[music]

Congressman Jerrold Nadler: I'm so proud of tonight's victory, and I'm thrilled that we were able to win while remaining committed to our principles of kindness and progressivism.

[applause]

Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. That was Congressman Jerrold Nadler, who apparently will still be Congressman Jerrold Nadler after he won the primary in the newly-drawn Congressional District that unified the east and west sides of Manhattan from around 14th Street up through the upper west and upper east sides. We'll play an important piece of Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney's concession speech in that race from last night coming up. We'll open today, generally, by going over all the meaningful New York primary results from last night.

At around 10:15, Dan Goldman will join us for a few minutes. Dan Goldman, the projected winner in that primary, that 10th Congressional District primary with a baker's dozen candidates in Lower Manhattan and Northwest Brooklyn, Dan Goldman coming up this morning after his nomination. There is probably no result more meaningful than the special election, not a primary, that was also held yesterday in the 19th Congressional District, north of the city, a swing district, as many of you know that went for Donald Trump in 2016 and Joe Biden by just about one point in 2020.

Democrat Pat Ryan, the Ulster County Executive, defeated Republican Marc Molinaro, the Dutchess County Executive, in a race that was widely considered a bellwether election for swing district America for the fall. This race got a lot of national coverage. Here's Pat Ryan from his victory speech last night.

Pat Ryan: Three months ago, three months ago, we got in this race unexpectedly, certainly unexpectedly, and from the beginning, people counted us out. The early polls had us down 14 points. Don't forget that. A lot of people counted us out, but we got in this race because the foundations of our democracy were and remain under direct threat, and that is deadly serious.

Brian Lehrer: Democracy and abortion rights apparently carried the day over the Republican emphasis on crime and limiting abortion rights. We'll talk about that race and much more now with WNYC and Gothamist political reporter Elizabeth Kim, who mostly covered that 10th Congressional District race that Dan Goldman has been projected the winner of, and Ben Max executive editor of Gotham Gazette and host of the Max Politics podcast. Good morning, Liz. Good morning, Ben. I hope you got a few hours of sleep last night.

Elizabeth Kim: Good morning, Brian.

Ben Max: Good morning. A few is a good term.

Brian Lehrer: A few is a good description. Let's begin with that special election. This was the seat that Democrat Antonio Delgado gave up to become Lieutenant Governor for Kathy Hochul. Democrat Pat Ryan now goes straight to Congress. He doesn't have to pass go or anything else. Do you know if he was accurate in that clip that he was originally down by 14 points?

Ben Max: I think there was some polling to show that, but this moved very quickly. I don't know how much to really buy into any of the initial polling. There's obviously the whole redistricting mess that was unfolding, Delgado resigning from Congress to become lieutenant governor. Things were shifting very quickly here. These candidates will be running in different districts for the fall very soon. It got very messy, but certainly, this was a district that Republicans were eyeing and really thinking they had a good shot at taking here.

Brian Lehrer: How did he run? How did he win?

Ben Max: He very much ran after the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade focused on abortion rights. He ran on roots in the district, Ulster County Executive. He ran on just very solid Democratic talking points around guns. He's a veteran. Really, abortion and gun control were major focus issues. He ran on also pointing out some of the things that a lot of Democratic candidates are pointing out about Republicans and questions around democracy and whether the Republican Party is fully committed to who the United States democracy and not election lies and overturning election results.

Brian Lehrer: Is attempting for the national democratic party to make too much of Pat Ryan's win as a blueprint for swing districts nationally. Yes, this was an even split district between Biden and Trump, but it did also have a Democratic congressman in there already, Delgado, who this was to replace. There was some propensity to vote Democratic, and the Ulster County part of the district, the more Democratic New Paltz and Kingston side of the river had the most people. What do you think the limits are of taking the Ryan campaign as a national blueprint?

Ben Max: I think there's some significant limits. This is a special election in August, first of all. The amount that can be read into that, no matter what is limited. This election was in on election day, there would be far, far more voters participating. It's not totally clear what that would mean, but this is just a much smaller sample size of voters here. Is there clear evidence around the country that things have been swinging back towards Democrats' way here? Absolutely. You see it in lots of polling, you see it in a variety of other races. You can definitely look at this purple district as something of a bell weather. I would absolutely caution people not to read too, too much into it because every race is different.

The candidates themselves matter a lot. You know, we've been seeing that in many races, but on the flip side of that, Marcus Molinaro the former gubernatorial candidate, the Dutchess County Executive is a very strong Republican candidate to have run in this race. It's not like Pat Ryan was facing somebody that would fully turn off a lot of the sort of swing voters or independent voters. Someone who was very Trumpy. Marcus Molinaro was not a Trump supporter, which came up in his gubernatorial race. I think there is a lot to read into this, but of course, we should take it with a big grain of salt as an August special election.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, in the 19th Congressional District or anywhere else, we invite you into this morning after primary day conversation. Anything you want to say about any of the races that you voted in, or just any of the races that you were watching as a spectator from outside a particular district, or any questions you want to ask about winners down-ballot, who we haven't mentioned yet. We'll get to some of the state Senate races or anything else, any other way you want to chime in here with a question or a thought 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, or tweet @Brian Lehrer for Ben Max and Liz Kim. Liz, let's talk about that 12th Congressional District. Jerrold Nadler going back to Congress, Carolyn Maloney is not. How did Nadler win?

Elizabeth Kim: Well, he was already leading in the polls and it seemed as if the New York Times endorsement really enhanced his lead and gave him further credibility in that district. There were already signs that he was ahead. Even before the polling, there was a lot of talk that there are more west side voters and that he would have that west side advantage. I think ultimately, in the end, people thought it could be close because he's facing another senior member of Congress who is also very well-liked by members of her original district. I think in the end, it was not a huge surprise, I think, to people who had been watching this race evolve that he won pretty handily in the end.

Brian Lehrer: He was a bigger name. I don't know if that matters that he was a bigger name nationally, but as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, a lot more people around the country knew Jerrold Nadler. He got a lot more media coverage because of impeachment and other things. I don't know if that translates locally, but I imagine that was one piece of advantage that he had.

Elizabeth Kim: I imagine so. I was very interested that he didn't do too well in the debate, especially the first debate, but that didn't seem to hurt him at all. His opponent really tried to go more negative in the waiting days of the campaign, accusing him of being senile, but as we could see from the results, that really didn't stick. He really relied on his reputation, and that turned out to be pretty strong and solid with voters.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. When you say he didn't do so well in the debate, he seemed to struggle with his words at times. That I guess was opportunity for his opponents but also a conundrum for others. Do you want to start questioning the guy's capacity at this point or is that not fair since he's obviously doing his job? That was a thing that came up. Nadler and Maloney were both very gracious to each other in their speeches last night, as they have been close allies in Congress over the years before redistricting brought on this run against each other. We played that Nadler clip, here's Maloney from her concession speech.

Carolyn Maloney: I have called Congressman Nadler to congratulate him on his victory. He is a distinguished member of Congress, I share his progressive values, and I wish him every success.

Brian Lehrer: Maloney also said this about something her defeat means, not just for her personally, as she cited the importance of women in Congress generally.

Carolyn Maloney: These heroic women fought sexist systems and misogyny that continues today as we know from my own campaign.

Brian Lehrer: Liz, did gender or any other kind of identity break out as an issue in this race, Nadler, white male, Maloney, white female, Suraj Patel, an Indian American male?

Elizabeth Kim: I don't think so. I think that the result speaks for itself. I know that Maloney and other candidates in New York 10, other female candidates tried to make that a central part of this race, but in the end, we have in those two highly tight races, hard-fought races, we had two men winning out even though we had Carolyn Maloney who was trying to run on her track record of expanding women's rights. We had several women candidates in the 10th district running along the same theme of putting women in power at a moment where abortion rights are at stake, and who better to fight for those rights, who can understand what's at stake than women? That didn't-- it may have penetrated some, but not enough to lift a female candidate to victory.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we will have Dan Goldman, we're expecting him to call in in about five minutes after being projected the winner in that Lower Manhattan and Northwest Brooklyn 10th Congressional District, very crowded primary. Ben, we were just talking about the special election up in the 19th swing district, Democrat Pat Ryan beat Republican Marc Molinaro and will go straight to Congress. Here's a tweet that's already come in on that. You were talking about one of the ways not to make too much of this is that it was a low turnout special election at the end of August.

Sure enough, here's a listener who writes, "Thanks for your segment on the 19th Congressional District special election, that was yesterday. I didn't know it was happening until I heard the segment. After, I went straight to vote." There's one listener who didn't know until primary day itself, when we were covering that race, that that was even a thing.

Ben Max: I think that's indicative and one of the good things, I don't know where people who live in the Hudson Valley go to vacation in the summer, maybe they stay in the Hudson Valley. Maybe that's working at cross-currents that people don't leave the Hudson Valley in the summertime where it's so beautiful [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: Well, they go to Brooklyn Heights.

Ben Max: You're right, exactly. I had bump-ins with friends and acquaintances in my neighborhood and elsewhere who were not aware there was a second primary in the days leading up, and if I had not bumped into them, they would not have gone to vote. This was happening all over the place.

Brian Lehrer: Here's a caller on District 19. Andrew in Westchester, you're on WNYC. Hi, Andrew.

Andrew: Hey, thanks so much for taking my call. A couple of thoughts on the 19th, I'm so glad you led with that story. I grew up there and I was up there a couple of weekends prior to the election, and there were lawn signs everywhere to the point where it was noticeable. Not quite like a general election, but you knew there was something going on if you were in the area for sure. I agree that it's not necessarily indicative of what could happen in the general election, but I thought there were some encouraging signs for Democrats one of which was there wasn't this huge wave of Republican turnout, anti-Democrat, anti-Biden, anti-Congress turnout that might have been. Yes, I know it was not publicized, but there was a lot of activity up there around this election.

Brian Lehrer: I can confirm that. I was also up there for a weekend just a few weeks ago in New Paltz, in particular, and there were Pat Ryan signs everywhere. It was obvious that something was going on.

Andrew: I was in Gardiner, New Paltz, and saw the same thing.

Brian Lehrer: Andrew, thank you very much. Liz Kim, we're going to have Dan Goldman momentarily. Do you want to say anything about the state of that race before we bring him on? He has been projected the winner by the AP and other news organizations. Yuh-Line Niou, who is projected to have come in second, and a pretty close second, two percentage points, but last I saw last night, she had not officially conceded the race and said she wanted to wait until all the votes were counted. Do you know the status of that this morning?

Elizabeth Kim: Well, that's my understanding unless she's said something within the past 15 minutes that we've been talking, but my understanding is she has not officially conceded. We reached out to her as soon as the AP called it for a comment and she did not respond, which we took as her to say that she is still going to wait until all the votes are counted.

Brian Lehrer: With us now for a few minutes, the projected winner of that 13th candidate 10th Congressional District primary in Lower Manhattan and Northwest Brooklyn, Former Federal Prosecutor and MSNBC Commentator Dan Goldman, who became best known for being the lawyer for the House of Democrats for President Trump's first impeachment, the one about Trump's extortion or blackmail, or whatever you want to call it, of Ukraine's President Zelenskyy to try to get him to announce an investigation of Joe Biden, that only ended in 2020, it seems like so long ago. Mr. Goldman, congratulations on the projected victory in that highly scrutinized race, and thanks so much for giving us a couple of minutes on the morning after. Welcome back to WNYC.

Dan Goldman: Thank you so much, Brian. It's great to be here and appreciate the congratulations.

Brian Lehrer: What do you want to say to the people of the district and to the people of the United States, this is a seat in Congress after all, about how you hope to serve them assuming this is finalized and assuming you win the general election in November?

Dan Goldman: Well, I first want to say to the people of the district that I'm very grateful for the support that we got, and I really look forward to continuing to earn the support of everyone in the district. I share so many progressive ideals with so many, not only of the other excellent candidates in this race, but with my opponents who were-- sorry, but also with the voters. I'm eager to get to work and to continue what we did over the last three months, which was go to every corner of the district to learn and to understand their needs.

On a national level, obviously, we've got a lot of work to do in terms of policy and pushing it forward, but before we can do that, we need to make sure that we are going to preserve and protect our democracy. I'm eager to get down to Washington to pitch in in that fight and make sure that's what happens.

Brian Lehrer: Let me follow up on a couple of things you said there on learning the needs of everybody in the district for yourself who's been a prosecutor in the past, not an elected official, there was scrutiny of you for a number of reasons as you obviously know, including that you come from inherited wealth while other candidates had more lived experience with housing and other finances and things like that that are closer to the people you'll represent, that are real issues for people you'll represent that you haven't had in your own life. How do you hope to be in touch and not out of touch with your constituents in those respects?

Dan Goldman: Well, look, obviously I'm grateful for the opportunities that I have been given in this life. That's part of the reason why I've committed my career to public service. As a prosecutor, I was helping communities, protecting communities, trying to make sure that the playing field was level from the inside, and I look forward to continuing to do that. I think the way to do that is to do what we did, which is spend time talking to voters, understanding what their needs. I want to work very closely with the city and state elected officials and the various nonprofit groups who are on the ground dealing with so many of the critical issues that so many people face.

I am a committed public servant. That's where my drive and where my foundation is. I'm eager to do that because ultimately, I got into public service because I want everyone to have the opportunities that my family was able to benefit from.

Brian Lehrer: You fought Donald Trump in the impeachment, he gave you this sarcastic endorsement on social media the other day, "Dan Goldman was a worthy opponent, he did his job very well. I look forward to him going to Congress and me defeating him again," things along those lines. [laughs] How did you react to that?

Dan Goldman: Well, look, this is just true Donald Trump at its core. It does go to show, first of all, I think as we said, that he is concerned that my experience in effectively proving his case during the impeachment will be very valuable in making sure that he doesn't take over the Oval Office by election or by force, as he will almost certainly try in 2024, but it also shows what a danger he is. The fact that he would try to meddle in a Democratic primary in a House District in New York shows that he's still very much present, he's still very much around, and he's still very much a driving force in the Republican Party and the Republican Party has been fully co-opted by him, especially in the House.

We are going to need more people with my experience having stood up to them and effectively proving the impeachment case and using those same strategies to take on what is a Trumpified Republican Party now.

Brian Lehrer: On protecting democracy, you obviously hope Trump won't be president again. If he's not, how much of a battle do you see yourself having to fight in Congress to preserve democracy, even without him and his authoritarian tendencies, or if he does withdraw from the scene by not running or by losing in 2024, how much does that change that in your opinion?

Dan Goldman: Well, it's hard to predict because we don't know what the circumstances would be, whether he chooses not to run or ultimately if he were to actually lose the election and go quietly into the good night, neither of which I think will happen. Part of this is that we have to cut the head off the beast, but we are going to need to expose Republicans for being complicit in the authoritarianism and fascism that Donald Trump represents. We can't be shy about pointing it out. We have to expose it and we have to put them on the spot to explain why they are supporting someone who is a threat to democracy, and now, based on the Mar-a-Lago search, appears to be a threat to our national security at some point. Are they ever going to acknowledge that Donald Trump is a blight on our country and needs to be eliminated?

Brian Lehrer: Do you have any particular committees that you hope to sit on?

Dan Goldman: I haven't gotten that far into it. Obviously, I had 10 years, as you mentioned, as a federal prosecutor in the Department of Justice and so in many respects, the Judiciary Committee would make sense and especially because the ranking Republican member on that committee is Jim Jordan, who I went head-to-head with during the impeachment investigation, and I would love to be a bulwark against his general overreach and exaggeration. I look forward to talking to the Steering Committee and my future colleagues. I'd like to be a team player and make sure that I go where they need me.

Brian Lehrer: Last thing we mentioned before you came on that last we saw last night, Assemblymember Niou has not conceded. You're projected to be the winner of the election by the AP with 26% approximately of the vote, she got about 24% of the vote. She says she's waiting for all the votes to be counted, I guess that means primarily the absentee ballots to be more fully counted as they're received in the mail over the next few days. Have you heard from her directly yet, or how would you describe your declaration of victory with respect to that process still officially going on?

Dan Goldman: Well, I'm generally following the AP but also our own internal numbers are pretty clear that this is over. We had a larger percentage of the absentee ballots that have already come in and there's no reason to think that that will be any different or would overcome our lead, but certainly, she has a right to have all the votes counted, that's our democracy, and I think it's very important, especially for someone running on a platform of preserving our democracy, that I support her desire to do that. If that's what she wants to do, of course, I welcome that.

Brian Lehrer: Dan Goldman, projected the winner in the Lower Manhattan and Northwest Brooklyn 10th Congressional District primary. We really appreciate a few minutes this morning, thank you very much. Since there are hardly any Republicans in your district, presumably you're going to win in November, and then assuming that happens, we look forward to having you many times as you serve your first term. Thanks for coming on today.

Dan Goldman: Thank you so much for having me. I look forward to that as well.

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC with WNYC reporter and Gothamist reporter Elizabeth Kim, who covered that 10th Congressional District primary, and Ben Max, executive editor of Gotham Gazette and host of the Max Politics podcast. Liz, there's your projected winner in the race that you've been spending most of your time on for the last few months. It was interesting to me at the beginning of that exchange how he really acknowledged that in such a crowded field and it wasn't a ranked-choice voting election, so he only did get about a quarter of the vote in victory, and said right at the start that he looks to reach out to everybody in the district, whether they voted for him or not.

Elizabeth Kim: Right, and I think he has to say that because he was neck and neck with what many considered the less-leaning candidate in the race. That suggests that there is a real political divide in this district, although yes, there's so many candidates and it's just a quarter and 2% separates them, but she almost won. When we were watching the returns come in, I think a lot of people were surprised, A, because he had poured $4 million of his own money into the race, B, he had the endorsement of the New York Times, which everyone said would be very important in this race in the district where there are many Times readers and yet Yuh-Line Niou, who raised the least money of the top four candidates, came pretty close.

I think what he said that the absentee ballots favor him and they probably do and in the end, it probably will be certified in his favor, but I don't know that for her it is-- of course, I think she wanted to win, but it's not a total defeat I think for her as sort of a rising progressive star in her party.

Brian Lehrer: Jeffrey in Cobble Hill, you're on WNYC calling about the 10th Congressional District. You're in the 10th Congressional District, hi there.

Jeffrey: Yes, thanks very much. You just mentioned ranked-choice voting, and I think, boy, if there was ever an election where really points up why we need ranked-choice, not just in city elections but state and congressional elections. I congratulate Mr. Goldman, I think it's very unlikely that he would have won if there was ranked-choice voting. My question is, could the state legislature make it so that we could have ranked-choice voting at all levels of New York State, and are there perhaps cynical reasons why they might be reluctant to do that because one of them might get ranked-choice voted out the next time?

Brian Lehrer: Ben, you want to take that? I think some voters expected after last year's mayoral primary that that was it permanently, that's the system in New York State, but it wasn't in the gubernatorial primary because that's at the state level. It wasn't in these primaries, for Congress that is, because it's congressional level, it's only New York City elections that have ranked-choice voting so far if I understand it correctly. I don't know if anybody did a model of how this race might have turned out if there was ranked-choice voting, but do you think that this will increase the pressure to bring it more universally to elections in New York?

Ben Max: I absolutely think this will increase some of the calls. I think it will be a very heavy lift to make it happen through Albany. I think there's been a lot of election and voter law reform over the last few years. Clearly, it's part of the reason that we got absentee ballots being counted as they come in is the legislature has been somewhat responsive and of course the advent of early voting in New York well before that and other things. I think this would be a heavy lift because incumbents would probably see it as a threat in some ways. There has been discussion about it certainly. It's one of the reasons people said either that New York City doing it was a good thing to then push for it to go further or that it was a bad thing because it would confuse voters as you're getting at.

I think if you look at the initial map of results and our friend Steve Romalewski put out some good ones already quickly from the CUNY Mapping Center, you can tell by the initial results of where candidates won that Carlina Rivera and Mondaire Jones probably came in second in a whole bunch of places because either Goldman or Niou won a lot of the territory. That would be very interesting, of course, to try to figure out whether Carlina Rivera's voters and their second choices would have gone to Yuh-Line Niou or someone else and so on.

I don't think it's as easy as saying all of Mondaire Jones's voters, of course, would've gone to one of the other progressives because I don't think things break like that. Obviously, the Times editorial board played a somewhat decisive role here, but also if you look at that map, you can see that Goldman not only did well in some of the wealthiest parts of this district that are predominantly white but also he did very well in the small Borough Park area, which could have easily made the difference here in this narrow margin. There's some really interesting pieces in the results.

Brian Lehrer: Liz, maybe one note of sadness here as far as a lot of Democrats might be concerned is that Mondaire Jones now loses his seat in Congress. The other leaders in this pack get to keep their seats and other elected bodies, Carlina Rivera stays in city council, Yuh-Line Niou stays in the state assembly, but Mondaire Jones who got awkwardly redistricted from what was his seat, just north of the city, he decided to run in this race. Of course, he got defeated by Dan Goldman.

I don't know what he'll do next, but he was, I think, considered a very impressive also potentially rising star in the Democratic Party, a valuable voice, one of the first two openly gay, Black members of Congress, among many other things, him and Ritchie Torres elected at the same time in the last cycle, and his voice now, at least in elected offices lost.

Elizabeth Kim: That's correct. I just want to say that Yuh-Line also no longer keeps her seat in the state assembly.

Brian Lehrer: She had to give up that seat to run in the primary.

Elizabeth Kim: Yes. She elected to, yes. I guess that is a real conundrum and a lot of us were talking about that last night, especially because he did pretty well because the polls had suggested that he would come in maybe fourth after Rivera, but instead he came in third and I think in talking to voters and I was comparing notes with my colleagues in the newsroom yesterday about what they were hearing from voters. We consistently heard from a lot of voters who said that they like Mondaire. I think part of the reason is because he is a skilled politician. He did perform well in the debates. He's a skilled campaigner.

I think what we were hearing is that the New York Times, although they did not endorse him, they basically almost-- some people almost called it a little bit of a co-endorsement, but they did make a very positive, favorable mention of him in their endorsement of Dan Goldman ironically. I think that that did help them and in talking to some voters, they did mention that. They said that made them feel good. They had already liked him from watching him on MSNBC and that sealed the deal for him. It is a shame I imagine for a lot of people who liked him and he was a rising star. Where does he go from now? Does he stay in Brooklyn? Does he consider running again in the New York City sphere of politics? I don't know, but he's definitely someone to watch.

Brian Lehrer: Here's David in Nassau County calling in on another Democratic congressional primary that had a lot of candidates yesterday. David, you're on WNYC. Hi, there.

David: Hi, Brian. Well, I live in Tom Suozzi's PD in Nassau County, also includes part of-

Brian Lehrer: Northeast Queens.

David: -Eastern Queens. The winner there was a multimillionaire guy from Great Neck who defeated another former politician from Great Neck and a county legislator from Jericho. He'll be a fine congregant. He'll do as the majority wants, but in this long wait, I just looked it up, the turnout in the Democratic primary was 12.35% of enrolled Democrats. There was basically minimal turnout and I have no idea how much money was spent, but given the number of mailings that I got from the three principal candidates and the television commercials I saw, I'm wondering how much was spent per vote. It's absolutely appalling because I also looked it up, you only get $174,000 a year for being a member of the house. They spent many multiples of that. Although I've read that Goldman spent $5 million for his sit. Again, you figure out the cost per vote. It's incredible.

Brian Lehrer: Now, tell the victors what they've won. Wait, that's my salary? Not that that's so bad in the scheme of things, but it might be a little less than people might guess for members of Congress. Ben Max, were you covering that race at all? I think in this case, the winner Robert Zimmerman, unlike Dan Goldman and unlike Jerrold Nadler, goes into a very competitive general election against a Republican.

Ben Max: Yes. Our attention shifts from these Democratic primaries and these big New York City infighting to Long Island and the Hudson Valley, and, of course, New York 11 in the city for the general election plus the governor's race, and so forth. This will be one of several major Congressional races in New York to watch as New York will play a key role in which party has the majority in the House come January. Robert Zimmerman was the favorite and expected to win. This district includes a part of Queens, of course, that Tom Suozzi has represented.

It's interesting to Queens voters and New York City voters, and it will be a general election to watch where given the district itself ends the way that some things are swinging, he'll be the favorite in the general election, but it will be absolutely one of these districts that'll be watched as part of what happens in New York and therefore the country.

Brian Lehrer: Ben, we talked about Democrat Pat Ryan's win in the special election for Congress, north of the city against Republican Marc Molinaro. We also had two Democratic primaries in the Northern suburbs that pitted more progressive Democrats for Congress against more centrist ones and the results were mixed. Incumbent Sean Patrick Maloney considered the more moderate one, in that case, held off progressive challenger Alessandra Biaggi, and incumbent progressive Jamaal Bowman held off two candidates challenging him from a bit to his right. Here's Bowman reflecting on his new district that presumably made it a little harder for him to win as it removed parts of the Bronx and added more of Westchester.

Jamaal Bowman: I hate to lose Co-Op City, I hate to lose Riverdale and Woodlawn, but I'm really excited to have gained White Plains in Greenburgh, all of the river towns in Port Chester while keeping the other areas that we had. People respond to good leadership, and they respond to honest leadership with integrity, and they respect hard work and transparency. Those are things we try to provide from the very beginning.

Brian Lehrer: Ben, do we make anything about the trends in more progressive wings versus more centrist wings of the Democratic Party from all these results, whether it's the Dan Goldman result in the ways that we talked about that so far, or in this case, the progressive Bowman got renominated, but the progressive Biaggi couldn't defeat Sean Patrick Maloney?

Ben Max: I think first and foremost, one of the biggest takeaways of the night, whether in those districts or in the city overall is that incumbency was very strong, yet again, we saw this in the June primaries as well for the statewide seats and the assembly. In both those cases, Sean Patrick Maloney had much more of a claim, of course, to incumbency, even though the district was different and Jamaal Bowman was the only member of Congress running in his district. I think it was very interesting that Maloney won by such a wide margin, but that speaks to the fact that Alessandra Biaggi who was not even a state Senator representing even part of that district.

This was a huge gambit by her and goes back to the Mondaire Jones's decision 2020 hindsight, of course, but it's clear and it was clear for a little while that he probably should have stayed and tried to fight for his district against Sean Patrick Maloney, but that would be a tall task given Maloney is the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and if Mondaire Jones had gotten the New York Times endorsement, for example, he might very well have won in New York 10. I agree with Liz. It was a little surprising how well he did, especially compared to Carlina Rivera.

I also think that Jamaal Bowman got something very important there, which also speaks in some ways to Sean Patrick Maloney is that voters don't always just go by these ideological labels that we often give them in the media and that people that are following really closely know very well. People respond to how they feel about candidates and charisma and things like that that Jaamal Bowman has a lot of and, at least to some people, Sean Patrick Maloney has a good amount of, and the fact that they've been in Congress means a lot to people as long as they haven't made some great mistake that voters are clamoring to unseat them for.

Brian Lehrer: How competitive are either of those districts believed to be for November, the Bowman district or the Sean Patrick Maloney district?

Ben Max: The Maloney district is seen as definitely competitive and Assemblymember Mike Lawler will be the Republican there. He's seen as a pretty strong candidate. That will definitely be one of the races to watch there. I think Bowman will be probably much more of a lock for the general election but will be facing a challenge and part of a national atmosphere, so anything could happen there, but the 17th Congressional District where Sean Patrick Maloney is running against Mike Lawler will be one of the races where Republicans are putting a lot of resources and the Democrats will probably as well, especially given Maloney's charing the DCCC to try to keep that race in Democratic hands or flip it for the Republicans.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take one more call pertaining to this question of whether the progressive wing of the Democratic Party in New York State and relevant to District 10 and Dan Goldman edging out Yuh-Line Niou from Julianne in Brooklyn. Julianne, you're on WNYC. Hi.

Julianne: Hi, Brian, longtime listeners. So glad to be calling in. I was a volunteer on Yuh-Line Niou's campaign. I do want to call in to express my disappointment about the general lack of progressive consolidation in this race. A lot of the conversations that I and other volunteers are having in the last days on phones or in person were with people who seem to be deciding between Mondaire, and Carlina, and Yuh-Line. We were really pushing our belief that we thought that Yuh-Line was the progressive with the best chance to beat Dan Goldman. Based on the very close result, it seems that that was pretty well founded.

We're so proud of Yuh-Line and the campaign we ran, it was actually an incredible organization, so many volunteers. I think that there's definitely room for progressives to think about how to be a bit more strategic if we're in the situation in the future, and we still don't have ranked-choice voting.

Brian Lehrer: It's a tough one though, Julianne, right, because it's democracy. Everybody's allowed to run, and who out of Yuh-Line Niou, Carlina Rivera, and even people with East River Park controversies and everything? A lot of people said, "Well, the real progressive alternatives were just Yuh-Line and Mondaire Jones, but how do you decide who's going to drop out?"

Julianne: Oh, no. Sure. It's a great question. It's a tough question. I believe that everyone absolutely has the right to get in the race, and to try their hand and see how things were going. I do think that as things progressed, some of the polling became a bit clearer. Definitely, Jo Anne Simon and Liz Holtzman didn't seem to have a path to victory. Whether their votes would have gone to Yuh-Line, who knows, but of the ones you mentioned, I do think it was pretty foreseeable that Mondaire was not going to prevail in this race. I think he's been a fantastic Congressman, I am sorry he's not going back to Congress as well, but realistically, if the movement is bigger than 1%, again, who knows?

As one of your guests noted, these things don't always break cleanly, but given just how close the margin was and given again, how those one on one conversations were going, you have to wonder what would have happened if a few more people had broken away at the end.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. I guess it would have taken that last-minute kind of pivot by Mondaire Jones, in particular, and Carlina Rivera to decide to endorse Yuh-Line once they saw that she apparently was breaking out as the closest challenger to Dan Goldman. Julianne, thanks. Just to wrap this up, and I know we're over time. Liz and Ben, thanks, after probably not that much sleep last night for joining us, for a long segment this morning, but I just want to touch on the State Senate primaries. There was a lot of real estate money, Wall Street money, even some Walmart money that went into challenging progressives in the State Senate with more moderate candidates and State Senate primaries. I don't think any of those challengers won. Ben, am I missing anything?

Ben Max: No, you're not. Other than the incumbency theme that I mentioned earlier with New York 10 being a big exception, it was a very good night for the left in New York, including holding on to several State Senate seats where more progressive state senators were being challenged from the right and that includes most notably the Bronx State Senator Gustavo Rivera, who was facing an immense support for his challenger and Manhattan and now partly in the Bronx State Senator Robert Jackson, who had a similar challenge from his right, both of them holding on to their seats, among others and progressives picking up a new State Senate district in the new District 59 that includes parts of Western Queens, Western Brooklyn, and a little bit of Manhattan as well.

Brian Lehrer: Liz Kim, we'll state one more like this. Moderate Max Rose won his congressional primary over a more progressive challenger. Max Rose will now run against Nicole Malliotakis as they've run against each other before for Congress on Staten Island and nearby Brooklyn.

Elizabeth Kim: That's right. I'm sure that will be the really big high-profile race that we'll be watching as we head into the general election, that will be the rematch. I think that was pretty much the expectation too, that those two would meet each other again. It's going to be an interesting test with the Supreme Court and abortion in play, how Max chooses to use that issue. Can he turn that to his advantage, and upset Malliotakis the incumbent?

Brian Lehrer: Liz Kim from Gothamist and WNYC, Ben Max Executive Editor of Gotham Gazette and host of the Max Politics podcast. Thanks, both for this morning. Appreciate it a lot.

Elizabeth Kim: Thanks, Brian.

Ben Max: You bet. Thanks, Brian.

 

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