legislation banning weapons sales to Israel.

In Maryland, state Del. Adrian Boafo won the race to replace retiring Rep. Steny Hoyer, a staunch Israel advocate and AIPAC ally. Boafo was buoyed by $5.7 million in spending by United Democracy Project and called for strengthening the U.S.-Israel relationship, though he was also critical of Netanyahu.

"Critics of Israel on the left are having a moment,” said former Rep. Steve Israel, a New York Democrat who chaired the party's House campaign arm in 2012 and 2014, “but that doesn't mean they represent a majority of congressional Democrats in the country." 

"Having said that,” he added, “pro-Israel Democrats clearly need a better strategy before a handful of primaries approach a tipping point."

Alex Hoffman, a Democratic strategist and donor adviser not involved in the campaigns, said pro-Israel groups face a reckoning.

"For pro-Israel groups, there really needs to be a rethink of the strategy, the people involved, and how money gets spent," Hoffman said. "Otherwise it's going to hurt Democrats nationally."

The three newly nominated candidates are expected to face straightforward general election contests in November in heavily Democratic districts.