WASHINGTON — House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said Wednesday that New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has “got work to do” in repairing relationships with congressional Democrats after two sitting lawmakers lost to candidates the mayor supported.
“Every race is going to be judged on its own merits, and I’m sure that there’ll be an assessment of what happened,” Jeffries told The Post, before expressing appreciation to Reps. Adriano Espaillat (D-NY) and Dan Goldman (D-NY) for their service in Congress.
Jeffries had earlier told Punchbowl News that he and the democratic socialist mayor had agreed to “strongly disagree” about their preferred candidates in the high-stakes primaries, which effectively served as general elections in the city’s heavily Democratic districts.
“He’s got work to do in terms of the conversations that he’s going to have with members of Congress moving forward,” Jeffries told the outlet.
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Darializa Avila Chevalier, a former Mamdani organizer aligned with the far left, unseated five-term incumbent Espaillat in the 13th District, which includes Upper Manhattan and the Bronx. In the 10th District, spanning Lower Manhattan and affluent brownstone Brooklyn, former city Comptroller Brad Lander defeated Goldman.
Mamdani supported both Chevalier and Lander, while Jeffries put his backing behind the incumbents, Espaillat and Goldman.
Another Mamdani-backed candidate, state Assemblywoman Claire Valdez, won the primary for the seat being vacated by retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez (D-NY), whose Brooklyn-Queens district race had included her endorsed choice, Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso.
