{"id":276378,"date":"2026-06-24T08:39:31","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T08:39:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/276378\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T08:39:31","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T08:39:31","slug":"micah-lasher-wins-ny-12-democratic-primary-to-succeed-longtime-rep-jerry-nadler","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/276378\/","title":{"rendered":"Micah Lasher wins NY-12 Democratic primary to succeed longtime Rep. Jerry Nadler"},"content":{"rendered":"

Assembly Member Micah Lasher has won the Democratic primary<\/a> for New York\u2019s 12th Congressional District, defeating a crowded field of rivals in the race to succeed retiring U.S. Rep. Jerry Nadler.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With 94.21% of scanners reporting, Lasher led with 39.04% of the vote, followed closely by Assembly Member Alex Bores at 35.01%, Jack Schlossberg at 10.79%, \u00a0Nina Schwalbe at 7.09%, and George Conway at 6.09%, according to unofficial results from the New York City Board of Elections.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Associated Press called the race<\/a> at 10:08 p.m.\n<\/p>\n

He entered the final stretch with the backing of Nadler, Gov. Kathy Hochul and former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who injected close to $10 million dollars into a Super Pac to support him. <\/a>Nadler, who has represented the Manhattan-based district for 34 years, appeared at Lasher\u2019s election night party and thanked voters for choosing someone he said would continue his work in Congress.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been the honor of my life to represent this district in Congress for the last 34 years,\u201d Nadler told supporters gathered at Jacobs Pickles to the Jerry Springer-esque chants of \u2018Jerry\u2019. \u201cI want to thank you for electing a worthy successor who I believe will carry on the work that I\u2019ve been doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lasher used much of his victory speech to place the district in a broader political and historical tradition, pointing to Broadway, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Central Park and the district\u2019s long role in movements for labor, civil rights and social justice.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 12th district is not just any district,\u201d Lasher said. \u201cThis is a district that changes history.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

He also paid extended tribute to Nadler, calling him \u201cNew York City\u2019s liberal lion\u201d and saying he could not replace the longtime congressman but would try to emulate him.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor so many of us on the West Side of Manhattan, Jerry has been here our entire lives, governing with courage and without fear, delivering change that echoes across the nation,\u201d Lasher said. \u201cI cannot replace him, but in all I do, I will seek to emulate him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"U.S. Rep. Jerry Nadler joins Micah Lasher onstage after Lasher won the Democratic primary for New York\u2019s 12th Congressional District, putting Nadler\u2019s former aide and endorsed successor on track to inherit the Manhattan seat.Photo by Lloyd Mitchell \"\"Gov. Kathy Hochul praises Micah Lasher during his election night partyPhoto by Lloyd Mitchell<\/p>\n

Gov. Kathy Hochul also took the stage, praising Lasher as the right candidate to continue Nadler\u2019s legacy and pointing to his work as her former policy director and later as a state lawmaker.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe will be that champion, not just in New York State, but for all of America,\u201d Hochul said.\n<\/p>\n

Hochul described Lasher as a deep policy thinker whose ideas turned into results, saying he helped shape work on affordability and child care before becoming what she called an \u201cextraordinary partner\u201d in the Assembly.<\/p>\n

For Hochul, Lasher was the only congressional candidate endorsed by her who came out on top. She had thrown her support behind Rep. Dan Goldman and Rep. Adriano Espaillat who lost their primaries to candidates backed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani<\/a>. Hizzoner did not endorse any of the candidates running in NY-12.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Throughout the campaign, Lasher argued that the district needed a representative who already understood government and could deliver results in Washington from day one.\n<\/p>\n

Taking the stage after the race was called, Lasher began by acknowledging his rivals \u2014 Bores, Schlossberg, Conway, Schwalbe and Laura Dunn \u2014 saying the district deserved a serious contest and that the primary field had met that standard.<\/p>\n

He said his campaign was built around recharging a Democratic Party in Washington that, in his view, had failed to meet the moment, while also showing that Democrats could offer \u201cbold new ideas\u201d to improve people\u2019s lives and then deliver on them.<\/p>\n

\"\"Supporters celebrating at Jacob\u2019s Pickles after Micah Lasher won the Democratic primaryPhoto by Lloyd Mitchell \"\"Micah Lasher embraces Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-SigalPhoto by Lloyd Mitchell<\/p>\n

Lasher also used his victory speech to take aim at the artificial intelligence companies and outside groups that helped make the race one of the most expensive and nationally watched congressional primaries in the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have some news for the two big AI companies who have taken such an unusual interest in who won this congressional seat,\u201d Lasher said of OpenAI and Anthropic, before signaling that he would not take direction from them when it came to protecting children.<\/p>\n

The AI line landed after months of attacks over outside spending, tech money and the role of super PACs in the race. It also offered a direct bridge to Bores, the Upper East Side assembly member whose campaign became the center of a nationally watched fight over artificial intelligence regulation and the political power of tech money.<\/p>\n

Bores, a former Palantir employee, made AI safety a core part of his campaign and argued that his experience in technology made him uniquely suited to regulate the industry. But his campaign also drew heavy outside spending, both for and against him, turning the race into a larger test of how AI policy could shape Democratic primaries.<\/p>\n

Outside a poll site on the Upper West Side on Tuesday, speaking to amNewYork, Bores framed the race as a test of whether voters would stand up to what he called Trump-aligned tech donors and super PAC money.<\/p>\n

He said anti-Bores spending had been far larger than some public estimates and argued that he was facing major outside spending both against him and in support of one of his opponents.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no one more motivated than me to get all of this money out of politics,\u201d Bores said.\n<\/p>\n

Bores argued that the stakes went beyond NY-12, saying AI regulation in Congress would be chilled if outside spending could defeat a candidate known for pushing the issue.
\n\"\"Assemblymember Alex Bores on the primary election trail in District 12 Tuesday morningPhoto by Lloyd Mitchell\n<\/p>\n

In a statement after the race was called, Bores congratulated Lasher and said the Democratic nominee would \u201crepresent this district well in Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not the outcome we hoped for,\u201d Bores said. \u201cBut I want to congratulate Micah Lasher, who will represent this district well in Congress.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Bores said he did not enter the race \u201cto make a singular point about AI,\u201d but to bring to Washington the same focus on effectiveness and standing up to powerful interests that he said he brought to Albany. He accused \u201csome of the richest people on the planet\u201d of trying to make an example of the race by spending more than $10 million against him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was an unprecedented fight, and one we did not back down from,\u201d Bores said. \u201cThough we\u2019ve come up short tonight, the example set here was not the one the AI oligarchs intended. They set out to make people afraid to stand up to them. Instead, they learned just how ready people are to push back.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis campaign may be over, but the battles we took on are just beginning,\u201d Bores said. \u201cWe are at a true inflection point in this country, and we cannot meet it with fear or complacency.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nina Schwalbe, a public health researcher, finished fourth after running as the field\u2019s most progressive candidate. She campaigned on public health, universal health care, paid family leave, housing affordability and a sharper critique of the Democratic establishment.<\/p>\n

Her campaign celebrated the result as a stronger-than-expected showing, noting that she finished ahead of Conway after polling in the low single digits earlier in the race.<\/p>\n

\u201cTonight we proved that voters in NY-12 are hungry for a candidate with real expertise and a real plan,\u201d Schwalbe said in a statement. \u201cIn a field this crowded and this well-funded, we built something from the ground up \u2014 and the people of this district responded. And we did it without much help from those whose job it was to tell them we existed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Nina Schwalbe during the June 9 NY1 debatePhoto by Lloyd Mitchell<\/p>\n

Speaking to amNewYork before casting her ballot Tuesday, Schwalbe said the race had revealed how difficult it is for lower-budget candidates to break through in NY-12.<\/p>\n

She said her campaign had set out to prove a candidate could run seriously for Congress without spending more than $1 million. Schwalbe said her campaign planned to spend about $700,000 and ended up spending roughly $648,000, while forgoing a formal office, using Manhattan Mini Storage locations as campaign dump sites and avoiding mailers.<\/p>\n

But she said the campaign also showed how locked down the district\u2019s political infrastructure had become.\n<\/p>\n

Schwalbe said her campaign submitted 61 applications to clubs and organizations but received just one endorsement. She said only two groups even got back to the campaign.<\/p>\n

The \u201cDemocratic machine,\u201d she said, was \u201ctotally locked up.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Schwalbe also argued that money shaped debate access and, by extension, which candidates voters got to see. She said voters stopped her throughout Election Day to tell her they had seen her in the NY1 debate<\/a> and were voting for her because of it.<\/p>\n

In her statement Tuesday night, Schwalbe said the amount of money poured into the race could have been used elsewhere.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cTwenty million dollars can solve a lot of problems,\u201d Schwalbe said. \u201cAsk me how.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

She congratulated Lasher and thanked her opponents, saying the race was about the future of the district and \u201cthe urgent work of fighting for health care, housing, and the people who make this city run.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat fight doesn\u2019t end tonight,\u201d Schwalbe said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Assembly Member Micah Lasher has won the Democratic primary for New York\u2019s 12th Congressional District, defeating a crowded…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":276379,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[89536,24879,22545,9,11,10,31167],"class_list":["post-276378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-2026-democratic-primary","tag-alex-bores","tag-assembly-member-micah-lasher","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-ny-12"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276378","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=276378"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276378\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/276379"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}