Former Meeks challenger launches bid to unseat Assembly member Weprin

Shaniyat Chowdhury is running to unseat Assemblymember David Weprin in District 24.  Photo via New York City Campaign Finance Board

By Jacob Kaye

Longtime State Assemblymember David Weprin will face a challenger when he runs for reelection in his eastern Queens district next year.

Shaniyat Chowdhury, a 29-year-old public school teacher from Jamaica, announced his bid for Assembly District 24 last week, a little more than a year after he lost in a bid to unseat 12-term incumbent Rep. Gregory Meeks in Congress.

“For me personally, after having run for Congress last year, we analyzed where we succeeded, where we could improve, and we realized that District 24 is a district we did extremely well in,” Chowdhury told the Eagle. “I think it speaks to the working class values that people want to see in the district.”

Chowdhury, who is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, said that his main policy positions focus around equitable funding in public schools, expanding housing and expanding health care, particularly for immigrants and undocumented Queens residents and New Yorkers.

“My platform is about helping all of us – it's all about bringing all of us together, it's not trying to single any one single person out,” Chowdhury said. “But it's really about representing every working class, middle class person, not just in New York, but I really want to speak to the rest of the country.”

Chowdhury was born in Queens but spent the majority of his early years in New Jersey. He moved back to Queens as a young teen with his family, who had suffered financially at the start of the Great Recession. It was a defining moment in his political life, he said.

“A lot of immigrants, working class families, lost everything during that time and that's when I started to become really engaged with everything else affecting us,” he said.

The Jamaica resident joined the Marine Corps, where he served for six years and where he said he first felt the desire to give back through public service. After leaving the Marines, he attended and graduated from John Jay College. He went on to serve as a legislative intern for Brooklyn Assemblywoman Latrice Walker and work on Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s 2018 run for Congress.

Chowdhury challenged Queens Democratic Party Leader Gregory Meeks in the 2020 Democratic primary, just as his former boss had done against former Congressmember and Queens Democratic Party Leader Joseph Crowley two years earlier.

However, the result was not the same – Meeks took in over 75 percent of the vote.

Though he lost by two votes in AD 24 in 2020, Chowdhury performed better in the district than he did in nearly every other district. And though he currently lives only a few blocks outside of the border of the assembly district, candidates running during a redistricting year only need to live within the county they are running in.

He also previously lived in the district from 2007 until 2012 and set up his campaign office there when he ran for Congress.

Chowdhury says he learned several lessons in that initial run for public office.

To start, Chowdhury says his first focus is on fundraising, bypassing building up a campaign team. By getting money early, he said he hopes to build out a staff that he can pay a livable wage.

“I don't want to rush the process, I don't want to exploit anyone for the work,” he said. “We do need to raise a lot of money to make sure we can pay for resources, literature and building a team. So, that's just my biggest priority and I wish I had done that earlier as a candidate last year. But it was just me, a first time candidate just really learning the ropes the first time around.”

Chowdhury’s run also may look different come January, when the State Legislature votes on the New York State Independent Redistricting Commissions new electoral lines.

His campaign strategy will have a focus on getting the vote out among the South Asian, Indo Caribbean and general immigrant population located mostly in the district’s western portion. The only district he won outright in his Congressional race was AD 38, which is currently represented by Jenifer Rajkumar and home to a large South Asian and Indo-Caribbean population.

However, Richmond Hill, which is divided among several Assembly and Senate districts, has been a focus for advocates who seek to keep the neighborhood whole.

The redistricting battle hasn’t been his main focus, but Chowdhury says that he hopes to see a district that truly represents the population of Richmond Hill and the surrounding areas.

“We obviously do want to see a seat that represents us,” he said. “We're very diverse, our experiences are unique when it comes to the South Asian and Caribbean diaspora, and I do think it's time where we feel like our voices are heard, and we shouldn't have a seat.”

“We also have the opportunity to push the right candidates to represent those seats – it's just about meeting those two together,” he added. “But, you know, I'm just taking one day at a time keeping an eye out what that looks like.”

Weprin, who comes from a long line of elected officials, has represented the district since 2010, when he won a special election to replace the former seat holder, his brother, Mark. His father, Saul Weprin, was the speaker of the Assembly from 1991 until 1994.

“I obviously take all challenges seriously but, at the same time, my record speaks for itself,” Weprin told the Eagle.

The incumbent said that he was proud of the work he had done in the western portion of the district with the South Asian and Indo-Caribbean population who lives there, including opening up a satellite office in Richmond Hill when the neighborhood was added to the district during the last redistricting process a decade ago.

Noting that he was facing a challenge from the left, as many others in Queens and throughout the city have seen in recent years, he touted his work on criminal justice as the chair of the Assembly’s Committee on Correction and his work to pass the religious garb law, which protects people from being discriminated against for their religious clothing.

“I like to think of myself as a progressive before we used the word progressive,” Weprin said.

But Chowdhury, who did not receive the DSA’s endorsement when he ran for Congress, said it’s time for a change, noting that Weprin seeked higher office when he ran for New York City comptroller earlier this year.

“A lot of these dynasties have kind of gotten comfortable, or almost feel entitled to just being there,” Chowdhury said. “I'm saying that respectfully – it's not like they haven't done anything for the community, they've definitely done a lot, but I do think that sometimes people get comfortable being in that seat and feel like they're entitled to it just because of the legacy that they have.”

“I do think that people are probably just ready for change, and I think that's just natural,” he added.