Progressives were eager to primary sitting Democrats — until they weren’t.
Some left-wing Democrats are questioning how to balance electoral ambitions with policy aspirations in light of democratic socialist Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s victory in New York City.
Mamdani reportedly tried to dissuade a city council member and close ally, Chi Ossé, from primarying House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries in 2026. The Democratic Socialists of America’s New York City chapter voted over the weekend against endorsing Ossé, and the council member is reportedly considering forgoing a primary challenge.
This same calculus is popping up in other races in the state as progressive groups, which once backed often-young candidates wanting to run against entrenched Democrats, reconsider those efforts.
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“I think the most important thing is to show that those that have a bold vision can pull it off and pull it off competently,” Adam Green, a co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee — a grassroots organization that backs progressive candidates at all levels of government — told NOTUS.
“The value to New Yorkers and to the entire progressive movement nationally is so much higher when it comes to Zohran getting his agenda passed confidently when the spotlight is on him than the value of picking up one more congressional seat,” Green said.
There isn’t total alignment among progressives on the question of to primary or not to primary.
Rep. Dan Goldman could face primary challenges from Mamdani allies Alexa Avilés and Brad Lander, who has hinted at Goldman’s lack of support for Mamdani as a motivating factor in his consideration to run against him. And former New York City mayoral candidate Michael Blake, who cross-endorsed Mamdani, is aiming to unseat Rep. Ritchie Torres.
Other primary challengers — like Ossé and community organizer Darializa Avila Chevalier, who is looking to unseat Rep. Adriano Espaillat — are taking aim at lawmakers who did fall in line behind Mamdani.
“As much as we have a duty to build on Zohran’s momentum, to ensure that it goes past City Hall all the way to Washington, D.C., I don’t think this is simply about Zohran,” said Usamah Andrabi, a spokesperson for the progressive group Justice Democrats, which is backing Chevalier in her primary bid against Espaillat in New York.
Stepping back from primary challenges to cement Mamdani’s policies, Andrabi said, would be a sign that progressives are letting their power “just stop at City Hall.”
The complication for some, however, is that Mamdani has come to represent something bigger than City Hall for the progressive movement.
“Primaries happen,” Jasmine Gripper, the co-director of the New York Working Families Party, acknowledged, but added that as more progressives win, there’s more of a need to play some inside baseball to prove their ideas can succeed.
“Being in governing power means you need your colleagues in government to help you win and to help you govern well and to deliver for New Yorkers,” Gripper told NOTUS. “Some of the policies and promises Zohran made he can’t do by himself. He needs help from Albany. He needs help from D.C. to deliver on those promises.”
In New York, Mamdani has already strategically sought out an alliance with Gov. Kathy Hochul.
He will need buy-in from Congress too. The Democratic Party has long elevated older and more experienced lawmakers when it comes to leadership positions, and those lawmakers could be crucial to Mamdani’s efforts to hang onto federal funding under a presidential administration that has already taken shots at New York City’s money.
“There are a lot of progressives in Congress, including appropriators who have a vested interest in Zohran Mamdani being a successful mayor, who might be inclined to go to bat for funding for the city and even the state of New York,” Green told NOTUS.
Lawmakers in the delegation have said as much.
“It’s going to be important that we have an open line of communication” with the mayor-elect, Rep. Yvette Clarke, a Mamdani supporter, told NOTUS. “You know, Trump has already put a lot of threats out there.”
Still, electoral enthusiasm is still alive on the left. Justice Democrats said it plans to recruit progressive candidates across all 50 states ahead of the 2026 primary elections, and Green told NOTUS that there’s room for primary challenges in races in other states that are not as closely tied to Mamdani’s policy agenda as those in New York.
But even among the progressives who don’t think Mamdani’s win should be a signal to dial back campaigns, there’s a tone of caution that’s somewhat new this year.
“It’s just important for ourselves, as well as other organizations, to make sure that we’re looking carefully at these races and figuring out which ones build power for the long term,” Ravi Mangla, a spokesperson for the national Working Families Party, told NOTUS. “We never want to do anything that feels like it’s going to be an impediment to actually winning concrete gains for working people.”
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