On November 5, 2024, New York’s 15th Congressional District once again elected Ritchie Torres to serve in Congress. With broad support from the Latin, Black and Jewish communities in the area, the consensus candidate was a shoe-in.
In the weeks following the sweep of Republicans to the Executive Office, Senate and House, Torres attacked the far-left of the Democratic Party for foolishly advocating for non-common sense positions. He has taken particular aim at New York’s Governor Kathy Hochul, a fellow Democrat whom he seems intent on challenging in the Democratic primary of 2026.
On November 21, Torres said there was a “poverty of governance in New York” as well as a “leadership crisis.” The next day he called Hochul “the new Joe Biden” who is so clueless about “her vulnerabilities as a Democratic nominee,” that allowing the Democratic machine to prop her up will “give us a Republican Governor in 2026.”
Torres has not officially declared he will run for state Governor but his attacks on a fellow Democrat are not subtle. The following week he called Hochul a liar and hypocrite.
While Torres represents the poorest district in the United States, he has built strong relationships with many wealthier sponsors including Jews and pro-Israel advocates who appreciate his strong fight against antisemitism and supporters of Hamas. Torres should be able to stage a strong fight against Hochul, if he can build support around New York State.
The next question becomes who is best positioned to take his seat in Washington, D.C. should Torres move on to Albany. The likely contenders are former Congressmen Jamaal Bowman and Mondaire Jones.
Bowman has strong roots in the Bronx. He defeated Eliot Engel in the Democratic primary in 2020 and then rapidly lost hold of the district when new lines were drawn which replaced much of the Bronx with lower Westchester County. While Bowman lost in his 2024 Democratic primary, he faired well in Co-op City in the Bronx.
Jones has bounced around a few districts after his seat in Rockland and Westchester counties were redrawn. After a single term in 2020, he failed in his attempted run for office in lower Manhattan in 2022, and then again running in 2024 for the lower Hudson Valley in NY’s 17th district. He would need to build a new strong ground team to take on Bowman in his comfortable turf.
Or a newcomer could enter the race, perhaps someone Hispanic as the district is 53% Hispanic and 31% Black.
Will the Democratic Party rally to the disgraced Bowman who was censured for pulling a fire alarm, putting many lives at risk? For chanting to a crowd that there were no rapes of Jewish women by Palestinian Arabs on October 7, 2023, in a #DontBelieveJewish Women moment?
The Jewish community that invested so much in Torres and wants to see him succeed in his political aspirations will be outraged and appalled if Bowman comes back to Congress to represent them. It must therefore work with the Democratic power brokers, Mondaire Jones or another rising candidate from the Bronx immediately, to prevent the return of the toxic squad.
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