The three Democrats fighting to replace U.S. Rep. Nydia Velazquez spent most of their first televised debate agreeing with each other. Then they clashed over Gaza and super PAC money.
City Council Member Julie Won, Assemblymember Claire Valdez and Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso met for an hour-long debate on Spectrum News NY1 on Wednesday, June 3, their first head-to-head before the June 23 Democratic primary in New York’s 7th Congressional District, which stretches across western Queens and northern Brooklyn. The debate was covered by QNS reporter Shane O’Brien, and you can watch the full hour on NY1.
All three are left-leaning Democrats running to succeed Velazquez, who has held the seat since 1993 and is not seeking reelection. On the biggest questions they mostly lined up together. All three said the NYPD should not cooperate with federal immigration agents. All three said they would fight to end the war in Iran, called Israel’s actions against Palestinians a genocide, and said they would support arresting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he set foot in New York on an International Criminal Court warrant.
The candidates split on immigration enforcement details. Won said police should cooperate with ICE during serious criminal investigations such as rape or murder charges. Valdez countered that the state already has criminal procedures to hold people accused of heinous crimes accountable without pulling in ICE. Reynoso argued that most ICE operations do not involve serious charges at all.
Valdez, a movement socialist endorsed by the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, challenged Reynoso directly over the timing of his position on Gaza. She accused him of only calling Israel’s actions a genocide after he launched his congressional campaign, and said he had never called for a ceasefire.
“I and many others have been in the streets calling for a ceasefire, calling for an end to US complicity in that genocide, but I never saw you there,” Valdez said. “As far as I can tell, I don’t believe you’ve ever called for a ceasefire, and the first time you called a genocide was when you launched this congressional campaign.”
Reynoso, who has picked up Velazquez’s endorsement, responded that the timing of his message mattered less than his willingness to follow through on ending the conflict in Gaza.
Then Reynoso and Won turned the funding question back on Valdez. They pressed her over money from American Priorities, a new super PAC formed to counteract pro-Israel super PACs, which has put $2 million behind Valdez and two other vocal Israel critics running for Congress, Brad Lander and Darializa Avila Chevalier. Won said all three candidates had agreed in March not to accept super PAC money, and accused Valdez of going back on her word. Valdez said she would not take money from corporate, fossil fuel or real estate super PACs.
Reynoso pushed further, asking why Valdez had used a red box on her campaign website, a public signal that tells outside groups where to spend, to direct a super PAC to spend in the richest part of the district. Valdez said her campaign has run on grassroots donations averaging $45 from around 20,000 donors. She said she supports overturning Citizens United, the Supreme Court ruling that struck down limits on campaign spending, but that she has “a campaign that we need to win.”
The personal alliances showed up in a lightning round, when the candidates were asked who they would rank second under ranked-choice voting. Won and Reynoso both named each other. Valdez picked Won.
Each candidate leaned on their own biography. Reynoso, born in Brooklyn to Dominican parents, pointed to a childhood he described as extremely poor. “In one generation, my family is able to see me here before you, running for Congress,” he said. “It is the American Dream.” Valdez, endorsed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani, pointed to her years working minimum wage jobs, feeling the squeeze at a grocery store, and organizing a union shoulder to shoulder with coworkers. Won cast herself as an outsider who came into politics after a decade in tech, and noted she won a crowded 2021 race for the 26th Council District without backing from major unions or political figures.
On housing, the three were broadly supportive of Mamdani’s Sunnyside Yard plan, a $21 billion proposal to deck over the railyard and build 12,000 homes plus community facilities, with half of the units built under the Mitchell-Lama affordable housing program. All three said they would back it only if it went through intense public scrutiny, and all three said they would not visit President Donald Trump in the Oval Office to move it along, even though Trump has voiced support for Mitchell-Lama.
Reynoso used that answer to take an apparent shot at Mamdani, who met with Trump over the Sunnyside Yard proposal in February. “I don’t think we should be visiting the White House and talking to Trump,” Reynoso said. “This guy is terrorizing our neighbors and is committing war crimes. He’s somebody that we should be getting ready to impeach.”
Won said the project needed a “fair, legal process.” “Neither Donald Trump nor Zohran Mamdani are kings of the city, and we have to make sure that there’s a fair process, legally,” she said. Valdez called for multiple rounds of public hearings and said she would not be welcomed in the White House by the current administration. “We need to make sure that our constituents are able to weigh in, make sure that this is a project that they can get behind and feel excited about,” Valdez said.
Early voting in the primary starts Saturday, June 13, and Election Day is Tuesday, June 23. Bushwick Daily has broken down the primary matchup for local voters.
