All three candidates endorsed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani won primaries on Tuesday in a sweep that cements the Democratic Party’s lurch toward socialism.
Mr. Mamdani, appearing at a victory party Tuesday for socialist state Assembly Member Claire Valdez, cheered the Democratic Socialists of America. The election of socialist candidates to public office, Mr. Mamdani said, was the beginning of a political movement “that is ready to write a new chapter in our party’s history.”
Ms. Valdez was among three candidates who, with Mr. Mamdani’s endorsement, defeated the Democratic Party’s establishment picks on Tuesday.
The primary winners will compete on the November ballot in deep-blue districts that all but guarantee they are headed to Congress, where they’ll reinforce a growing list of House and Senate lawmakers who embrace an extreme socialist agenda that the far-left base is now clamoring for.
In a stunning upset, former New York City comptroller Brad Lander, a socialist who pledged to serve as Mr. Mamdani’s ally in Congress, handily defeated two-term Democratic incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman.
Rep. Adriano Espaillat, who heads the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, shockingly lost his bid for a fifth term to Darializa Avila Chevalier, a former Mamdani campaign staffer who helped organize anti-Israel protests at Columbia University. She was part of a campus group that called for “Death to America,” and in deleted social media posts, she supported abolishing the police, prisons and opposes all deportations of illegal immigrants.
Ms. Valdez defeated Antonio Reynoso, who was backed by Democratic leaders and endorsed by retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez.
Ms. Valdez pledges to “dismantle and abolish ICE,” and provide “Medicare for All, paid for by taxing billionaires and corporations that have rigged the system.”
The socialist candidates are riding a wave of voter discontent.
Rep. Ro Khanna, one of the most liberal lawmakers in the House, tapped into the movement. He endorsed Ms. Valdez and Mr. Lander, but rather than acknowledge they are socialists, he described the far-left winners as “progressives” who crushed the establishment Democrats in New York and are poised to drastically reshape their agenda.
“Some have criticized my supporting of progressive insurgents,” Mr. Khanna said Tuesday. “Tonight shows we have a new party.”
Several other DSA-backed House candidates have advanced to the November ballot and are poised to expand the socialist ranks in Congress into a small army.
Sacramento City Councilmember Mai Vang, who refused to say the Pledge of Allegiance at city council meetings and turned her back against the U.S. flag, won a spot on the November ballot against incumbent Democratic Rep. Doris Matsui in California’s 7th Congressional District.
She’s endorsed by the Sacramento DSA, who describe her as “rooted in movements for justice — from fighting to abolish ICE to demanding an end to genocide in Gaza.”
In New Jersey, plastic surgeon Adam Hamawy, backed by leading congressional socialists Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Sen. Bernard Sanders of Vermont, defeated a crowded field of establishment Democrats to win a spot on November’s ballot in the deep blue 12th Congressional District.
Democratic voters picked Mr. Hamawy despite his past role as a character witness for Omar Abdel-Rahman, also known as the “Blind Sheik,” who was convicted for masterminding the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Democratic voters backed oyster farmer and self-declared communist Graham Platner in the primary for U.S. Senate in Maine.
Polls show he’s running neck-and-neck against incumbent GOP Sen. Susan Collins in the general election, despite claims by past girlfriends of abuse and volatile behavior, his Nazi tattoo and an array of disturbing social media posts.
“The Democrat party, the socialists, the Marxists, have nominated some of the most radical candidates to ever run for office, and they’re running for Congress. The insurgent left is on the rise,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, Louisiana Republican, said Wednesday.
Socialists have blazed a path through the nation’s mayoral races. Mr. Mamdani’s 2025 win in New York City was followed by Katie Wilson’s upset victory in Seattle. This year, socialist candidates advanced to the November ballot in the District of Columbia and Los Angeles.
Their agenda aligns with polls that show young voters are fed up with the status quo, as the cost of housing, food and gas and healthcare has skyrocketed and far outpaced wage growth.
A Fox News survey in March found a record 38% believed it would be a good thing for the United States to move away from capitalism and in the direction of socialism — up from 32% in 2022 and 18% in 2010.
Very liberal voters (66%) and Democrats under age 45 (66%) were most likely to favor shifting toward socialism.
House Democratic leaders are carefully tiptoeing around the shift in their party, knowing it is fueled by dissatisfaction within their own base.
House Democratic Conference Chairman Pete Aguilar of California on Wednesday downplayed the socialist victories as “a couple” of wins in districts around the country, which he blamed on “recoil” against President Trump.
“But we understand that much of that is based on their frustration and anxiety and the economic uncertainty that people face, and voters are going to take it out in different ways,” Mr. Aguilar said. “Voters have that ability to make those decisions in Democratic primaries. And we’ll work with whoever they send.”
