The Scoop
Progressives are trying to entice New York City Comptroller Brad Lander into a Democratic congressional primary with a poll that shows him leading Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y. — if he runs.
The Data for Progress survey of 553 likely Democratic primary voters in New York’s 10th congressional district, which Goldman has represented since 2023, found him with a 48% favorable rating. At the same time, 41% support Goldman in a race against an unnamed Democrat.
Given a choice between Goldman and Lander, the comptroller leads the incumbent congressman by 19 points — with 52% supporting Lander and 33% backing Goldman. Demand Progress Action, a separate progressive group, commissioned the poll. Data for Progress was one of the first pollsters to identify Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani’s surge in the June New York City mayoral primary.
Lander, whose cross-endorsement of Mamdani helped the 33-year-old state legislator win that race, declined to respond on record to a question about the poll.
A strategist for Goldman, a pro-Israel Democrat who has declined to endorse Mamdani and urged him to do more to win over Jewish voters, said that the campaign was “not paying any attention to agenda-driven push polls” as Goldman works on “defending our democracy” from the Trump administration.
“Dan has a lot of respect for Brad and enjoys working with him on a number of issues, including Trump’s attack on immigrants,” said Simone Kanter. “If he or anyone else would like to throw their hat in the ring, they are more than welcome to.”
Local progressives were reinvigorated by the mayoral primary, and saw the party’s leaders and establishment as newly vulnerable to a challenge. The Working Families Party, which worked against Goldman when he defeated more left-wing candidates to win the seat, has said that any Democrat who refuses to endorse Mamdani could face opposition.
Mamdani carried the 10th district, which stretches from lower Manhattan into liberal Brooklyn neighborhoods like Park Slope — home of Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, who has also not yet endorsed Mamdani. Potential challengers are also eyeing House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, whose district also supported Mamdani in June.
“The NYWFP is approaching 2026 with a commitment to elect leaders who side with working families, not billionaires, and fight to make NYC affordable for all,” said Ana María Archila, the co-director of the left-wing third party. “That will be our criteria for every endorsement, including in NY-10.”
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David’s view
Kamala Harris won 79% of the vote in Goldman’s district, and local Democrats are confident that whoever wins the nomination would go to Congress. Even as they work to elect Mamdani, progressives are looking down the calendar, wondering whether they can replace any of their current members of Congress with more reliably left-wing Democrats.
Progressives fumbled their 2022 campaigns for the seat, when multiple candidates with left-wing credentials knocked each other out, letting Goldman prevail with just 26% of the vote.
Two years later, as an incumbent, he won 66% of the vote against little-known rivals. That kept progressive campaigners interested in his seat. They saw an opening when Mamdani and Lander ran so strongly there. And they saw the incumbent’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza as a mismatch with his seat.
How many Mamdani-skeptical Democrats could the left really challenge? How could it prove that AIPAC, which has a -40 favorable rating in this poll, is not to be feared anymore? That would start with recruiting ideal candidates.
Room for Disagreement
Rep. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., whose Long Island-based district includes a sliver of Queens, has refused to endorse Mamdani and warned that his victory would be bad for the party.
“Each member of Congress has to decide what’s best for their district,” Suozzi told Semafor. “I just think that Mamdani is bad for the overall Democratic brand.”
Notable
- In the New York Times, Benjamin Oreskes wrote about Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie’s refusal to endorse Mamdani. He’s urged the nominee to convince skeptics who are “concerned by his outspoken criticism of Israel and has asked him to promise not to “endorse primary challengers pushed by the Democratic Socialists.”