Valdez to run for Congress, setting up NY-7 showdown

Queens Assemblymember Claire Valdez launched her campaign for Congress on Thursday. Eagle file photo by Ryan Schwach

By Ryan Schwach

Queens Assemblymember Claire Valdez launched a campaign to succeed Nydia Velázquez in Congress on Thursday.

In launching her bid, the freshman socialist elected sets up a showdown between the Democratic Socialists of America – who are fresh off their recent win with Mayor Zohran Mamdani – and the wider progressive movement via Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, who entered the race a month ago.

Valdez and Reynoso are the two leading candidates to succeed Velázquez in the Queens-Brooklyn 7th Congressional District, following the trailblazing representative’s decision to retire late last year.

“It just felt that we needed to elect a true working class labor organizer to Congress,” Valdez told the Eagle Thursday. “Not just to win back the working class but to really fight for an agenda that supports and empowers working class people in NY-7 and around the country.”

The district contains the Queens neighborhoods of Astoria, Woodside, Sunnyside, Long Island City, Maspeth, Ridgewood and Woodhaven, as well as a significant portion of eastern and northern Brooklyn.

It has a large Hispanic population and has a strong progressive base – it’s the congressional district where Mamdani performed the best.

The 36-year-old assemblymember is a former union organizer, a past she is leaning on in her campaign. She ran for the 37th Assembly District, which includes Ridgewood, Glendale and Long Island City, following sexual harassment allegations made against then Assemblymember Juan Ardila.

Valdez won a three-way Democratic Primary against Ardila and attorney Johanna Carmona, and was subsequently elected in November 2024.

However, she said her short time in elected office was not a concern as she seeks to make the jump from state to federal office.

“I think the experience that I bring is one that's very familiar to most voters, and we're excited to stand up a field campaign and get out there and knock some doors,” she said.

“People are really hungry for the politics that [Mamdani’s] mayoralty represents, that his campaign put forward,” she added. “I think there's a real vision that we can build on and try to fight to make sure that the affordability agenda is advanced in New York.”

She will likely be running with the full-throated support of the DSA, which are currently running insurgent campaigns across the city hot off their biggest political win in nearly a decade.

The mayor has yet to weigh in officially, but reporting suggests he was key in pushing his DSA-ally to run.

Valdez’s campaign includes Mamdani-alums, including advisor Morris Katz and communications professional Andrew Epstein, two parts of the brain trust behind the former Astoria assemblymember’s meteoric rise last year.

It will be a tough race to June for Valdez, however. She will have her work cut out for her in defeating Reynoso, a prominent progressive with a long career in elected office.

Reynoso has seven years in the City Council under his belt, and three years as BP. He already has the support of Public Advocate Jumaane Williams.

Reynoso’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.

The race between the two for NY-7 will also be a race between the growing power of the DSA versus the broader progressive movement within the Democratic Party.

“I think Democratic primaries are really the place that we want to hash out the future of the party,” Valdez said.

Whoever wins the socialist versus progressive fight for NY-7 will have big shoes to fill in succeeding Velázquez.

Born in Puerto Rico, Velázquez was elected in 1993 and became the first Puerto Rican woman elected to Congress, representing a newly redistricted seat that was majority-Hispanic, defeating a longtime incumbent.

She has served 16 terms, chairing both the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Small Business Committee, and was the first Latina to chair a congressional committee.

In running for Congress, Valdez will not be able to hold onto her Assembly seat, regardless of the race’s outcome.

The DSA however already intends to back another member, Samantha Kattan, who works for a tenant protection nonprofit, to run for Valdez’s Assembly seat. Kattan is the only person filed for the seat as of Thursday.