Democratic Socialists notch New York wins as Black and working-class Hispanic precincts backed their opponents, returns show
NEW YORK, July 26. Democratic Socialist candidates have posted two primary wins in New York City in recent months, but precinct-level returns show the coalitions that carried both races were built on younger and college-educated voters while working-class Black and Hispanic neighborhoods backed their opponents by wide margins.
Key takeaways
- Democratic Socialist candidates won two recent New York City primaries, but precinct returns show their coalitions were built on younger, college-educated voters while working-class Black and Hispanic neighborhoods backed their opponents.
- In the June mayoral primary, Zohran Mamdani lost Black voters citywide to Andrew Cuomo by nearly six points, with heavily Black neighborhoods like Brownsville and East Flatbush going strongly against him.
- DSA member Darializa Avila Chevalier unseated five-term Rep. Adriano Espaillat 49.4 percent to 45.9 percent, but Espaillat won lower-income areas by 9.1 points and majority-Hispanic precincts with 56 percent.
- The DSA's 2021 internal survey found the organization is 85 percent White and 4 percent Black, with a median age of 33 and more than 80 percent holding a college degree.
- Chevalier's winning margin came from a 24.5-point advantage with younger voters and a 20-point lead in college-educated precincts.
NEW YORK, July 26. Democratic Socialist candidates have posted two primary wins in New York City in recent months, but precinct-level returns show the coalitions that carried both races were built on younger and college-educated voters while working-class Black and Hispanic neighborhoods backed their opponents by wide margins.
Mamdani's gap in Black neighborhoods
In the June mayoral primary, Zohran Mamdani, now New York City mayor, lost among Black voters citywide to Andrew Cuomo by nearly six points. Brownsville and East Flatbush, two of the city's poorest neighborhoods where more than 60 percent of residents are Black, went heavily against him. Mamdani spent months pivoting toward pocketbook issues, including housing costs, before securing enough of that support to win the November general election.
The 13th District results
In New York's 13th Congressional District, DSA member Darializa Avila Chevalier unseated five-term incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat, 49.4 percent to 45.9 percent, according to results reported by The New York Times and analyzed by VoteHub. Chevalier's margin in higher-income areas was 5.1 points. Espaillat won lower-income areas by 9.1 points and carried majority-Hispanic precincts with 56 percent, including Morris Heights and Kingsbridge. Chevalier's margin came from a 24.5-point advantage with younger voters and a 20-point lead in college-educated precincts.
The homeownership dispute and who the DSA is
A senior Mamdani campaign adviser called Black homeownership "a weapon of White supremacy masquerading as 'wealth building' public policy," according to the source. Queens Borough President Donovan Richards accused the DSA of acting like White supremacists. The head of a Bedford-Stuyvesant organization founded in 1978 to keep Black families in their homes argued homeownership is what generations of Black New Yorkers fought redlining to secure. The National Black Empowerment Action Fund, a Black-led advocacy group, spent $2 million on ads warning that the DSA agenda threatens decades of social and economic progress.
The DSA's own 2021 internal membership survey found the organization is 85 percent White and 4 percent Black, with a median age of 33. More than 80 percent of members hold a college degree, better than a third hold a graduate or professional degree at more than double the national rate, and nearly a third clear six-figure incomes.
Warnings from within the Democratic coalition
Democratic political analyst Van Jones warned that "no police, no prisons, no borders" is regressive and risks pulling the party past where voters are willing to go. Bill Maher, host of HBO's "Real Time," noted Vermont could not sustain single-payer healthcare for 626,000 people. Former Biden White House aide Yemisi Egbewole described the DSA's rise as a socialist cub that establishment Democrats allowed to grow into a full-sized lion because no one intervened while it was small. The organization is also reportedly drafting a new platform that calls for abolishing the U.S. Senate.