As several powerful Democrats have refused to endorse Zohran Mamdani and some Democrats have even endorsed his opponent, Brooklyn Democratic Party Chair Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn continued to embrace him Thursday night. He was the marquee guest at her Brooklyn Democratic Party gala, themed \u201cPower in Unity.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not a revolution. This is what our Democratic Party is,\u201d she said, standing on stage with Mamdani and about a dozen other elected officials. Indeed, the packed event brought together Democrats from across the city and across the political spectrum, from Common Sense Caucus Council Member Susan Zhuang to democratic socialist Assembly Member Marcela Mitaynes. When Mamdani arrived, he was mobbed. But there were notable absences, and the party is hardly unified. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries did not make it, though he was expected to give remarks. Neither did U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, who sent a video. Gov. Kathy Hochul skipped as well. So did Rep. Dan Goldman. Two rumored 2026 congressional primary challengers, Chi Oss\u00e9 and Alexa Avil\u00e9s, made appearances. Bichotte Hermelyn welcomed New York City Comptroller candidate Mark Levine, noting that she was proud to have endorsed him \u2013 a subtweet of her Brooklyn Democratic adversary Justin Brannan, who lost to Levine. The Brooklyn Young Democrats, who are not recognized by the county party though they are recognized by the state Democrats<\/a>, weren\u2019t there.<\/p>\n This may not be a revolution, but Mamdani had revolutions in mind. \u201cAs we stand here in Brooklyn, I\u2019m reminded of the history of this borough, of standing up to repression. \u2026 In the largest battle of the Revolutionary War, hundreds died in Flatbush, in South Slope, in Prospect Park because they believed in a future of self-determination and freedom,\u201d he said. He said Brooklyn\u2019s \u201cspirit of refusing to abide by oppression\u201d carried forward to today in the form of standing up for \u201cBrooklyn\u2019s very own Tish James.\u201d In a moment of true unity, the whole crowd joined Mamdani in chants of \u201chands off Tish.\u201d The state attorney general too urged the audience to \u201cstand together and elect someone who believes we should all be united.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As several powerful Democrats have refused to endorse Zohran Mamdani and some Democrats have even endorsed his opponent,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":23545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1414,9,24,11,10,49,51,50,87],"class_list":{"0":"post-23544","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-campaigns-elections","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-city","11":"tag-new-york-headlines","12":"tag-new-york-news","13":"tag-new-york-state","14":"tag-new-york-state-headlines","15":"tag-new-york-state-news","16":"tag-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}