New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s endorsed candidates went three-for-three, ousting two incumbent members of Congress, with matching victories further down the ballot in New York. The Democrats are as close to a Tea Party moment as they’ve ever been.
Progressives seeking to remake the party in the wake of a second loss to President Donald Trump had a fantastic night on Tuesday.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s endorsed candidates went three-for-three, ousting two incumbent members of Congress, with matching victories further down the ballot in New York.
These victories, which include the ousting of Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chair Adriano Espaillat, will cause massive internal headaches for party leaders, who must deal with members across the country fearing they are next. These wins are also exposing massive gaps – ideological, generational and stylistic – between what Democratic primary voters want and what the party’s elected officials provide.
The left’s wins this cycle are stacking up, taking advantage of moments where the party’s establishment failed to adjust to new political realities.
Mamdani defeated former Governor Andrew Cuomo, who seemed more interested in reputational rehabilitation than innovative governance; oysterman Graham Platner defeated 79-year-old Maine Governor Janet Mills, who needed to be dragged into a race against Republican Senator Susan Collins; Randy Villegas won the right to challenge Republican David Valadao against Jasmeet Bains, a state legislator who voted against the most concrete step Democrats have taken to fight back against Trump’s wannabe authoritarianism; and other wins came in House primaries in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
But as of this moment, the purported Democratic Tea Party still lacks the scale of its right-wing Republican predecessor.
Tuesday’s biggest victories all came in one city, in one state, and to be one of 435 members of Congress’ less powerful chamber. By contrast, the Republican Tea Party moment ousted three incumbent Republican senators in a single election cycle.
Indeed, if you look to the west of the Hudson River, establishment Democrats had a much better night. Former Representative Ben McAdams, who was one of Congress’ most conservative Democrats during his single term in office, easily won a primary to represent a safely Democratic seat in Utah. Retiring Representative Steny Hoyer’s handpicked candidate, Adrian Boafo, won the primary to replace him in suburban Maryland.
And in the race with the most direct impact on November, Army veteran Cait Conley won the Democratic nomination to take on vulnerable Republican Representative Mike Lawler in a swing district in upstate New York despite Republican attempts to meddle in the primary there.
All of that said, establishment Democrats should be scared. Boafo’s win hardly counts as a display of strength, coming with a third of the vote in a crowded field and backed by $10 million worth of outside spending from super PACs aligned with pro-Israel groups and the cryptocurrency industry. Elsewhere in Maryland, a state senator who opposed gerrymandering lost reelection, and the Senate president got a scare from a social media influencer.
Chevalier’s victory over Espaillat drives home another reason for the establishment to be worried: Progressives no longer have to run flawless campaigns for candidates to win. Platner overcame a huge number of personal scandals, and Chevalier’s Twitter history provided Espaillat with plenty of ammunition to argue she was insufficiently loyal to the Democratic Party. (She notably once tweeted an expletive at former Vice President Kamala Harris.)
Espaillat was no easy target, either. While other incumbents have managed to survive by highlighting long histories of progressive votes or by shunning AIPAC, Espaillat’s record, including support for both Medicare for All and abolishing ICE, did little to save him.
The rubber matches – what will truly determine whether Democrats are facing their Tea Party moment or not – are the Senate primaries scheduled for August. In both cases, the party establishment is backing unreconstructed moderates in Reps. Haley Stevens of Michigan and Angie Craig of Minnesota. Both are hoping significant monetary advantages, aided by outside groups affiliated with AIPAC or crypto, will lead them to victory over their progressive rivals, Abdul El-Sayed and Peggy Flanagan.
If the existence of the Democratic Tea Party is in question, the strength of Mamdani, who emerged Tuesday as a major political kingmaker, and his allies in the Democratic Socialists of America is not.
The victories for DSA went far beyond the big-ticket congressional races won by Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier. In state legislative races in New York City, the DSA-endorsed candidate won in 9 out of 10 races where the group endorsed, including knocking off three incumbent state legislators. Meanwhile, incumbent DSA members state Sen. Jabari Brisport and assemblywomen Diana Moreno and Phara Souffrant Forrest won renomination, while Samantha Kattan won her primary to fill Valdez’s seat.
This is a huge coming-out party for the DSA. The number of democratic socialists in the state legislature will jump from 9 to 15. It is the largest single-year increase in DSA state legislators since the group entered the political fray in New York.
Mamdani’s election in 2025 led to rapid growth in DSA membership, which reached 14,000 – double its level five years earlier. That energy has fueled the insurgent campaigns waged by the group’s members. It has also established the democratic socialists as a new model for party-building in the 21st century and as a rising power in one of the most influential states for the Democratic Party.