Hello on this soggy, muggy primary day! After the polls close at 9 p.m. tonight, we'll find out whether Mayor Zohran Mamdani has the political juice to launch a pair of democratic socialists into Congress, or whether New York's Democratic power structure still has the muscle to keep their turf.
Will the Mamdani-anointed State Assemblymember Claire Valdez win and represent the "Commie Corridor" in Congress? Or will Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, son of Los Sures, prevail in the race that has gotten increasingly nasty? (Also: Julie Won spoiler alert?)
Can Darializa Avila Chevalier move past her own social media history and the racist attacks coming from her opponents to dethrone Representative Adriano Espaillat uptown? Or will $7 million in super PAC cash and an "anti-gentrification" narrative fend off the newcomer?
And what about the raft of Mamdani-backed state candidates? (And the DSA-endorsed ones he declined to support?) Oh and we can't forget Lander vs. Goldman, or Jessica vs. Jessica, or any of the important-but-obscure district leader races happening in Brooklyn that could determine the soul of the Democratic Party in Kings County. Want to read all our previous election coverage this cycle? Go here.
Hell Gate's live blog will be humming all day, as our reporters fan out across the city to talk to voters and keep an eye on the polling sites. Also, be sure to tune in tonight to Hell Gate's primary election livestream, starting at 8 p.m.!
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7:41 p.m. | Washington Heights
Outside of the polling site at PS 173, a 20-year-old NYU student named Julian explained to Hell Gate why he cast his vote for Darializa Avila Chevalier. "I listened to the debate just for my own research. I kind of agreed with her side more," he said.
Julian said he wasn't a fan of how Rep. Adriano Espaillat ran his campaign. "He's just using these old things just to try to make her look bad," he said. "So honestly, he gives me the bad vibes, and also just he's been in power for a long time and not a lot of good change, I guess."
For Julian, it was Mamdani's endorsement of Avila Chevalier that made him consider voting for her. "Actually, that's why I heard about her in the beginning, because I saw Mamdani was recommending some candidates, and I looked into them, especially since I'm part of this district," he said. "So, that was a big influence. And I also trust Mamdani's word a lot."
Alex Longnecker, a 35-year-old classical singer, was honest about his preparation for the election. “I knew very little until about two hours ago, when I spent a couple hours looking up as much as I could,” he told Hell Gate. “But it's surprisingly hard to find things.”
He specifically explained that trying to figure out who the judicial delegates are was a challenge.
“My big beef with the state of New York is that [it's] very hard to figure out what all of these things are,” he said.
But Longnecker did cast his ballot for Darializa Avila Chevalier, though she nearly lost his vote during his research. "A lot of things about her tweets came up. It was one of the reasons why I almost didn't vote for her," he said. "I do think in the age of technology, everyone has said a lot of bad things in the past, especially if they were young. The thing that was hard for me was that a lot of the things that she said when she was young was, like, two years ago." (Most of Avila Chevalier's contested tweets in question were posted between 2018 and 2020.)
Ultimately, though, Longnecker decided to vote for Avila Chevalier because he wanted "new blood."
"I think we're in sort of an age right now, especially with who is in charge and who controls everything in the federal government at this time, that any sign of complacency from someone who's been there for a long time matters a lot," he said. "And for the last several election cycles nationally, our only choices have been octogenarians or people who have been in government for a very long time."
Juliana, a 32-year-old bank supervisor, gave Hell Gate the full rundown of her ballot choices: Drew Warshaw, Julien Segura, Nobles Crawford, Nayma Silver-Matos, and Darializa Avila Chevalier.
She said she voted for Avila Chevalier and Silver-Matos because she wants to see more women in Congress. "And fuck AIPAC money, fuck any corporation, corporate money in politics," she added.
As a voter, Juliana said she's big on candidates having a social media presence. "I feel like so many people that run don't post anything on social media. Like, how are people supposed to learn about you and what you've done, and what you fucking stand on?" she said. "So, if you don't have that, it's a red flag for me."
Juliana said she thought the conversation about Avila Chevalier's past tweets was propaganda from AIPAC. "They're spending money because they don't want to see a woman in Congress. They don't want to see someone going against AIPAC money," she said. "So, surprise, surprise, it's the same thing they did to Mamdani because they didn't want him going against corporate money."
To Juliana, the negativity just means Avila Chevalier is a serious candidate. "Why are they spending so much money to do smear campaigns against her? It's because she's meaning business and they're scared of her."
And her verdict on the square "I Voted" stickers the BOE is handing out at the polls this year? "They're kind of looking dingy," she said.
—Alisha Allison
7:18 p.m.
The latest voting numbers, courtesy the NYC Board of Elections:
— NYC Board of Elections (@BOENYC) June 23, 2026
7:12 p.m. | Williamsburg
A block away from a polling site in Los Sures, the Puerto Rican hub of Williamsburg where Antonio Reynoso grew up, a pair of Claire Valdez volunteers, Adam and Lex, stood in the rain, handing out literature to would-be voters.
"It's been more Claires than Reynosos," said Adam, who had been standing on the corner for a little more than an hour.
But a little deeper into South Williamsburg, outside MS 50 on South 3rd, we mostly encountered Reynoso voters.
Nelson Dones, a landlord and former cop who owns a building a few blocks away, told Hell Gate that when he had an issue with the gas in his building, he went to Reynoso, who was then a City Councilmember, and got help.
"Very rarely do you see nowadays a politician pick up the phone or answer a question—you don't see that," Dones said. As for Valdez? "She's new. I'm not saying new means bad—Mamdani's new, everybody's new. Everybody deserves a shot. But I tend to go with people who have helped me, and I think a good amount of voters tend to go with that also."
Nathan Stripp, a 30-year-old teacher at MS 50, also voted for Reynoso based on his roots in the district.
"He's a graduate of our school. He's been in this community for a long time. I've seen him doing the work to make my life better as a member of the district, but working hard to make sure that the working class kids who I teach every day are succeeding and thriving."
Stripp said he understood that the Working Families Party and NYC-DSA have many similar policy positions, but that he felt the WFP was better at executing.
"I fear that DSA can get too trapped in, sort of like, rhetorical discussions," he said, "and in so doing, get pulled away from actually making the change that's gonna benefit the kids and the people who need it the most."
—Christopher Robbins
6:27 p.m. | Flatbush
In Assembly District 43, comprising parts of Flatbush and Crown Heights, the New Kings Democrats were hoping to elect insurgent candidates Akel Williams and Nakisha "Nikki" Evans to the state committee—the consortium of Democratic district leaders who run the party in Brooklyn, which is currently overseen by a long-running, entrenched political machine.
Yet traffic was slow in the late afternoon at the polling site at the Brooklyn Public Library's Flatbush branch. Other than conversations Hell Gate had with people who were just hanging out on the block—like 40-year-old James Hood, who didn't vote but wanted to talk about Haitian history and whether Black people created the KKK; or a non-voting Jamaican Trump supporter who didn’t want to debate because "it's going to cause a problem"—there were not many people out to talk to.
Among those who were headed to the polling site, which also serves voters in New York's 9th congressional district, the consensus on the race for state committee (confusingly also called "district leader") was the sort of bewilderment that usually surrounds the down-ballot races.
James Miller, 33, was the second person I chatted with Tuesday who was on their way into the polls thinking they were going to vote for Claire Valdez, despite not being in NY-7. "I think alignment with Mamdani, what he's doing, is the priority," Miller said. "But admittedly that's as far as I know, because I didn't even realize that voting was happening until this weekend."
Another voter, Nisani Lopez, 26, remembered the name of the State Assembly candidate she was voting for—Brian Cunningham—after a moment, but needed a refresher on the rest of the ballot. Originally from Long Island, she moved to Flatbush three years ago. "I feel like I'm just excited, especially with Mamdani in office, seeing things slowly change," she said. "I'm just generally hopeful."
The only person who was sure who he was voting for in the race for state committee—Evans and Williams, though he needed to check his phone—was actually running for Congress himself. Joshua Bristol, 43, is a leftist waging a long-shot campaign against incumbent Yvette Clark. (Theirs is the congressional competition in Flatbush's NY-9, not Valdez's.) "I know all the lower-ballot [stuff]," he told Hell Gate. "I have to."
Bristol said beating Clarke was going to be tough, but "what I'm hoping is that the centrists—the other two on the ballot—will fight it out among themselves and split the centrist vote, and that will let the leftists swoop in," he said. "I might even eke out a victory."
Outside the library, he ran into two voters, one of whom, 27-year-old Ava Dennis, was volunteering for him. She said I could include her name "if you put it with the caveat that they make it really hard for me to figure out who I want to vote for" on the state committee ballot line. I assured her that she was among the people I spoke to that knew the most. Both Bristol voters—Dennis and Sydney Liser, 23—said they unintentionally voted for only one New Kings-aligned state committee candidate. As someone who also voted at the library, I admitted that I, too, had to take out my phone to double-check who I was voting for.
—Adlan Jackson
4:27 p.m. | Ridgewood
Around lunchtime, Queens Assemblymember Jenifer Rajkumar, in one of her signature red dresses, was personally approaching passersby in Ridgewood and introducing herself.
The incumbent, who is facing a strong challenge from the immigrant and workers' rights lawyer David Orkin (he's been endorsed by the WFP, DSA, and AOC), said that she was feeling good on primary day, and that "early voting was tremendous, too"—in fact, she said, she'd fielded a call from a constituent earlier that morning who told her that he was on his way to vote for her.
"I woke up early in the morning at 5:45, and I started getting calls from an Indo-Caribbean constituent who was going to the poll site, and I told him that's the wrong site, because he went to the early voting site instead of the day-of site, so he turned around and went there," Rajkumar said. "See that energy though? So early in the morning. It's very inspiring to see a community speaking—I mean, this is when democracy comes alive. I love election day."
Rajkumar then posed for a quick photo next to an A-frame sign with her face on it.
Outside the polling place, PS 81Q Jean Paul Richter, canvassers armed with DSA literature, as well as a silent Antonio Reynoso canvasser in bright pink lipstick who seemed more focused on her cell phone than handing out flyers, were posted around the building, under a cavernous awning that made the gray day even gloomier.
One of the DSA canvassers (full disclosure: an acquaintance of mine) told me that the NYPD officer who was lingering outside of the school had had to ask Rajkumar to move away from the polling place "like, four times."
Inside, there was no wait to vote. Ridgewood residents Wilson and Teresa had swung by to vote in between loads of laundry at a nearby laundromat. "I thought there was a rule where you can't canvass near the polling sites, but it feels like they've been very aggressive this election," Wilson said. "We tried to do laundry, and the people near Gottscheer Hall, they're really in your face," Teresa chimed in, adding, "I saw on Reddit, people are getting harassed a lot."
They told me they hadn't been following this race as closely as they had the mayoral election, but that they'd both voted according to the Soft Power Vote guide for this area's primary—Claire Valdez for Congress, and Orkin for State Assembly.
"It would be nice to put Mamdani in a stronger position to get what he needs to do, done," Teresa said. "That's how I'm framing it—and I'd been following Claire's newsletters for a while, and she seems cool, so I'm happy to vote for her."
—Katie Way
4:15 p.m. | Long Island City
At the Information and Technology High School in Long Island City Tuesday afternoon, a handful of voters dribbled past volunteers brandishing literature for NY-7 candidates Claire Valdez, Antonio Reynoso, and Julie Won.
Johnny, 31, who works in audio and has lived in the district four years, said he knew going into the voting booth that he wanted to vote for Valdez. "She's DSA, she's endorsed by Zohran, she has a good stance on genocide and affordability," he said. The other races were more difficult to parse. "Some of the candidates don't even have websites," he said. "I was in the voting booth on my phone for almost an hour trying to figure out what these people stand for."
While Hell Gate was at the polling station, Valdez herself rolled through, accompanied by Assemblymember Diana Moreno and a small campaign team. Valdez had been up since 6 a.m., crisscrossing the district, talking to voters near polling places and on the subways. What is she saying to motivate people on Election Day? "These are serious times—there's a fascist in the White House!" she said. Her travels over the day so far suggested a low turnout, but she was hopeful that after work, when the rain let up, numbers would pick up. "A higher turnout is definitely better for us," she said. "But everyone's exhausted after the Knicks last week."
Valdez said she's been buoyed by talking to voters all day, and by the fact that her campaign has been endorsed by the mayor. "Bernie Sanders's endorsement also means a lot," she added. "We're really excited about that. It shows that this is about building a movement."
What did Valdez have to say to voters who don't see a great deal of policy difference between her and her competitors. Is Antonio Reynoso not part of the movement?
"Well, it's a big movement," she said. "But I would say that my journey to politics is different. I came up through my union, thinking about labor solidarity, democratizing the UAW—it's just a perspective, a different origin story."
—Nick Pinto
3:13 p.m.
Here are the latest voting numbers from across the city, courtesy of the BOE:
— NYC Board of Elections (@BOENYC) June 23, 2026
2:56 p.m. | Harlem
As married couple Nicolas and Laura headed into PS 154 to cast their ballots, they told Hell Gate they were voting for Darializa Avila Chevalier. "I want to support the mayor, and I think it's best to vote for those who are going to support him," Laura said, referring to Mamdani's endorsement of the insurgent congressional candidate.
Nicolas said he wanted fresher faces and policies that were further left. "Everyone knows Espaillat. I don't have anything against him, but he's been there for a while and I kind of like this new wave of democratic socialists that are coming around," he said. "I just like a little more youthful energy."
He said he isn't concerned by Avila Chevalier's tweets. "I did read a little bit about that. It's my understanding, it was a while back," he said. "It didn't bother me that much." As for the vote Nicolas cast for State Assembly hopeful Conrad Blackburn, he "didn't look that much into it, but again, maybe moving a little bit more left—just riding the Mandani wave and seeing what happens," he said.
Nicolas also told Hell Gate that he and Laura had received a lot of campaign literature in the mail, and had been inundated by volunteers for Assemblymember Jordan Wright knocking on their door. "We had to stop answering because it was a bit out of control," he said. "They were pretty heavy-handed. Yeah, they were definitely better funded, I guess."
Actor André Ward, currently starring as Toulouse-Lautrec in Broadway's "Moulin Rouge," declined to tell Hell Gate who he voted for as he left the polling site at PS 154—nor had he heard about Darializa Avila Chevalier's controversial tweets. But he was aware of the comments made by Rep. Adriano Espaillat's staffer about Avila Chevalier.
Still, "people are people, and people make mistakes," Ward said. "If people take responsibility, then I'm not gonna hold somebody else's lump with what the staff does."
Mamdani's endorsement of Avila Chevalier, though, caught Ward's attention. "It made me look more into both candidates, actually, for her and Adriano," he said.
Central Harlem resident John Fiscian, 32, declined to tell Hell Gate who he voted for, but also said he wasn't fazed by Avila Chevalier's tweets. "I think you have to take everything with a grain of salt," he said. "The most important thing is letting your inner judge, I guess, discern the best it can—like, the best of the worst in some scenarios, or hopefully the best of the best."
—Alisha Allison
12:45 p.m. | Flushing
Canvassers for incumbent Congresswoman Grace Meng and challenger Chuck Park are standing on opposite sides of the block in front of John Bowne Elementary School in Flushing.
A former U.S. state department employee, Park has waged a spirited campaign, but still faces a huge uphill battle against a politician that is still widely-liked in NY-6, New York City's only Asian-majority congressional district.
Park has hit Meng on donations she's taken from AIPAC, her stance on the war in Iran, and the fact that she hasn't outwardly opposed the casino in Corona-Flushing Meadows Park.
Martha Flores-Vazquez, a Democratic District Leader in the area, was there to vote for Meng, while also voicing her dislike of Democratic Socialists like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, whose district neighbors NY-6. She was also supporting Marty Dolan, AOC's longshot challenger.
"If something's not broken, it doesn't need to be fixed," Flores-Vazquez said. "I'm sure that Chuck Park is a nice man, but he picked the wrong district, he picked the wrong person to run against, because she does good work. If he would have chosen a different office, and if he wasn't aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America, I might have even supported him." (Park is actually not aligned with NYC-DSA.) Still, Flores-Vazquez had nice things to say about Park. "He's impressive, he's Korean. My granddaughters are Korean. They're Koryican, I'm Puerto Rican."
Flushing resident Katherine Kim was there to vote for Park.
"For me, the issues that stand out are that he's not AIPAC-supported, and that his grassroots organizing reminds me of Bernie Sanders," Kim said, who found out about Park's campaign through Instagram. "Chuck is also outspoken about where his campaign money comes from and how it matches his values. We want someone who doesn't answer to donors. No one's in favor of what's going on with Iran and Israel, and AIPAC tells people how to vote on those."
Kim conceded that Park faced some long odds. "His chances? Oh, I don't know about that," she said. "Grace Meng has widespread support. And Flushing is surprisingly split when it comes to politics. There's a lot of Koreans that support Trump. But for our voters, which are mostly elderly, Grace Meng is a familiar face."
—Max Rivlin-Nadler
2:01 p.m. | Lower East Side
Near a Lower East Side polling site next to the scaffolding-saturated intersection of Rivington and Pitt Streets around lunchtime, Hell Gate bumped into actor and former gubernatorial candidate Cynthia Nixon.
Nixon was there to support Brad Lander, who was himself there to greet Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who was due to make a pit stop to rally voters.
We asked Nixon, who ran against Andrew Cuomo in 2018 and was wearing a Knicks-themed "Cynthia Knickson" T-shirt, how she is treating Tuesday's primary. Is this an existential moment for democratic socialists and the Democratic Party establishment? Or merely a hard-fought skirmish that will soon be forgotten?
"I think we are having an existential struggle within the Democratic Party, absolutely, and that is playing out in New York as it's playing out in many places," Nixon replied. "Are we going to pretend that the genocide is not happening? Are we going to take corporate funds? Are we going to be hundred-millionaires running for office? Or are we going to have grassroots, DSA, Working Families Party, ceasefire now?"
When we began a question about NY-7 by noting that Claire Valdez and Antonio Reynoso were very similar on paper, policy-wise, Nixon interjected, "Yes, but Antonio takes real estate money."
Asked about the congressional race in her own district, NY-12, Nixon said she'd made up her mind and would hit the polls later—but that she wouldn't tell us who she's picking.
"No one is perfect in that race by a long shot," Nixon said. "My wife and I have been turning it over and over, but I think we have finally settled on our choices."
A few minutes later, Mayor Mamdani's SUV pulled up, and he emerged to a smattering of applause. The mayor embraced the two candidates he had officially endorsed—Lander and the DSA-backed Illapa Sairitupac, who is running for State Assembly—and also hugged his former colleague in the state legislature, Yuh-Line Niou, who is running for State Senate. Morris Katz, one of the mayor's senior advisors and a political strategist for an increasing number of Democrats across the country, looked on.
"This is a moment when New Yorkers have an opportunity to vote for a partner in fulfilling the affordability agenda," Mamdani said. A reporter asked the mayor whether Tuesday's results would be a "referendum" on his agenda, especially if his candidates lost.
Mamdani replied that one year ago, he thought he would lose the mayoral primary, and yet here he was. He added, "As Brad often says, it's not just about electing more Democrats, it's electing better Democrats."
Phyllis Sanfiorenzo, an artist who has been living on the Lower East Side for 25 years, said that the cost of housing was foremost in her mind when she voted on Tuesday.
"My son's 40 years old and he needs a place to live. He works hard as a journalist himself, and I just feel terrible," Sanfiorenzo said. After she injured her knee, he would come into the city from New Jersey every day to help her. "He wishes he could live closer to me, you know."
Sanfiorenzo voted for Lander over Goldman. Why? "Dan Goldman, I felt, needed to move away from Israel," she said. Sanfiororenzo also chose Sairitupac over Jasmin Sanchez for the State Assembly, and noted that overall, she felt pulled to the left this election.
"I honestly feel that if Bernie Sanders would have been president, we would have never had a Trump presidency," she said.
—Christopher Robbins
1:22 p.m. | Downtown Brooklyn
There was a light drizzle and only a slow trickle of voters at the Ingersoll Community Center on Myrtle Avenue in Downtown Brooklyn Tuesday morning.
"Yeah, it's been slow so far," a man handing out flyers for Antonio Reynoso told Hell Gate. "It'll pick up in the evening. People around here work."
Chris, 43, a 3D graphic artist, said he voted for Reynoso "because he's more moderate," and that Claire Valdez seemed too radical for his taste. "I generally worry that driving tax-paying businesses out of the city will threaten our ability to pay for public services," he said. "I agree with the goals of socialism, but not with the methods."
One man who didn't wish to give his name said he was happy to talk about his political thinking, but not about who he voted for. "I come from the school that you keep that inside your head," he told Hell Gate. "But as for what's motivating who I'm voting for, it's affordability. I just got priced out of my apartment. The landlord jacked the rent 20 percent. My wife and I have probably had to move five times since we started living together. I'm tired of packing everything into boxes."
What would he like to see elected officials do to make housing more affordable?
"More like what we saw in Gowanus. I want lots of affordable housing, and put it in places where you're not displacing a lot of people. I don't want to have to leave this city. I love it here, man."
What does he make of Mamdani's affordability agenda so far?
"You know, I was raised to believe that politicians are scammers. But I have to say, Mamdani seems to be delivering some stuff that he promised."
Chris Almon, 40, a lawyer, said he didn't vote for Reynoso, Valdez, or Won, but for a lesser-known candidate, Vichal Kumar, a public defender. "His platform aligns with the things I care about," Almon said. "Medicare for All, things like that. A lot of the candidates had pretty similar platforms, but that's why it came down to professional background for me. Kumar knows the needs of the people he's trying to represent."
—Nick Pinto
1:08 p.m. | Bedford-Stuyvesant
At the building that once housed Boys' High School in Bed-Stuy, several voters on Tuesday morning told Hell Gate they had their eye on the district leader races on their ballot, and that they voted for insurgent candidates Carmella Charrington and Omar Hardy.
Few people typically pay attention to district leader races, but many of these voters have had a front-row seat to the hyperlocal race thanks to the advocacy of their neighbors. The polling site is just a stone's throw from Charrington's longtime home, where she has been fighting forcible eviction from the brownstone that she says was stolen via deed theft. (The New York Attorney General's office has said the situation does not constitute deed theft; her case is ongoing.) Many of the voters I spoke with were Charrington's neighbors, or at least knew of her case.
"It's been a crazy few months for our block," said Delaney McDonough, a luxury event producer who lives on Jefferson. I asked McDonough how they decided who to vote for. "I trust Carmella," they said. "And I spent a lot of time Googling everybody and making sure that we're protecting the people that live here."
Charrington and Hardy are running as part of a Brooklyn Can’t Wait slate of district leader candidates put together by the New Kings Democrats. NKD hopes to add at least eight new district leaders to their 14 reform-minded incumbents in the June primary, earning a majority of seats on the county party’s 42-member executive committee. If that happens, it would allow them to oust the current party chair, Assemblymember Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn, and put in a new chair less beholden to the party machine. One big reason behind this push for change? For years, leaders of the Brooklyn Democratic Party establishment have essentially handpicked Brooklyn's judges in backroom deals that favor party faithfuls—something reformists are looking to change.
Asked Tuesday who she'd like to see take over, Charrington simply said, "anybody but Rodneyse." Hardy added: "She was handpicked by Frank Seddio, and he has done a lot of harm to the community. We need someone that's gonna bring everybody together and not participate in this whole pay-to-play situation."
Yonette Baker, who has lived in Bed-Stuy for 20 years, had just finished her job as a chef at a nearby nursing home before hitting the polling booth, and also voted for Charrington for district leader. "One of the ladies I met the other day was saying they were trying to take her property," she said of Charrington. "I can see and understand her and she wants changes." However, she voted for the incumbent Stefani Zinerman over DSA's Eon Huntley for Assembly, as she knows Zinerman through lobbying in Albany with her union, 1199SEIU. "I am voting for the people that I know. I don't want to hear about somebody right when it's election time," she added. "It bothers me."
Others were voting in the hopes of continuing to build the progressive movement that got Mamdani into City Hall last year. "I'm a little concerned about the low turnout for early voting," said Luke Peterson, who works in advertising. Peterson voted for current State Senator Jabari Brisport, Huntley, Charrington, and Hardy. "Because everything with Zohran is going so well that people might be, like, 'Well, he's got it, I can take my hands off the wheel a little bit.' Which is not the right thing to do," he said.
Meanwhile, jewelry designer Cali Hellerman didn't know who to vote for when she hit the polling booth, but she still cast her vote for Charrington and Hardy—thanks to the use of ChatGPT. Pulling out her phone, she showed how she asked ChatGPT to tell her how to vote. It said it couldn't tell her who to vote for, but it summarized the positions of each of the candidates. As a result, she voted for Marlon Rice for State Senate, Eon Huntley for Assembly, and Charrington and Hardy for district leaders.
"I am for the community people," she said, pointing to ChatGPT's summary of Charrington and Hardy's deed theft advocacy. "I just think the housing thing is a big issue."
12:04 p.m. | Harlem
Two blocks away from his office at 163 West 125 Street, Assemblymember Jordan Wright and a canvasser stood on the corner handing out palm cards to passersby, hoping to sway late-decision voters in his campaign for reelection against NYC-Democratic Socialists of America-backed candidate Conrad Blackburn.
Wright said that earlier that morning, he had cast a vote for himself and Congressman Adriano Espaillat, who is also being challenged by a DSA-backed candidate, Darializa Avila Chevalier. When asked about election turnout and what he expects will happen today, Wright was confident that his community would show up at the polls.
"I'm not sure what it's gonna be today," he told Hell Gate. "I know it's a little lower than people might have anticipated, given the weather and everything, but Harlem always turns out when the time is right."
But Wright had a last-minute message to voters: "Get out and vote, make your voice heard," he said. "This is the most important thing you can do when you get to the polls, do the right thing."
—Alisha Allison
11:37 a.m. | Bedford-Stuyvesant
The Democratic primary race for State Assembly in Bed-Stuy is between 61-year-old incumbent Stefani Zinerman, who has participated for years in the Black-led political establishment that zealously guards its influence in central Brooklyn, and 41-year-old Eon Tyrell Huntley, who has the backing of the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America.
It's Huntley's second attempt to oust Zinerman. In 2024, Zinerman defeated Huntley by fewer than 500 votes, while the vast majority of the district's 74,000 registered Democrats did not vote at all. This year, Huntley is trying again, hoping to build upon the inroads NYC-DSA made when they helped elect Zohran Mamdani. Election whisperer Michael Lange told Hell Gate that early voting results look positive for Huntley: "It's 65 percent under 50," Lange said of voters who cast their ballot before Tuesday. "The electorate is getting younger every year."
On Sunday in the neighborhood, voters young and old expressed skepticism to both candidates, and to politics in general, best summed up by the words of a 72-year-old voter who declined to give his name but said he has lived in the neighborhood his whole life. The voter stopped to chat with a Huntley volunteer as he strolled toward an early voting site on Gates Avenue on Sunday: "They're all crooks."
That Huntley volunteer was Maya Meredith, 33, head of the NYC-DSA's Afrosocialist caucus. She told me that that disillusionment is something she's also been hearing a lot. "Honestly, when I talk to Black voters and other voters of color," Meredith said, "the thing that I hear more often than 'I'm voting for the other candidate' is 'I don't believe in these politicians.'"
Meredith continued, "I think that this conflict that we see around this particular race is not actually representative of the way that the whole Black electorate, both in New York City and other places in the country, are experiencing Democratic politicians right now, which is a massive amount of disappointment."
The conflict Meredith was referring to is one in which both candidates have implied the other is a puppet. The pro-Zinerman super PAC Moving Brooklyn Forward flooded the district with mailers tying Huntley to Mamdani's infamous threat to raise property taxes and saying he would "sell out" Black homeowners for the socialist agenda. Last week, pro-Huntley volunteers launched a website cataloging the pro-Israel and real estate donors to Zinerman's campaign and PACs like the aforementioned Moving Brooklyn Forward, which is largely backed by real estate developers. Though Mayor Zohran Mamdani didn't endorse Huntley, his platform largely amounts to securing state funding for Mamdani's campaign promises, while Zinerman supporters portray his campaign's younger, whiter base as the people who are dismantling Black Brooklyn.
On Gates Avenue on Sunday, Meredith said it was important to her to be visible to "show that there are Black people that represent socialist policies," perhaps because every other pro-Huntley volunteer was white; every Zinerman canvasser I encountered on Sunday was a Black woman.
And so it's hard to blame voters with decades of political engagement in the district, like Cherie Hobson, for sticking with the woman they know. "People come out of nowhere to run against you because they're younger?" Hobson scoffed when we spoke on Sunday at the early voting site at Intermediate School 324 on Gates Avenue. "Just because they're younger doesn't make them right." If she dropped dead tomorrow, Hobson said, she knows her children don't know the ins and outs of keeping the brownstone she owns running. That's how she sees Huntley, though she did not disparage him.
Zinerman has been a known commodity in Central Brooklyn politics for decades, and in this cycle has racked up endorsements from the traditional core of Democratic politics: unions, and Black-run political clubs like the Vanguard Democrats. Hobson says she remembered Zinerman as the campaign manager for former City Councilmember Robert Cornegy, predecessor of local Councilmember Chi Ossé (who has endorsed Huntley, and amplified scrutiny into Zinerman's donors.)
On Tuesday at around 9 a.m. on the morning of the primary, a small number of voters trickled into the polling place at a senior center by Herbert Von King Park. Brisport and Huntley joined a small DSA scrum across the street. Huntley managed to convince Linda Brathwaite, 67, who has lived in a nearby building for three years, and in the district longer, to vote for him. "He said that he's gonna come and visit us. No one comes to visit us," Braithwaite said. "I don't see any elected person come to say hi. Nobody does that." Braithwaite's 40-year-old caretaker, Ismaude Segis, also said she was about to vote for Huntley. "He just sold himself," she said.
"Eon's always been fighting for the full community," Brisport told Hell Gate. "It's definitely the Zinerman campaign that portrayed half the community as outsiders and interlopers, in a really disgusting way."
—Adlan Jackson
11:09 a.m. | Ridgewood
The most Brooklyn-y neighborhood in Queens has been the staging ground for one of the most interesting races this primary season: the contest for NY-7, with frontrunners Claire Valdez and Antonio Reynoso acting as proxies for, respectively, the new and old guards of New York City's left.
Still, the trio of canvassers across from the polling site at Ridgewood middle school IS 93 weren't representing either congressional candidate. Instead, they were handing out flyers for state Senate candidate and current Assemblymember Steven Raga, State Assembly candidate Melissa Orlando, and Julie Won, the City councilmember trailing Valdez and Reynoso in the race for NY-7.
Just a few minutes earlier, Mayor Zohran Mamdani had apparently appeared at the polling site alongside Valdez, who he endorsed back in January. But by the time this reporter made her way there, the mayor was gone. A QNS reporter who'd watched Hizzoner give a stump speech—the mayor didn't take any questions—told Hell Gate that Mamdani had given him a "shoutout to Schneps Union" upon seeing his press pass.
Although the mayor had moved on, Valdez and state Senate candidate Aber Kawas, along with New York City's hottest young politico Morris Katz, were just a few blocks away with a few other campaign staffers, while a lone Antonio Reynoso canvasser held up a sign next to them.
According to both Valdez and Kawas, energy on the ground had been good so far, and that neither of them were falling victim to any major election-day jitters (although Kawas noted she was currently on iced coffee number one of an indeterminate amount). "The nice thing about election day is that you really are moving around so quickly," Valdez said. "Whatever campaign you've set up is what is happening now, and you're just there to kind of live through it."
"Sometimes people see the picture on the [campaign] lit and go, 'I voted for her,' and we're like, 'Well, that's me!'" Kawas said. "That's usually what happens."
In fact, our conversation was quickly interrupted by Samson Rambler, a Jones Bar bartender who greeted Valdez with a, "Hey Claire, whaddup?"
"I'm trying to send a big message to my work right now, about voting," Rambler continued, "and a picture with you, so I could send it and be like, 'Guys, I'm with Claire right now, would be awesome, obviously…"
The candidate, of course, obliged.
—Katie Way
10:27 a.m.
The New York City Board of Elections shared voting totals as of 9 a.m. this morning, and turnout across the city continues to be low. According to the BOE, about 25,000 voters cast their ballot on Tuesday morning:
— NYC Board of Elections (@BOENYC) June 23, 2026
The City Reporter has some analysis of the early voting numbers:
New voters failed to show up at the polls during early voting for New York City’s June primary election amid overall low turnout. Only 172,743 New Yorkers cast ballots in the nine-day early voting period that ended Sunday. Of that number, only 11,573 ballots were cast by new—and generally younger—voters, New Yorkers who registered after the 2024 general election. That’s 6.7 percent of the early voting total, while Boomers and Millennials turned in comparatively higher numbers, according to an analysis by The City Reporter.
8:30 a.m. | Jackson Heights
Down the block from PS 69 on 37th Avenue, canvassers supporting State Senator Jessica Ramos and a canvasser from 1199 SEIU, which is supporting her opponent, Assemblymember Jessica González-Rojas, were arguing as they handed out leaflets to potential voters.
"Steve Cohen is funding her campaign! She took money from him," said a supporter of Ramos, referring to the $850,000 that flooded into a super PAC supporting González-Rojas during the race's final days. (Cohen, the billionaire Mets owner who is in the process of building a casino next to Citi Field, has not responded to questions about whether he is the source of the dark money.)
"No she didn't," responded the SEIU member. "She didn't take the money. It's an independent expenditure, he can do what he wants with the money. He chose a side. Ask him why he spent the money, I only know why we endorsed her."
One tangible impact of the late spending on the race? A deluge into people's mailboxes. A Jackson Heights resident told Hell Gate that they received nine mailers supporting González-Rojas just yesterday, and that wasn't including the ones from the Working Families Party, which also supports her.
Despite the furor surrounding the casino, one 50-year resident of Jackson Heights was ready to turn on Ramos.
"She embraced Cuomo, which determined my vote," said Fanny, referring to Ramos's endorsement of Andrew Cuomo during last year's mayoral race. "I don't know Jessica González-Rojas, but a lot of people I like are backing her."
Indeed, González-Rojas is supported by almost every other elected official in the area, including Congressmember Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
For first-time voter Zinat, she was just happy to be able to cast a vote at all. She became a citizen last year.
"I was so excited and everyone in there was so helpful," Zinat said as she held up her "I Voted" sticker outside of the polling site. "I already knew who I was going to vote for, so it was easy."
Who did Zinat vote for? She wasn't telling.
—Max Rivlin-Nadler