(C) Common Dreams
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In one of New York’s most competitive primaries, Jamaal Bowman is a party of one [1]
['Https', 'Gothamist.Com Staff Michelle-Bocanegra']
Date: 2024-04
Rep. Jamaal Bowman’s supporters hunkered down in the back of a local fish and chip shop on a drizzly night in Yonkers to hear a celebrity politician rally the troops for the congressmember’s re-election.
“We proved the first point that you can get in the door,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told hundreds of Bowman supporters gazing up at her at the top of the stairs. “The question now is can you survive? Can you stay?”
Although the question was posed to Bowman’s supporters, it may as well have been directed at his campaign. Outside the warm embrace of a supportive crowd, Bowman is fighting for his political survival and is betting his future on one of the most fractious issues in New York politics: the Israel-Hamas war and the future of the Palestinian people.
Since his upset victory over 32-year incumbent Eliot Engel in the 2020 Democratic primary, Bowman has become a national progressive figure and conservative foil with a penchant for attracting a harsh limelight: He defended TikTok in Congress; he wrote blog posts more than a decade ago that appeared to give credence to 9/11 conspiracy theories; and the former middle school principal even pulled a false fire alarm in a House office building when Democrats were trying to stall a vote.
But as mainstream Democrats walk a delicate line between supporting Israel and condemning the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Bowman has doubled down on his calls for an immediate, permanent cease-fire and has called the Israeli air and ground offensive on Gaza a “genocide.”
Bowman’s challenge now is convincing enough constituents, many of whom disagree with his crusade against the war, that he can still represent them.
His primary challenger, Westchester County Executive George Latimer, is a veteran of local Democratic politics who has the backing of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and much of the local political establishment. Engel has declared support for Latimer, and so have retired Rep. Nita Lowey and, a throng of local Democratic town committees, among others.
Latimer’s $1.4 million in fundraising last quarter trounced Bowman’s haul by nearly 2-to-1, with a boost from AIPAC outreach. And in a first for the organization, the Jewish Democratic Council of America, which has strong ties to the party, endorsed a challenger over a sitting incumbent by throwing its support behind Latimer.
And constituents bent on unseating Bowman are mobilized.
“He’s really not a builder, he’s a destroyer,” said David Rivkin, a New Rochelle resident who volunteers with Westchester Unites, a group that is registering Republican and undeclared Jewish voters as Democrats for the June 25 primary.
“Even before Oct. 7, [Bowman] sought to interject race into the Israel-Palestinian situation. That had a profound impact and really put Jewish communities in this district and elsewhere at risk," Rivkin said. "That affected me and my family personally."
Bowman has castigated fellow Democrats, including President Joe Biden, for not being outspoken enough on the atrocities, even those who have modified their stances to call for a temporary cease-fire.
The progressive is showing no signs of backing off.
“I've been told not to use the word 'blockade,' not to use the word ‘ethnic cleansing,’ not to use the word ‘occupation,’ not to use the word ‘apartheid.’ Well, if 18 human rights organizations have referred to Israel as an apartheid state, that's not Jamaal Bowman saying that,” Bowman said in an interview. “And are we not going to talk about this and try to deal with it?”
'Too damn honest'
Bowman’s supporters say his tendency toward the controversial is refreshing and even crucial, especially among Black voters.
“To be honest and truthful in this day and age, you’re going to seem a bit radical, a bit out of touch, because you’re just too damn honest,” Robert Winstead, president of the Yonkers African American Heritage Committee, said at Bowman’s Black History Month event at the Yonkers Public Library. “They said that about Malcolm. They said that about Martin.”
A vocal antiwar contingent has been strong in its support of Bowman and criticisms of Latimer. Bowman also has the support of progressive groups like the union 1199 SEIU and New York’s Working Families Party, which has defended him against attacks.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a Brooklyn Democrat who himself enjoys AIPAC support, endorsed Bowman on Friday morning.
Latimer, who has repeatedly called his opponent’s calls unrealistic and out of step with the party, tepidly endorsed a temporary cease-fire backed by the Biden administration in early March. Bowman is one of four members of New York’s congressional delegation to call for a permanent and immediate cease-fire and has drawn recrimination for using the word “genocide.”
Engel said Bowman’s comments went beyond simple advocacy for a cease-fire.
“They weren’t, in my opinion, only anti-Israel. They were bordering on antisemitism,” Engel, who is Jewish, told Gothamist.
Bowman frowned at Engel’s accusation and called his characterization “absurd.”
“I’m not antisemitic,” he said.
“Criticism of Israel is not antisemitic,” he added. “When I criticize the U.S., you know, am I against the U.S. people?”
Westchester Unites, which officially launched in January, converted more than 2,000 Republican and undeclared voters to the Democratic Party to help sway the primary. The county Board of Elections, which does not cover the Bronx portion of the district, said more than 2,300 former Republicans and unaffiliated voters registered with the Democratic Party between Dec. 1, 2023 and Feb. 14, 2024, the deadline to participate in the primary.
“I have not encouraged anybody to change their party registration at all,” Latimer said of the efforts. “The people who are supporting me today are not people that I encouraged to support me. They're people who have been in opposition to the incumbent for some length of time.”
Bowman’s calls for a cease-fire and his rhetoric on the war have come to symbolize divides within the Democratic Party over both the conflict and political fealty to Israel, which appears to have split Democrats along generational lines according to polling.
Polls have also shown that Americans’ sympathy for civilians in Gaza is growing. A Gallup poll released this week showed that more Americans disapproved of the Israeli military operation in Gaza than supported it, and that dissent among Democrats has only grown between November and March.
“The reason this primary is getting so much attention is obviously sort of the underlying issue of Israel and the Middle East and the fact that there is a split within the Democratic Party,” said Peter Kauffmann, a Democratic strategist who served as a top campaign aide to former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and as Hillary Clinton’s press secretary when she was a New York senator.
In a recently surfaced TikTok post from November, Bowman questioned the veracity of claims that women had been raped by Hamas.
“There’s still no evidence of beheaded babies or raped women. But they still keep using that lie for propaganda,” he said in a rally in White Plains last November.
When Politico asked Bowman about the video, he eventually responded with a statement reversing his comments.
Kauffmann said letting the issue of Israel take on a life of its own at a campaign launch like Bowman’s — where even the representative took part in chants to “Free Palestine” — was a “bizarre strategy.”
“Most elections at the end of the day are defined by the economy, what's happening in people's lives,” Kauffmann said. “And the idea of kicking off your re-election about a foreign policy issue strikes me as much more deeply ideological than, you know, running for office to represent people in Congress.”
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[1] Url:
https://gothamist.com/news/in-one-of-new-yorks-most-competitive-primaries-jamaal-bowman-is-a-party-of-one
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