Insurgents From The Left Threaten To Upend Dem Party Plans In Tuesday Primaries

Engel – the powerful chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee – has come under attack for spending more time at his home in Potomac, Md., than at his apartment in the Bronx. And recently he was put on the defensive after he was captured on a live microphone suggesting that “if I didn’t have a primary, I wouldn’t care” about speaking at an event.

Bowman, a former middle school principal, is surging in the polls thanks to the attention and support he’s received in recent weeks.

“Let’s make history,” he tweeted as he headed out to vote on Tuesday morning.

Let’s make history. #NY16 pic.twitter.com/kfwxnkhsTp

— Jamaal Bowman (@JamaalBowmanNY) June 23, 2020

If he succeeds, his victory will be compared to Ocasio-Cortez’s ousting of Crowley.

But Engel’s getting a helping hand as he fights for re-election, landing endorsements from former senator from New York and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, some top House Democrats, and the political wing of the Congressional Black Caucus.

The Congressional Black Caucus PAC (@CBCPAC) endorses Congressman Eliot Engel for Re-Election!
👉 👉 🇺🇸 Vote Today! 🇺🇸 👈 👈 #cbcpac #teamengel #ny16 #vote2020 #bluewave pic.twitter.com/VtHLgDBTOW

— Engel for Congress (@TeamEngel) June 23, 2020

Other opportunities for progressives

Just north of Engel’s district, progressive candidate Mondaire Jones appears to be favorite to win the primary to succeed retiring longtime Rep. Nita Lowey in New York’s 17th Congressional District.

Jones is being backed by the progressive group Democracy for America, which also endorsed Bowman and Booker.

“Progressives have already won by simply being in contention in all these races and we’ll be ecstatic if we get a straight out victory in any one of them,” noted Democracy for American communications director Neil Sroka.

He added that “winning all three would be like finding out you’d won the lottery, while you nabbed a royal flush on the river card just after hitting the jackpot on the slots.”

Wins on Tuesday would give the left a big boost. While they’ve enjoyed a handful of successes in primaries so far this year – think Marie Newman toppling conservative Democratic Rep. Dan Lipinski in Illinois and Kara Eastman’s primary win in Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District – they’ve come up short in many other races.

Incumbents facing primary challenges

Democratic Reps. Yvette Clarke and Carolyn Maloney are both facing primary challenges. But the New York City congresswoman who’s grabbing the most headlines is Ocasio-Cortez.

Challenger and former CNBC anchor Michelle Caruso-Cabrera has raised over $2 million for her bid to unseat Ocasio-Cortez, thanks in part to help from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other pro-business groups. But in the race for campaign cash, she remains far behind Ocasio-Cortez, who’s built a massive war chest thanks to grassroots progressive support.

Odds and ends

Western New York voters head to the polls on Tuesday to pick a replacement for former Republican Rep. Chris Collins, who resigned last year and pleaded guilty to insider trading charges.

GOP state Sen. Chris Jacobs is favored over Democrat Nate McMurray – who came within 1,100 votes of toppling Collins in 2018. But the Buffalo-area district was won by President Trump by a whopping 25 percentage points four years ago.

And in North Carolina, there’s a Republican primary runoff in the race to succeed White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows in the state’s 11th Congressional District. Trump-endorsed Lynda Bennett is facing off against Madison Cawthorn, a charismatic former Meadows staffer. Bennett earned 23 percent of the vote in the March 3 Republican primary. Cawthorn came in a close second with 20 percent, sending the contest to a runoff because no candidate got 30 percent of the initial primary vote.

Virginia’s also holding state primaries on Tuesday, with runoff contests in Mississippi and South Carolina.

Story cited here.