On June 26, 2018 Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pulled off one of the great upset victories in American political history defeating 10-term incumbent Joe Crowley in the Democratic primary race for New York’s 14th congressional district. AOC’s victory was also one of the high points for the contemporary progressive movement.

On June 23, 2020, there are two more brilliant progressive candidates, running in neighboring congressional districts, Samelys Lopez in NY-15 and Jamaal Bowman in NY-16, who have a real chance of joining AOC in the U.S. House of Representatives.

PDA is proud to endorse both Jamaal Bowman (NY-16) and Samelys Lopez (NY-15) for congress.

Jamaal is running against 16 term incumbent Eliot Engel, one of the staunchest foreign policy hawks in the Democratic caucus.  Bowman, in contrast, is as progressive on foreign policy matters as he is domestically – and, on both fronts, he’s right in line with PDA.

Jamaal is so in sync with Samelys Lopez that they just did an event together last night. Indeed, just like Jamaal, Samelys lines up perfectly with PDA on the issues. One thing that is different is that Samelys is running in an open seat, due to the retirement of Rep. Jose Serrano. There are a lot of candidates running in the 15th, but the left has consolidated around Lopez; and she has a great shot at winning in the crowded field.

New York City produced a magic moment for progressives in June 2018 – let’s make two on June 23rd.