The three challengers for New York’s 12th Congressional District all agree; the moderate Democratic establishment has failed, and it’s time to give the progressives a turn.
Last night, Ben Max of the Gotham Gazette hosted a virtual forum for the primary candidates of NY-12: Lauren Ashcraft, Peter Harrison and Suraj Patel. Incumbent Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens) was invited, but couldn’t make it due to sickness.
Ashcraft, Harrison and Patel found common ground on most of the issues that Max introduced. On the issue of transportation, for instance, all three candidates were fully in favor of making public transit free. Transportation, they said, ought to be a human right.
“You’re not free if you can’t afford to go to school,” said Harrison. “You’re not free if you’re one flat tire away from losing your job. The idea of ‘freedom’ has to be retaken by the Democratic Party.”
The three candidates were also unanimous in their support of Medicare for All; however, they slightly differed on how far they would be willing to compromise. Patel suggested introducing “Medicare for Kids”, a plan that would ensure coverage for minors. This, he said, would be more palatable to Republicans, while still being a step in the right direction.
But Ashcraft, as someone who has a personal stake in the issue, was firmly against the idea of introducing compromises.
“I’ve seen family members almost die because they were afraid of a co-pay,” said Ashcraft. “I’ve battled myself trying to find health insurance. We have 23,000 people in the district right now who are afraid to go to the doctor because they don’t have insurance. Medicare for All is my compromise; that is the starting point of the conversation.”
Other parts of the forum had Harrison placing himself substantially to the left of his two opponents. Harrison, a self-proclaimed Democratic Socialist, argued for full-scale structural reform and “taking on the capitalist system” when asked how he would address police brutality.
“We’re not just talking about police reform; we’re talking about structural reform,” said Harrison. “To me, that means attacking the logic and the incentives of the capitalist system that the police operate under. And that means taking on the real estate industry. It is not a coincidence that the police protect property over people. The real estate industry needs the police to keep black and brown people out of the fancy parts of this city, and manage the process of displacing them and gentrifying neighborhoods. That’s what they do.”
But all three candidates found common ground on one position; namely, that we can’t trust the establishment Democrats to bring forth the reforms we need. Harrison criticized the Democratic Party for letting the Republicans dictate the terms of negotiation – particularly on fiscal matters.
“Part of the problem is that we, as a party, have kind of conceded the playing field,” said Harrison. “We’re playing on Republicans’ bad faith arguments about what’s ‘fiscally responsible’ in this country. We need to elect new progressives that kind of reject the rules of the game in DC.”
The candidates also agreed that incumbent Maloney, with all due respect, is part of the problem. Patel was especially critical of her, calling her out for not “walking the walk” on campaign finance reform.
“I take no corporate PAC money; I think the same is true of everyone in this race, aside from the current representative,” said Patel. “That’s a huge difference between us three and the current representative. If you believe that the Citizens United decision was wrong, then I don’t understand why you wouldn’t walk the walk and refuse to take corporate money as well.”
The primary election is slated for Tuesday, June 23.
