Disputes About Race and Party Strategy Shape N.Y. Democratic Primaries
The New York Times
Several State Assembly contests have become contentious as the June 25 primary nears, with the party grappling between moderate and progressive forces.
In Brooklyn, a State Assembly race has attracted the involvement of marquee figures like Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic leader, and Letitia James, the New York State attorney general.
In East Harlem, race and ethnicity have cast shadows over another contest, with the question of whether the neighborhood should be represented by a Latino. And in Westchester County, a Democratic primary fight has included ugly accusations of lies, betrayal and purloined emails.
If there was any illusion that Democrats in New York would play nice until November’s all-important general election, these contests for the Assembly in Tuesday’s primaries suggest otherwise.
At the heart of many of these contests lies a long-simmering tension between institutional and progressive Democrats that has come to dominate many debates inside the State Legislature, including those involving housing and criminal justice.
“Democratic primaries are still a competition for the soul of the party. It’s not a formality,” said Trip Yang, a Democratic consultant and strategist. “There are public policy differences and differences in approach.”
Progressives argue that their mainstream Democratic colleagues have not done enough to improve the lives of working-class voters of color, leaving them frustrated and open to switching parties, as evidenced by the increasing numbers of Black and Latino men who have become Republicans. To stanch the bleeding, progressives argue, Democrats must reignite their base by addressing society’s inequalities with housing and health policies that shift power from the corporate class to working people.
A businessman in the Bronx falsified information on thousands of returns, committing one of the largest tax frauds in Department of Justice history, prosecutors said.
Officials in Wisconsin gave little new information on Tuesday about a shooting that left a student and a teacher dead and six others injured.
The president-elect’s latest attempt to overturn his Manhattan conviction was rebuffed by the judge overseeing the case, who called it “mere hearsay and conjecture.”
Undocumented immigrants whose children or spouses are U.S. citizens are feeling particularly vulnerable to President-elect Donald J. Trump’s threats to push them out.
The man whom authorities call a serial killer was charged with second-degree murder in the case of Valerie Mack, who disappeared in 2000.
The Commerce Department is banning the few remaining operations of China Telecom in the United States, a move that appears unlikely to deter Beijing from conducting sophisticated cyberoperations.
The police in Wisconsin are working to establish a motive for the attack, which left a student and teacher dead and six others injured.
The defendant, Rex Heuermann, is due in court Tuesday. Investigators have been trying to tie him to other unsolved killings on Long Island.
Some Republicans have said that a constitutional convention is overdue. Many Democratic-led states have rescinded their long-ago calls for one, and California will soon consider whether to do the same.
The New York City Campaign Finance Board voted to withhold as much as $4.3 million in matching funds from Mayor Eric Adams, hampering his re-election bid.
He built Mississippi’s Republican Party into a conservative powerhouse, making himself a regional power broker in the process.