If you want a say in who represents you in Congress, your real chance is not in November. It is the Democratic primary on Tuesday, June 23, an election most New Yorkers will sit out, in a city where the primary is usually the whole ballgame.
The math is the reason. About two-thirds of city voters are registered Democrats, so in most districts whoever wins the Democratic primary cruises to victory in the fall. And turnout for that decisive primary is brutal: roughly a quarter of voters bothered in the 2021 mayoral primary. The election that decides who runs the city and represents it in Washington is the one almost no one shows up for.
This year that sleepy primary has a loud subplot: it is shaping up as a referendum on Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s clout, and he has already lost one round. In the April special election for a Manhattan City Council seat, Carl Wilson won with about 43 percent while the candidate Mamdani endorsed, Lindsey Boylan, finished 17 points back. It was the first real test of his endorsement power, and his pick lost.
The marquee race is in NY-7, which spans Brooklyn and Queens. Sixteen-term Representative Nydia Velazquez is retiring after three decades, and she endorsed Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso to replace her, pointedly after Mamdani backed Reynoso’s rival, DSA-aligned Assemblymember Claire Valdez. The contest is a straight proxy war: Reynoso carries the unions, the Working Families Party and the retiring congresswoman, while Valdez runs with the mayor and the Democratic Socialists, in a field of nine that also includes City Councilmember Julie Won.
Across the river in Manhattan, NY-12 is wide open for the first time in a generation. Longtime Representative Jerrold Nadler, first elected in 1992, is not running again, setting off a crowded scramble. The field includes Assemblymembers Alex Bores, who wrote the state AI-safety law Hochul signed, and Micah Lasher, whom Nadler endorsed, alongside ex-Republican lawyer George Conway and Kennedy heir Jack Schlossberg.
There are races worth watching closer to home, too. In central and south Brooklyn’s NY-9, Representative Yvette Clarke is defending her seat against a primary challenge from Democrat Mike Goldfarb. In Queens’ NY-6, Representative Grace Meng faces challenger Chuck Park while holding a big fundraising lead. Taken together, political watchers are reading the whole slate as a test of whether Mamdani’s endorsement can reshape the city’s House delegation, and the early evidence from that Council special is that his coattails are not automatic.
The thing to remember is that all of this gets decided by whoever turns out on June 23. Low turnout does not make these races less important; it makes each vote count for more. A primary a quarter of voters skip is a primary a motivated neighborhood can swing.
So the practical part. The deadline to register or update your registration for this primary is June 13, and the last day to change your address is June 8. Early voting runs June 13 through 21, primary day is June 23, and the general election is November 3. You can check your registration, confirm your congressional district and find your poll site through the city Board of Elections. The election nobody shows up for is the one that picks your member of Congress, and it is three weeks out.
Featured image: Phil Roeder from Des Moines, IA, / CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
