Congress
Public workers union helped sink labor nod for Lander
ALBANY, New York — The Big Apple’s largest municipal workers union helped sink the New York State AFL-CIO’s endorsement of Democratic House candidate Brad Lander.
The union’s president, Henry Garrido, said in an interview Thursday that Lander’s audit of New York City’s Health Insurance Stabilization Fund as city comptroller was a factor in the opposition to his endorsement. The report, which recommended the fund’s dissolution, angered the union.
“Our members were really upset about that,” Garrido said.
Lander has also been at odds with the union after the group backed moving retirees to a Medicare Advantage Plan, which the then-comptroller opposed.
Lauren Hitt, a spokesperson for Lander’s campaign, pointed to his efforts as the city comptroller to support workers at companies like Starbucks, Amazon and eBay as well as hotels across the country. He also plans to support a federal bill in Congress meant to address unfair labor practices and make it easier to unionize.
“Brad is a relentless supporter of workers’ rights to organize and bargain collectively,” Hitt said. “In just the last few months, Brad joined food service workers, nurses, residential building workers, bartenders, researchers, teachers, and many others on their picket line, demanding union recognition and fair contracts.”
The potential endorsement of another Democrat, socialist Darializa Avila Chevalier, is considered to be on hold. Garrido said he expects to meet with Avila Chevalier, whose insurgent left-wing candidacy toppled influential Democratic Rep. Adriano Espaillat. DC-37 endorsed Espaillat’s reelection earlier this year as well as that of Rep. Dan Goldman, who Lander defeated in the June primary.
“I don’t know the young lady,” Garrido said. “I hear good things. I want to meet her; I want to talk with her.”
Avila Chevalier’s campaign did not immediately comment.
Declining to endorse two Democrats considered shoe-ins to win their deep blue districts concerned some labor leaders eager to present a united front ahead of the November elections.
“We want a New York delegation elected in November that will fight and do things for worker pay and embody the fighting spirit we need across the nation,” said PSC-CUNY Vice President Jen Gaboury, whose union represents public higher education workers.
Garrido, though, disputed that his union was solely responsible for sinking the endorsements, noting that Lander would still have struggled to win over the full New York State AFL-CIO, a federation of some 3,000 unions of varying political stripes. To win an endorsement, candidates needed to get backing from two-thirds of the unions that fall under the AFL-CIO umbrella.
As the umbrella organization met in Albany this week, Lander received support from unions that backed Goldman during the primary, his spokesperson said. His campaign also pointed to endorsements during his successful primary from a range of labor groups including the United Auto Workers, 32BJ SEIU and the Communications Workers of America.
Both Lander and Avila Chevalier are part of a surging left-flank that won upset races against establishment-backed Democrats in June — losses that shook New York City’s political establishment and highlighted Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s kingmaker role in predominantly left-leaning districts.
Joe Anuta contributed to this story.
Sen. Ron Johnson is sending a letter Monday requesting a conference meeting to discuss the midterm results and a delay in the leadership election.
Johnson has gathered enough signatures to force the meeting under the Senate GOP’s rules and is proposing the gathering for 9 a.m. Tuesday.
“Tuesday’s result was a stunning defeat,” Johnson and his backers write in the letter to Conference Chair Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), a copy of which was obtained by POLITICO. “Holding leadership elections without engaging in a robust discussion and evaluation of how those running for leadership intend to lead would be political malpractice”
Republicans still expect their leadership election to be held Tuesday, where Majority Leader John Thune is so far unopposed to lead the party next year in the minority.
Sen. Chris Murphy announced Friday that he has been released from the hospital after suffering a stroke last week, but will miss “several weeks” of Senate votes while he continues to recover.
“The doctors are very encouraged by the progress I’ve made so far,” the Connecticut Democrat said in a statement. “In order to take my recovery seriously and get back to work on the quickest timeline possible, I will be spending several weeks at a rehabilitation center after being discharged from the hospital today.”
He added that he remains in touch remotely with his staff and colleagues.
Murphy, who was hospitalized last weekend, said Friday that he was “diagnosed with a small bleed in the thalamus region of my brain.” Jose Suarez, the Chief of Neurosciences Critical Care at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, said in a separate statement released by Murphy’s office that the senator “experienced a small hemorrhagic stroke.”
“He has shown tremendous progress, and at the current rate of improvement, we expect that he will make a full recovery following rehabilitation,” Suarez added.
Murphy is the latest senator to suffer a stroke in recent years. Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Ben Ray Lujan (D-N.M.) were both hospitalized for strokes in 2022. Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), at that time a Senate candidate, also had a stroke in 2022 that he later described as near fatal.
The head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus said his group will still be power brokers in a massive Democratic majority in a strategy memo previewing plans for next term.
“While some in the press have speculated that a majority of this size undermines our influence within the caucus, they have it exactly backwards,” Rep. Greg Casar of Texas said in the Friday memo obtained by Blue Light News. “Big majorities are good for getting big things done. Our goal is not to win a battle against other Democratic caucuses. It is to pass longstanding progressive priorities that bring down costs, root out corruption, and boost wages.”
The CPC will have at least 105 members next term, according to the memo. If Democrats had a narrow majority, progressives — and any other faction in the caucus — could have used their votes as leverage. Now that presumptive speaker Hakeem Jeffries will have as many 30 votes to spare, Democrats broadly are recalibrating their approach next term.
Casar laid out a “three-pronged” strategy for the CPC to “wield our power” in the three-page memo — tackling legislation, oversight and “holding Donald Trump to his word on populist economic policies.”
“Small majorities give corporate special interest groups the ability to block popular populist policies by recruiting a small number of opponents; a big majority gives us the advantage,” he said.
Casar previewed how the CPC can engage with Trump, noting that “one of the few bright spots for bipartisan lawmaking” was a housing bill that banned private equity firms from buying homes. He noted the caucus should push Trump to cap credit card interest rates, lower credit card fees for small businesses and lower prescription drug costs.
“While we oppose [Trump] strongly on the vast majority of fronts, we should send bills to his desk that would lower prices and raise paychecks. If he signs them, good. If he vetoes those bills, that will propel us to a continued Democratic majority and a trifecta where a Democratic president can sign these proposals into law,” he said.
Casar also outlined oversight targets beyond the administration, urging Democrats to specifically investigate corporations that use customer data for “surveillance pricing,” health care companies that are “taking advantage of seniors” through the Medicare Advantage program and artificial intelligence labs who are “putting jobs and lives at risk.”
“By focusing not just on the Trump administration but also on big corporations and billionaires, we will show the American people we are not just anti-Trump but also pro-worker and pro-consumer,” he said.
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