babies, not – In New York’s 13th Congressional District, Darializa Avila Chevalier is trying to unseat Rep. Adriano Espaillat in the Democratic primary, arguing that a decade in Congress hasn’t made life easier for residents—while AIPAC-backed spending targets her record on
The mailer hit the doormat like a challenge—Avila Chevalier’s face on a bold graphic. the words “Fuck Kamala Harris” stretched across three giant lines. and the campaign’s central argument suddenly tangled in something harsher. For Darializa Avila Chevalier. the contest that has tightened in New York’s 13th Congressional District isn’t just about unseating a longtime incumbent.
“It’s really reflective of the kind of politics that we’ve had for far too long—of divisiveness, of dehumanization, of cruelty in many ways,” she said, speaking after polling showed her in a real position to defeat Adriano Espaillat in the Democratic primary scheduled for Tuesday.
Espaillat has been in Congress since 2015 and has deep political roots in the city. and Avila Chevalier has positioned her bid as a direct break from that establishment. If she wins. she would move immediately into one of the most left-of-center factions in the House. with endorsements that include Mayor Zohran Mamdani. the Democratic Socialists of America. and Justice Democrats.
The race has also turned into one of the most expensive fights in a particularly intense New York election year. as outside spending from super PACs flooded the district. The leading Israel lobby group AIPAC has spent millions on ads backing Espaillat while disparaging Avila Chevalier over past tweets criticizing Kamala Harris and Joe Biden. along with her history of pro-Palestinian activism. Justice Democrats. among other groups. has countered with ads emphasizing Espaillat’s ties to AIPAC and his votes to fund ICE in Congress.
Avila Chevalier said she expected pressure to come after she entered the primary. “I knew that they would come after me,” she said. “I couldn’t know what form it would take.” She described what she says has been a campaign that moves beyond policy disputes—bringing strangers to her social media. calling her a gorilla. a rat. and trash. and questioning her Haitian identity while also attacking her Dominican heritage.
Her parents and grandparents are Dominican, she said, and all eight of her great-grandparents are Dominican.
In the district that stretches from East Harlem to Washington Heights and up into the Bronx. Avila Chevalier’s central case to voters is rooted in daily strain—rent. schooling. and the sense that residents are watching family members leave. She said Espaillat has been in office for nearly a decade in Congress and for almost 30 years in political office. but that conditions haven’t gotten easier.
“We’ve had more and more Black Harlemites leave the city, more and more Dominicans uptown leave the city,” she said. “And as people are really struggling to get by, the rent keeps going up. There are fewer and fewer resources to actually support folks through these really hard times.”
She described the question she asks voters: “Has your life gotten better in the last nine years of his leadership in Congress?” She said the answer has been overwhelmingly “no,” including for her own life.
Avila Chevalier told the interviewer that the rent has become “untenable. ” that she sees more neighbors sleeping on the street. and that more people are joining food pantry lines. She said elders tell her their children are moving away because they want to raise families in the city but can’t afford to.
She also said she has watched charter schools proliferate while public schools struggle to provide basic necessities. Before launching her campaign. she said she was pursuing a career in academia—but that she got priced out while teaching multiple classes at CUNY. calling CUNY “so deeply underfunded.”.
She described a financial squeeze that forced a choice between paying rent and pursuing her dissertation. “And so it was just this race to the bottom in many ways. ” she said. adding that she ended up working at the Neighborhood Defenders Service of Harlem as an investigator—a job she said she loves. even though it wasn’t the career path she had planned.
Avila Chevalier said she didn’t initially consider running for Congress until she was approached by Justice Democrats. She said she had been organizing in the district for over 14 years and that when she reached out to Espaillat’s office—sometimes daily—she never received a meaningful response. She pointed to what she encountered during campaigning for Zohran Mamdani. saying people repeatedly brought up Espaillat without being prompted and described him as emblematic of the politics of the past.
She said that when Justice Democrats emailed her asking her to consider running. she asked. “Why me?”—and then returned to the organizing work she was already doing. She described meeting with the group only after they told her she had been nominated. She said she decided to run after reflecting on whether she could ignore structural issues affecting neighbors.
Asked about the campaign’s ugliness—especially the language aimed at her—Avila Chevalier returned to her critique of what she says is a pattern of cruelty and an avoidance of accountability. She said she has been intentional about criticizing Espaillat on his policies and what she calls his absence. but said she has received “no clear answer” to questions about his voting record. the money he takes from special interests. and why he refuses to call it a genocide in Gaza.
She also defended her broader argument about immigration and the politics of language. During the interview. she addressed the dispute over a tweet about Kamala Harris that the interviewer said came from a since-deleted 2021 post. The tweet cited in the discussion was described as saying “Do not come” and drew sharp attention. with Avila Chevalier saying she regrets using the exact language.
When asked whether she still objected to the Biden administration’s immigration policies behind the sentiment. she said the tweet reflected frustration and powerlessness—because she said she had no political power when she made the statement. yet believes she is now facing dehumanizing attacks funded by more than $5.5 million in spending against her.
She also argued that migrants come to the United States because of failed foreign policy that destabilized their countries and that U.S. leadership then treats them as the problem. “I think what we’re seeing right now is the difference between a campaign that wants to run on the issues. to deliver for communities. ” she said. “and a campaign that is just interested in holding on to power.”.
Her campaign’s identity is anchored in Palestine, and she traced that focus to a trip to Palestine in 2014, when she was 20. She said the day after she returned, Israel began bombing Gaza, killing thousands, and that she remembered scrolling through photos and names of the people killed and sobbing.
She linked the moment to Ferguson. telling the interviewer that the same summer Michael Brown was killed and that she saw tweets from people in Gaza telling folks in Ferguson how to deal with tear gas. She said tear gas canisters in both places carried the phrase “Made in the USA. ” which she described as a realization that the systems were connected.
Against that backdrop, she said she wanted her campaign to carry a simple message: “babies, not bombs.” She said she wanted to lead with the value of life and argue that the society she wants is one that cares for children without spending resources on bombing babies abroad.
She also made the case that AIPAC money is disqualifying for the race. “And to know that my opponent takes AIPAC money is something that. for a lot of people. is just disqualifying. ” she said. Her argument. she added. was not only about Palestine but also about trust—whether a candidate who refuses to name a genocide will fight for residents’ basic needs.
She broadened the accusation beyond foreign policy. She said if she can’t trust Espaillat not to take money from real estate developers pricing people out of the city. she can’t trust him to fight for residents to stay. She said the same logic applies to what she described as corporate hospital CEOs funding. referencing a six-week nurses’ strike in one of the coldest winters she said New York has lived through.
When the interview turned to the newly unveiled U.S.-Iran deal. Avila Chevalier said she supports diplomacy but would need to study the details. “I will be very frank that I have not had time to sit down with all of the details. ” she said. She said she is always pushing for diplomacy because. in her view. the United States has an instinct to run toward its war machine in ways she called horrific.
She said if she were in Congress and a vote came up. she would have to consult her community and “think carefully about all the details of this agreement. ” because “at stake is human lives.” She connected the issue to the cost of war in financial terms. arguing that poor people in the country pay for wars that she said don’t compare to the loss people elsewhere are facing when children are being slaughtered indiscriminately.
For all her emphasis on diplomacy and anti-war spending. Avila Chevalier also insisted she understands what the fight has become—a contest shaped by money and the personal attacks it enables. She said she opposes super PACs and would seek to abolish them if elected. even though she acknowledged that outside groups are spending on both sides.
She said she doesn’t control what outside groups do, but she noted that her own campaign has raised over a million dollars, with the average contribution at $66. “Because what that tells me is that is what people are hungry for,” she said.
Asked what kind of left-wing lawmaker she wants to be if she wins—comparing the different lanes people associate with AOC and Rashida Tlaib—Avila Chevalier said she sees her role as fundamentally different. “I’m an organizer,” she said. “That’s really all I want to be.”
She said she wants to bring that organizing approach to the House, saying delivery for the community requires organizing together and thinking strategically about the roles different people play.
“Organize me into something bigger,” she said, framing her view of what the seat should mean. She said she is always prepared to stand up for the right thing and challenge power when necessary, and that she believes those decisions have to be made with the community.
With the primary fast approaching on Tuesday. the question for voters in New York’s 13th Congressional District is whether Avila Chevalier’s plea—“babies. not bombs. ” a rejection of AIPAC-backed influence. and a promise to fight for representation that delivers—can overcome the establishment weight behind Espaillat and the super PAC spending that has turned the contest so sharply against her.
Darializa Avila Chevalier Adriano Espaillat New York 13th Congressional District Democratic primary AIPAC super PACs Justice Democrats Palestine Gaza ICE Zohran Mamdani Neighborhood Defenders Service of Harlem CUNY Iran deal