Good morning. It’s Wednesday. Today we’ll look at the results from the Democratic primary. We’ll also get details on the Trump administration’s lawsuit over a state law that bans Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents from wearing masks.
The big winner in the Democratic primary was Mayor Zohran Mamdani, and he wasn’t on the ballot. He had backed Brad Lander, a former New York City comptroller, who won a closely watched race against Representative Dan Goldman in a district in Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn. Lander ran to the left of Goldman. Mamdani and his allies, in an aggressive push to expand the power of progressives, had taken issue with Goldman’s support for Israel. Mamdani’s influence also paid off in the race for the House seat in Brooklyn and Queens that is being vacated by Representative Nydia Velázquez. There, the candidate he had backed — Claire Valdez, a Texas-born democratic socialist serving her first term in the State Assembly — defeated the Brooklyn borough president, Antonio Reynoso, who had been a Mamdani ally. Reynoso, with his own progressive record and deep roots in the district, would normally have been the favorite to succeed Velázquez. But Valdez turned the race into a contest to define the left and the district. Reynoso’s base was made up of older, longtime residents. Valdez’s support came from newcomers in gentrifying neighborhoods. A third candidate who ran with Mamdani’s support — Darializa Avila Chevalier, an activist and democratic socialist, upset Representative Adriano Espaillat. Mamdani and his allies had targeted him as too cozy with corporate interests and too friendly to Israel. The outcome was arguably the biggest upset in a House primary in New York since Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defeated a 10-term congressman from Queens. And in a race Mamdani did not weigh in on — the contest to succeed Representative Jerrold Nadler, who is retiring — Assemblyman Micah Lasher won, according to The Associated Press. Lasher, a protégé of Nadler, ran an old-fashioned campaign that emphasized his experience in government. With 85 percent of the vote counted, Lasher was ahead of another assemblyman, Alex Bores. Jack Schlossberg, the grandson of John F. Kennedy, was running a distant third, ahead of Nina Schwalbe, a public health expert, and George Conway III, who was once married to President Trump’s 2016 campaign manager but is a harsh critic of the White House. You can read our coverage of other races here. Mamdani’s push to capitalize on his popularity and put more progressives on the ballot strained relationships with the left-leaning Working Families Party and labor unions. It also led to tensions with Representative Hakeem Jeffries of Brooklyn, who is in line to become speaker if the Democrats win control of the House in November. Grace Mausser, a co-chair of the New York City Democratic Socialists of America chapter, said on NY1 on Tuesday that she hoped that Jeffries had learned this from the results: “Americans are tired of status quo politics.” The primaries were expensive. SuperPACs channeled more than $50 million into the congressional races, and former Mayor Michael Bloomberg promised millions for Lasher’s campaign as Bores became the target of a multimillion-dollar proxy fight between competing factions of the artificial intelligence industry. Groups connected to two major artificial intelligence companies and other Silicon Valley giants spent more than $25 million on television ads against him. “Bottom line, politics takes money. Elections are expensive,” Katharine Pichardo, the president and chief executive of the Latino Victory Fund, told my colleague Sally Goldenberg. “The fact that there’s money in politics doesn’t mean that the elected officials are beholden to those funders,” added Pichardo, whose fund had spent $380,000 on advertisements for Espaillat in his campaign against Avila Chevalier. “It just means that that’s what it takes to win.” WEATHER After a few rainy days, sunny skies are expected to return with a high near 82. Tonight will be mostly clear, with a low around 65. ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING In effect until July 3 (Independence Day observed) QUOTE OF THE DAY “It’s seen the best of Bushwick and the worst of Bushwick.” — The Rev. Dr. James Steward III, the pastor of South Brunswick Church in Brooklyn, which survived 173 years of natural disasters, neighborhood upheavals and advancing gentrification until it was destroyed by fire last week. The latest Metro news
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New York is the latest state that the Trump administration has taken to court over laws banning Immigration and Customs Enforcement from wearing masks. The Justice Department sued over the state’s mask ban, which was scheduled to go into effect this week. The lawsuit argued that it was unconstitutional and that agents would be in danger if they had to uncover their faces. The ban was signed into law in May by Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat. The administration’s lawsuit, filed in federal court in Buffalo, also took issue with two other measures passed by the Democratic-controlled Legislature in Albany as part of the state budget. One calls for law enforcement officers to show the name of the agency they work for, as well as their own names or badge numbers. The other says that local jails and police departments in the state cannot enter into agreements to assist the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. New York countered with a lawsuit against the administration, arguing that the mask ban was needed to “promote public safety and keep its residents safe.” That lawsuit, filed in federal court in Albany, said the mask ban was necessary to safeguard citizens against federal overreach. “Repeatedly, we have seen masked agents overrun cities in this country at the direction of the current federal administration,” the state lawsuit said. But the Justice Department argued that New York does not have the power to dictate how federal officers dress and identify themselves. It also asserted that the New York laws obstruct federal immigration objectives. A mask ban in California was struck down by a federal judge who deemed it unconstitutional because state officers had been exempted. New York contends that its mask ban does not single out ICE agents because it applies to all law enforcement officers in New York. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals also blocked California from enforcing a law similar to the New York measure requiring local and federal agents to display identification. METROPOLITAN DIARY Manhattan debut
Dear Diary: On Sunday afternoons when the weather is nice, there’s a restaurant on Columbus Avenue, Manny’s Bistro, that puts a really good four-piece jazz band out on the sidewalk. It’s a busy stretch of Columbus, and yet the band fits right in. Manny sets tables on the sidewalk and in the street and transforms it into a jazz club, and people get up and sing with the band. One day, I was singing with the band, and I noticed a young girl of about 5 watching very closely. I asked her father if I could talk to her and whether she sang. He said yes, so I squatted down and asked her name. Riley, she replied. I asked if she liked to sing, and she swallowed her breath, afraid. I said don’t be afraid and asked what her favorite song was. “The Wheels on the Bus,” she said. “Hey!” I yelled to the band “You guys play ‘Wheels on the Bus?’” “Yeah, we play that,” they yelled back. I held out the mic. The girl took it and began to sing. She was doing really well, but then started to falter and search for the words. On cue, everyone in the crowd started to sing along with her. It seemed as if everybody on Columbus Avenue knew “The Wheels on the Bus.” She finished the song, handed the mic back and said thank you. I wondered if she realized that she had just had her first New York moment. — Tony Danza Mr. Danza is an actor. He appears in the Starz show “Power Book III: Raising Kanan.” Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Tell us your New York story here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.
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