Congress

Some Democrats plan boycott of Trump’s State of the Union

Published

4 months ago

February 18, 2026

A slate of Democrats plan to skip President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address to Congress next week and instead will attend a counterprogramming event on the National Mall that same evening.

The rally, dubbed the “People’s State of the Union,” will include lawmakers who skipped Trump’s first and second inaugurations, underscoring a small but consistent block of Democrats who continue to opt out of the president’s most high-profile events.

Sens. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Reps. Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.), Becca Balint (D-Vt.), Greg Casar (D-Texas), Veronica Escobar (D-Texas), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) and Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) are expected to join the rally, organizers said Wednesday.

“These aren’t normal times and showing up for this speech puts a veneer of legitimacy on the corruption and lawlessness that has defined his second term,” Murphy said in a statement.

Ansari, who walked out of Trump’s address to Congress last year, said the rally continues her earlier protest.

“Americans deserve an honest account of the state of our union,” she said.

She said she plans to bring in a guest who was targeted by the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

The liberal group MoveOn is hosting the rally alongside other organizations, including the popular Democratic-aligned podcasting and media network MeidasTouch.

The White House dismissed the boycott, saying Democrats have routinely worked to thwart the administration’s policy goals.

“It’s not a surprise that they refuse to celebrate and honor the Americans who have benefited from the commonsense policies Republicans have governed with,” said White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson.

Democrats have boycotted a series of Trump’s biggest moments throughout both of his terms. Of the dozens of House Democrats who skipped Trump’s first inauguration, 31 were still in Congress and seven chose to attend his second one, signaling a faded resistance from the first Trump era.

Trump is set to deliver his address Tuesday night, even as a partial government shutdown continues, prompting concerns from some senior Hill Republicans and White House officials about the optics.

But Republicans also see the address as an opportunity to shift the focus away from mounting negative headlines — including fatal shootings by federal immigration agents in Minnesota and scrutiny over the release of the Epstein files — and instead bolster its economic messaging ahead of the midterms.

Congress

The Dems already had AOC. Now they have DAC.

Published

1 hour ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

NEW YORK — After thrashing incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat in Tuesday’s Democratic primary, Darializa Avila Chevalier is poised to become Republicans’ next priority punching bag.

Also known as DAC, Avila Chevalier has said she’s skeptical of deportation, borders and prisons, tweeted about using the American flag as a napkin, and expressed sympathy for Russia during its invasion of Ukraine. Those public remarks, and many more, already have GOP politicians and operatives in full-on attack mode. They have also left some Democrats worried that Republicans have found a potent new foil for the midterms.

The path she’s taking bears an uncanny resemblance to another democratic socialist firebrand who’s moderated her rhetoric and positions substantially since ascending to Congress eight years ago.

Like DAC, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez unseated another long-term incumbent to get to the House — and also instantly became a boogeyman for the right.

But as Ocasio-Cortez continues to moderate with an eye toward the mainstream, Avila Chevalier is storming onto the national political scene with a similar anti-establishment bent — and a very different dogma. And Republicans are trying to make her and her future democratic socialist colleagues a tool in their arsenal to defend the House this year.

“This is a very real problem in which the Democratic Party has been taken over by socialists,” said Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, who represents a suburban New York House seat that’s one of the most vulnerable in the country. “This is not something they’re going to be able to just run and hide from.”

Avila Chevalier, a doctoral student in sociology, helped organize the 2024 pro-Palestinian encampment at Columbia University that sent the campus into chaos and provided a national platform for the left’s discontent over Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.

On the trail, Avila Chevalier said her old tweets don’t represent her current views and that she’s focused on lowering the cost of living in her district, shifting the focus to “babies, not bombs.”

Her past comments, though, have made some in the Democratic Party uneasy, despite her apologies and assertions she’s changed (she also affirmed during the campaign that she still believes all deportations are wrong, including of undocumented immigrants convicted of serious crimes like murder and rape). And while there are parallels to Ocasio-Cortez in terms of their shared rise to prominence, many view the newcomer as a few steps farther left than the four-term incumbent, who’s frequently floated as a contender for senator and president.

Liam Kerr, co-founder of centrist Democratic group WelcomePAC, told Blue Light News that Ocasio-Cortez and Avila Chevalier are both products of a broader wave of insurgent Democrats that has risen since the election of President Donald Trump.

“If AOC was this Tea Party’s Ted Cruz, yes, DAC is this Tea Party’s MTG,” he said, referring to former Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. “It’s less substance and more about a sense that this person is unhinged and indefensible.”

Ocasio-Cortez’s team declined to comment for this article. In a social media post, Ocasio-Cortez congratulated the congressional primary winners, writing that she looks “forward to working together as a delegation as we fight for working families across New York.”

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez speaks with reporters outside the U.S. Capitol on June 9, 2026.

In a statement, Avila Chevalier’s campaign manager Ilona Duverge said: “We didn’t just run a campaign for better leadership in this district. We reminded people what the Democratic Party could be. After 2024, the lesson is simple: listen to your base. Working people don’t want scapegoats. They want a party that actually fights for them.”

In the waning days of the campaign, City & State dubbed Avila Chevalier “like AOC, but to the left.” When asked in a recent interview what her reaction was when she saw that, she downplayed the comparison.

“I think my reaction has been the same to all the comparisons I have gotten to anyone in political office right now,” she said. “Early on it was like, ‘Oh, are you going to be the next Zohran Mamdani?’ And I was like, ‘I’m going to be the Darializa Avila Chevalier.’ That is who I have always been. And that’s who I will be.”

Beyond Avila Chevalier, at least eight state legislative candidates backed by either the Democratic Socialists of America or New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani won in New York on Tuesday night.

Aber Kawas, a Queens community organizer who won one of those seats, is now facing renewed scrutiny for saying the long-term effects of capitalism, racism and white supremacy and Islamophobia resulted in the 9/11 attacks.

In another House Democratic primary in the city — for retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez’s seat — Mamdani’s longtime DSA ally, Assemblymember Claire Valdez, won in a blowout against Velázquez’s handpicked successor, Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso. Reynoso is the former co-chair of the city Council’s progressive caucus, but he never joined the city’s DSA chapter, the political home of Valdez and Mamdani.

“Democrats have a Bolshevik revolution going on in their primaries,” Rep. Richard Hudson, the chair of the House Republicans’ campaign arm, told fellow Republicans in a closed-door House GOP meeting Wednesday, according to three people in the room, granted anonymity to discuss the event.

House Speaker Mike Johnson also said the “radical” wins Tuesday night should spur GOP lawmakers to dig in their heels and fundraise.

The ascent of Avila Chevalier and her socialist colleagues also planted the seeds for more Democratic establishment displacement. The co-leader of the city’s DSA chapter, for instance, expressed regret for not supporting a primary of House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

When asked by a reporter Wednesday if he’s worried about a primary challenge in 2028 from a Mamdani-endorsed candidate, Jeffries replied: “When you ask me a serious question, I’ll give you a serious answer.”

The left’s rise also means the once-extreme Ocasio-Cortez is now on the ideological periphery of a new insurgent wave as she appears to position herself for higher office.

Ocasio-Cortez did not endorse in either Valdez or Avila Chevalier’s races. Speaking to reporters at the Capitol on Wednesday, she said her focus was on the 14 down-ballot candidates she did support: “I think I’m going to take a beat and really enjoy their success, and we’ll see what happens from there.”

Mamdani, the DSA and the left-leaning group Justice Democrats took on major roles to boost Avila Chevalier and Valdez. Mamdani’s move against Espaillat, as well as Velázquez’s successor of choice, upset Democratic power brokers.

Asked by Blue Light News on Tuesday if he believes rank-and-file DSA members are angry with Ocasio-Cortez for not endorsing in those two congressional primaries, Mamdani replied, “I think that AOC is somebody that has inspired so many across our city and our country in the fight for working people, and I think she continues to do so, and I think we’ll see that in the results.”

Mayor Zohran Mamdani at the Get Out The Vote rally on June 18, 2026, with his endorsed congressional candidates.

The mayor also expressed doubt that Avila Chevalier will morph into an effective boogeyman for Republicans in swing districts.

“We’ve heard from Republicans time and again that they are going to try and make these candidates the face of the Democratic Party,” Mamdani said Wednesday morning. “To them, I say that we are ready for that because for far too long we’ve been told that it’s not possible to fight for working people and win. These candidates have shown that they can. Let the Republicans talk about that more.”

A political consultant close to senior congressional Democrats agreed that such attacks won’t work in the current economic climate.

“In normal times, we should be concerned about attacks like that. In normal times, that probably would work,” said the consultant, who was granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. “But when the economy is this bad, it’s not going to work … [The GOP’s] best bet is to try to distract and focus on a random local candidate like Darializa, but the reality is that there’s a litany of horrific things that Republicans have done under this president and that’s what voters are going to care about.”

Andrew Bard Epstein, a top adviser to both Valdez and Mamdani, felt the same way — and then took a shot at Lawler, who faces a challenge in November from Army veteran Cait Conley.

“I don’t live in the 17th District, but I would think voters there care about costs of living and stopping chaos in the world,” Epstein said, referring to Lawler’s district. “Mike Lawler has just cosigned a disastrous war with Iran, which has raised prices and destabilized the world and has left both Iranian civilians and U.S. service members dead. They are the extremists.”

Still, some moderate Democrats are concerned. Matt Bennett, co-founder of centrist group Third Way, said he’s worried Avila Chevalier will become a “lightning rod” in the way Republicans like Greene and Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert did.

“She can live all day on cable news if she feels like it, and will have a huge social media following, and everything she does will be amplified by Republicans,” he said. “There’s a real risk of her becoming a national figure, even though she will have no impact whatsoever on actual legislating.”

Meredith Lee Hill and Ali Bianco contributed to this report.

Congress

‘Trying to read the tea leaves’: Ted Cruz offers few clues on his AI agenda

Published

2 hours ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Few lawmakers have as much influence over the fate of artificial intelligence legislation as Sen. Ted Cruz, but he’s keeping people guessing about how he’ll use that power.

As chair of the Senate Commerce Committee, the Texas Republican has pledged to convene members to vote on bills that would regulate the AI industry. He asked GOP members of the panel several weeks ago to submit their proposals.

“This markup is designed to move legislation that has a real chance of passing into law,” Cruz said in an interview this week, adding that he was vetting bills depending on “what bipartisan agreement and consensus can be reached.”

Cruz’s aides, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said the senator believes the federal government should take “targeted” action in “truly novel circumstances” where existing laws are silent — such as catastrophic risk, deepfakes and chatbots.

But they also concede that GOP committee staff is still reviewing dozens of existing bills, and what measures will make the cut for the scheduled late July markup remain in flux. Senators on the panel also say they haven’t heard from Cruz about his criteria for what AI legislation to put on the agenda.

It’s bringing real uncertainty to what Congress might accomplish on the high-stakes issue this year. It also underscores how Cruz, a one-time presidential candidate who could run again in 2028, is attempting to carefully navigate one of the most politically divisive policy debates of the midterms.

Cruz has even avoided saying whether he’ll allow the committee to vote on an emerging deal between Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and the White House that would bundle a kids’ online safety package with preemptions of specific state laws.

He said this week he “fully expects” that Blackburn’s bill, known as the Kids Online Safety Act, “will be on the next markup as a part of the package addressing AI and children’s safety.” But he declined to say whether he’ll bring up any revised bill text Blackburn brokers with the blessing of President Donald Trump.

A Blackburn spokesperson did not return requests for comment Wednesday, nor did the White House.

The outlook for how Cruz plans to legislate around AI is further clouded by his own record on the issue.

Back in 2024, Cruz was warning against broad regulation of AI, saying that “Big Tech and the Radical Left” were poised to empower the administrative state, kill innovation and cause the U.S. to lose the AI race with China. He pursued efforts to undercut a Biden administration executive order that took a more hands-on approach to regulating the industry.

As Cruz was preparing to take the gavel in the waning days of the Democratic majority, then-Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell of Washington accused him of opposing the inclusion of seven AI bills in a year-end government funding package — even though those bills had been advanced by the committee on a bipartisan basis.

Cruz’s aides disputed this characterization, saying there was no single lawmaker holding up the bills in late 2024 and House GOP leaders had issues, too. Cantwell, now the committee’s senior Democrat, said in an interview Wednesday the measures “would have helped us in regulating some of the biggest national security concerns.”

She added she’s now “trying to read the tea leaves” about what Cruz has planned for the upcoming markup. At least one Republican said he thinks Cruz has undergone a “very significant pivot” when it comes to engagement and interest around AI that could offer some clues.

“He originally had the position that we didn’t need to adopt any AI legislation whatsoever — that we should just allow the market to work,” Rep. Todd Young (R-Ind.), a member of the committee who is heavily involved in AI policy, said in an interview. “My sense is he has adopted a different position now, and I’m gratified by that.”

As for what accounts for the shift, Young said, “you’ll have to ask him why he’s become more inclined to legislate in this space.” But he acknowledged that “many people are coming to recognize” that it would be a mistake to allow the rapidly evolving technology to go unchecked.

Cruz’s aides disagreed with Young’s characterization. They note Cruz championed a measure making it a crime to publish nonconsensual sexual images — including AI-generated content — which was signed into law last year with support from first lady Melania Trump. Cruz is also pushing legislation that would regulate chatbots, or online apps that mimic human conversation and can pose harm for children.

His aides also said Cruz continues to believe too much federal government intervention into AI policy could threaten innovation and stifle freedom of expression.

Adam Thierer, a resident senior fellow at the right-leaning R Street Institute, said Republicans at the start of the Trump administration seemed to be waiting for cues from the White House before taking a firm position. That has changed as the White House scrambles to enact its own rules governing AI while urging Congress to codify a federal regulatory framework.

Cruz tried, and failed, to include a provision in the GOP’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act last summer that would have enacted a 10-year moratorium on the ability of states to set their own AI laws. Yet in just one year, Thierer said, the political landscape has transformed, and now preempting state AI laws is basically a nonstarter.

“It’s quite a reversal,” Thierer said. “Even limited preemption has become extraordinarily toxic because a whole bunch of people have come to believe what states are doing benefits them.”

Last fall, Cruz released an AI policy framework that aligned with Trump’s AI action plan, which laid out a “light-touch” regulatory strategy; Cruz’s aides suggested the senator plans to build on this blueprint. In December, Cruz was standing beside Trump for the signing of an executive order that would empower the federal government to evaluate and challenge state AI laws.

“I think they have a heightened sense of urgency, which is understandable because it has become increasingly urgent, and one of the major questions is whether Congress can keep pace with the accelerating rate of change in AI,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) of Republicans.

In the meantime, Cruz is facing tough choices about what bills to advance.

Cantwell said Wednesday she wants to see the seven bills that passed out of committee when she was chair, which she accused Cruz of undermining, taken up again next month. And a refusal to facilitate consideration of a potential Blackburn-White House agreement could put Cruz at odds with the president.

Cruz also could end up alienating colleagues whose support he needs on other legislative priorities in the coming months — including a major bill to overhaul the college sports industry.

Sen. John Curtis (R-Utah), a member of the Commerce Committee who has his own bill targeting chatbots that would go further than Cruz’s proposal, in an interview expressed some sympathy for the chair.

“Look, it’s a tough topic, right? There’s not a lot of consensus, and so anything that he can do to even further the conversation, I welcome,” he said. “I think we need to be having these conversations. I think we need to be having the hearings. Until we do, we won’t get to the right answer.”

Congress

The Squad 2.0 is coming — and they’re ready to frustrate Hakeem Jeffries

Published

12 hours ago

June 24, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Hakeem Jeffries has met his nightmare scenario: The Squad 2.0 is coming to Capitol Hill.

A trio of hard-left Democrats who won House primaries Tuesday in New York City boast among them eight protest-related arrests, three endorsements from Mayor Zohran Mamdani, two Democratic Socialist of America memberships, an average age of 41 and just one commitment to vote for Jeffries as the next speaker.

That adds up to a major governing challenge emerging for the House Democratic leader next year, when he will have to come to grips with a brash and emboldened faction of his caucus who believe they have a mandate to yank their party leftward.

”I know we all share very fierce values on things like guaranteed health care, raising wages, expanding union rights, and so I think our hope is that we use our ability in the majority to change people’s lives and make their lives better,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said Wednesday, reacting to the primary night earthquake in her hometown.

Eight years ago it was Ocasio-Cortez who was shaking up a hidebound Democratic leadership, sending the sitting No. 3 party leader into retirement and inaugurating a tight-knit “Squad” of unabashed progressives.

Now the left-wing bloc is expanding and on the cusp of asserting real power. It’s a function of the tight margin Democrats are likely to have if they can eke out a majority in November, coupled with Jeffries’ relative inexperience as top leader as compared with former Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the obvious progressive lurch of the party’s voting base on display Tuesday night.

Brad Lander, a longtime New York City official, walloped incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman. State legislator Claire Valdez trounced a Democratic opponent who ran with establishment support to replace retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez. And, in the biggest upset of the night, activist Darializa Avila Chevalier defeated longtime Rep. Adriano Espaillat, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus chair.

Jeffries and fellow House Democratic leaders have shrugged off the prospect of future caucus infighting. He told reporters this week that while he disagreed strongly with Mamdani’s endorsements, “a handful of primaries that go in one direction or the other in a given state or two aren’t going to reshape who we are as House Democrats.”

“We’ve been very clear,” Jeffries said. “What brings us together is a focus on driving down the high cost of living, fixing our broken health care systems, and cleaning up corruption.”

But the existing cadre of left-leaning House Democrats said Wednesday they are excited to have backup — even if some identify with the fractious DSA, which has been openly at odds with national Democratic Party leaders.

“Whether it’s DSA or progressive Democrats, we will have more power and more leverage,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), a former Congressional Progressive Caucus chair.

“We shouldn’t be moderating,” she added. “Having that ability to form a voting bloc, a bigger voting bloc, and a stronger voting bloc … allows us to continue to push for truly transformational policies that lift working people.”

The New Yorkers are all contesting deep-blue districts and are all but guaranteed victory in November, and they won’t be alone in beefing up the hard-left faction next year. Chris Rabb of Pennsylvania and Daniel Biss of Illinois are on track to join them, along with Rep. Analilia Mejia, who won a New Jersey special election earlier this year.

That’s in addition to the original squad members, Reps. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Ocasio-Cortez.

“Our team of progressive champions is growing,” Lander said during his Tuesday night victory speech. “I believe it will continue to grow in the months ahead.”

That could spell trouble for Jeffries, who has spent the past year-and-a-half cajoling his caucus into a unified message around lowering costs and accountability for the Trump administration. The new class of progressives threaten to unravel that work, using their platforms to force Democrats into uncomfortable — and politically precarious — conversations about support for Israel, Green New Deal environmental policies, defunding the police and the ethical bounds of immigration enforcement.

Avila Chevalier has emerged as a particular flashpoint. She has argued in recent interviews that all deportations are wrong, including for people convicted of breaking U.S. laws. Her deleted social media posts — later unearthed by CNN — express a deep disdain for the Democratic establishment including one reading, “Fuck Kamala Harris.”

Avila Chevalier and Valdez have not committed to backing Jeffries as speaker should Democrats take the majority. While they have said little publicly about him, they have also done little to dispel animosity among their supporters for their fellow New Yorker.

At Valdez’ Election Night party, supporters booed Jeffries and chanted, “You’re next.”

If Democrats win a slim majority, these progressives could wield considerable power. Much as the House Freedom Caucus has rocked the Republican Conference by withholding its votes on party priorities, the new progressives will have similar leverage. The AOC-centric “Squad” mostly avoided those tactics in the four years they had the majority — in part because they didn’t have the requisite numbers.

Valdez suggested she would not hesitate to deploy hardball tactics, criticizing her main primary opponent, Antonio Reynoso, on the campaign trail for not being aggressive enough. The person who represents her district in Congress, she recently told The New York Times, should “have real moral courage and conviction.”

More moderate Democrats are warning a clash is inevitable — and worrying about the political price the party as a whole could pay. House Republicans spent their morning caucus meeting salivating over the opportunity to paint their Democratic opponents as Marxists.

“I hope Jeffries is ready for the fight, because he’s got himself one now,” said one Democratic centrist, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly. “If it’s a tight majority, you’re going to see a huge tug of war between more moderate Democrats and people who want to get stuff done, and bomb throwers who are just trying to disrupt.”

Rep. Vicente Gonzales (D-Texas) said he had a “huge concern” about having to defend against attacks based on statements and positions taken by hard-left members.

“A lot of these policies that obviously I don’t agree with, and would be very difficult for me to sell to people in South Texas, and I don’t intend to sell them, because I don’t believe in most of them myself,” he said.

The progressives won’t be alone in the new class of incoming Democrats. More moderate candidates such as former Rep. Ben McAdams of Utah and Cait Conley of New York also won House primaries Tuesday. If Democrats take the majority, it will be in part because of a cadre of centrists who will be intent on beating back the left.

Those who were around for the rise of the original Squad said they were confident the vast ideological differences would eventually get bridged.

“It will be nothing special,” said Rep. Pete Aguilar of California, the Democratic Caucus chair. “We’ll talk with them about their hopes and their aspirations to represent their districts and what committees they want to serve on. … We look forward to building a relationship.”

Pelosi and Ocasio-Cortez had to weather a similar storm after the class of 2018 was sworn in. After months of crossfire on social media and the House floor, the two eventually reached a public détente. Ocasio-Cortez, notably, did not endorse any of the New York progressives, who were running against incumbents or candidates with leadership backing.

“AOC has been part of our caucus for a long time,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) said. “You know what representative government is? It represents. It means that every voice is represented.”

Yet by the time Ocasio-Cortez came to Congress, Pelosi was 16 years into her leadership of House Democrats, had four years as speaker under her belt and decades of experience as a cold-blooded political operator.

Jeffries does not have that level of seasoning, nor is he politically rooted in the progressive wing of the caucus as Pelosi was. He built his power base through the Congressional Black Caucus and ties to New York business interests and once co-led a PAC to protect incumbents from progressive challengers.

But veterans of the Democratic left said they expect him to make peace with the incoming insurgents by any means necessary.

“I’m sure he will do what Pelosi did,” Jayapal said, “which is cajole, bribe, make deals with, get to know, build a relationship with all of these new members, and that’s going to be a big part of his task as he comes in.”

Ali Bianco contributed to this report.