Polls opened across NYC on Tuesday as voters had their voices heard on Primary Election Day, with several closely watched Congressional races taking center stage throughout the city.
Among the races drawing significant attention are New York’s 10th and 12th Congressional Districts, where incumbents and challengers are vying for New York votes, with the victor moving on to the general election in November to represent their districts in the federal government.
Manhattan and Brooklyn voters came out strong to cast their ballots in the NY-10 election, which pits incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman against former city comptroller Brad Lander. Goldman recently found himself at the center of a controversy after a Park Slope coffee shop in his district refused him service because of his strong support for Israel amid the war in Gaza.
Poll workers at P.S. 321 in Park Slope said turnout in the morning was steady and much higher than early voting.
New Yorkers cast their votes on Primary Election Day.Photo by Ethan Stark-Miller
One voter named Peter, who has lived in the district for about 30 years, said he felt it was important to vote in primaries because they typically get a low turnout. He also wants Goldman to win.
“I felt strongly about getting the candidate that I felt was important, especially for the House of Representatives, get reelected,” he said, referring to Goldman.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani was in Manhattan’s Lower East Side in the 10th district alongside Lander, whom he recently endorsed.
“We’ve made it clear that we need to transform the city into one each and every person can afford,” the mayor said, reminding New Yorkers that polls close tonight at 9 p.m.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani stops for a photo opportunity.Photo by Ethan Stark-Miller
Lander said he was “feeling great” and would continue to campaign throughout the day. He said he would go back to fighting Immigration and Customs Enforcement overreach, no matter the outcome of the election.
“I don’t take anything for granted. This is poll site six, and we’ll keep working all the way through nine,” the challenger said. We got people texting and calling and knocking on doors. And however today goes, I’ll be at 26 Federal Plaza tomorrow morning.”
As voters arrived at the Emily Dickinson School on the Upper West Side Tuesday, NY-12 congressional candidate Alex Bores got an unusual endorsement. A passerby judged the candidate’s worn shoes and concluded he looked like an honest politician.
“Apparently, they’re honest-man shoes,” Bores laughed.
The exchange came amid a costly NY-12 congressional primary, with outside groups spending millions to influence the race. Bores, who has campaigned heavily on AI regulation, argued that voters have a chance to reject outside influence.
“Here’s an opportunity for New York 12 voters to look at those Trump mega donors in the eye and tell them they don’t run New York,” he said.
A crowded field of Democratic candidates are in the running in the Upper East Side, Upper West Side and Midtown district to replace the retiring Jerry Nadler, who has been in office since 1992. Other candidates include Assembly Member Micah Lasher, Kennedy kin Jack Schlossberg, lawyer and activist George Conway, as well as Nina Schwalbe, Patrick Timmins, Chris Diep and Laura Dunn.
Assemblymember Alex Bores on the primary election trail in District 12.Photo by Lloyd Mitchell
Julia, a 34-year-old scientist, said she voted for Lasher after concluding that Lasher and Bores were the two candidates most likely to win. She said she agreed with most of Lasher’s policies and viewed him as “relatively reasonable.”
Bores’ emphasis on artificial intelligence, she said, had the opposite effect.
“I actually kind of didn’t like how much Alex Bores framed his campaign around AI,” Julia said. “It felt like I was wanting a more well-rounded candidate that didn’t put all of his eggs in the AI basket.”
Assemblymember Alex Bores on the primary election trail in District 12.Photo by Lloyd Mitchell
For Isaac Feynman, the fight over AI helped push him toward Bores.
Feynman, who voted with his mother, Katherine Bindman said they considered themselves aligned with the left but did not see an obvious democratic socialist-style candidate in the congressional race.
He said they had considered Lasher, but ultimately voted for Bores.
“If the AI companies hate him, then he must be good,” Feynman said.
He said AI was not his top issue, but it was hard to separate from broader concerns about corporate power.
“It’s definitely, for people of my generation, pretty scary,” Feynman said. “The accumulation of corporate power is pretty nerve-racking.”
New York voters.Photo by Lloyd Mitchell
Bores said AI had come up “a good amount” in conversations with voters, partly because outside spending had elevated the issue. But he argued that the concerns were not abstract.
“It’s not political if you lose your job because of AI,” Bores said. “It’s just a problem that needs to be solved.”
Bores also pointed to parents worried about children and chatbots, saying the issue needed federal attention. Congress, he argued, had been slow to act because lawmakers feared the kind of outside spending he said had arrived in his race.
“The reason Congress doesn’t take action is because Congress members are worried about losing their job,” Bores said. “They’re worried about the outside spending.”
If he loses, Bores said, it would discourage other lawmakers from taking on AI regulation. If he wins, he argued, the effect could be felt quickly.
Some voters leaving the polls sounded less driven by any single issue.
John, a 75-year-old neighborhood voter, said he had been ambivalent and had relied partly on advice from his daughter, who follows politics closely. Campaign mailers, he said, were not much help.
“You just get these cards in your mailbox,” John said, who backed Bores in the end. “Doesn’t tell you that much. It’s a bit of a crapshoot, really.”
Further east, outside Robert F. Wagner Middle School, voters described choices that were more pragmatic than enthusiastic.
Allie, 39, said she did not feel especially inspired by the options in the congressional race.
“I’m feeling fine about it, but not totally inspired or sure that I made the right decision,” she said. “It wasn’t too hard to make a wrong decision, just not very exciting.”
She said Lasher seemed experienced and capable.
“He seems to be good at his job,” she said. “He has the best and most experience, it seems like a good person.”
But she also said she felt conflicted about backing a candidate associated with continuity at a moment when she sometimes wants bigger change.
“I just have a little bit of conflicted feelings, always voting for keeping things always the same, especially in these days,” she said. “I sometimes feel like it’s contributing to the problem if we’re not forcing a bigger change.”
In Queens, Mamdani was spotted with 7th Congressional District Candidate Claire Valdez, 37th Assembly District Candidate Samantha Kattan and 12th Senatorial District Candidate Aber Kawas, arriving at I.S. 93 in Ridgewood to vote. Valdez, Kattan and Kawas are each candidates from the Democratic Socialists of America and endorsed by Mayor Mamdani.
While the primary election between incumbent Grace Meng and challenger Chuck Park is underway, general awareness of the race seems to be low. Voting turnout at P.S./M.S. 219, located at 144-39 Gravett Rd. in Kew Gardens, was sparse early this morning. As of 9:45 a.m., there were fewer than 40 votes cast.
Meanwhile, in Upper Manhattan and parts of the Bronx, the highly watched race features socialist Darializa Avila Chevalier taking on incumbent Adriano Espaillat.
A poll site in NY-13.Photo by Nadia Knoblauch
Carmine Galasso, who lives in the district, said voting “is the most important thing that we can do,” though he did not say who he voted for in the race.
“It wasn’t such a great choice in my opinion today,” he said. “So the way I looked at it was that it was maybe the lesser of three evils, because there were three votes, and I’m always hopeful, especially in this day. You know, I never believed that I would see the country the way it is, and you know, we got to do what we could do. I tell my kids they got to do it.”
More coverage about borough-specific races can be found at qns.com, bxtimes.com and the brooklynpaper.com.
With reporting by Barbara Russo-Lennon