A lot of New York Democrats are mad as hell at Representative Sean Patrick Maloney — and one member of the party isn’t going to take it anymore.
On Monday, the New York Times reported that State Senator Alessandra Biaggi will formally announce her run in the 17th District, setting up a primary fight against Maloney, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. The move comes after Maloney — who leads the party’s mission to “support Democratic House candidates every step of the way” — decided to ditch his seat in the 18th District, which became more competitive after the chaotic redistricting this year. That decision hardly supported the 17th District’s incumbent, the Black progressive Mondaire Jones, who on Saturday said he would instead run in the now open but more competitive 10th District as a result.
In an interview with the Times, Biaggi said Maloney will likely say she is “hurting the party” by entering the primary. But “what hurt the party was having the head of the campaign arm not stay in his district, not maximize the number of seats New York can have to hold the majority.” She described Maloney, who has been lambasted by the party for his decision, as a “selfish corporate Democrat.”
While Maloney lives in the redrawn lines of the 17th district, Biaggi does not; until the redistricting chaos, she had been running in the Third District. The 36-year-old progressive has some experience overthrowing establishment Democrats. In her 2018 state Senate campaign, Biaggi ousted conservative Democrat Jeffrey Klein of the Independent Democratic Conference — the group of six state reps who caucused with the Republicans, kneecapping Democratic legislation for years.
