Mamdani wave: Lander, Valdez and Avila Chevalier win congressional primaries

Today's newsletter is curated by James Ramsay

Weather: ☀️ Sunny, highs in the lower 80s.

It's Wednesday in New York City, where Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s three endorsed candidates for Congress won their Democratic primaries last night.

Former City Comptroller Brad Lander defeated incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman. State Assemblymember Claire Valdez won the seat held by outgoing Rep. Nydia Velázquez. And community organizer Darializa Avila Chevalier — whom the mayor endorsed in the closing weeks of the campaign — eked out a tight win over incumbent Rep. Adriano Espaillat.

The primary results also marked a major victory for the Democratic Socialists of America’s New York City chapter, which counts Valdez, Chevalier and Mamdani as members.

"What you all have shown this evening — whether for state Assembly, state Senate or Congress — is that a year ago, it was not the end of a political movement," Mamdani said at Valdez's event last night. "It was the beginning."

Here's what else is happening:

• Frank Carone, former Mayor Eric Adams' longtime advisor and chief-of-staff, was arrested this morning as part of a possible FBI bribery investigation, according to several media reports.
• Micah Lasher won the Democratic primary in New York’s 12th Congressional District, defeating former tech worker Alex Bores and Kennedy scion Jack Schlossberg.
• A 19-year-old man has been sentenced to five-and-a-half years in prison for setting a man on fire while riding the subway last December.
• New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill and state lawmakers said they're scaling back eligibility for a tax relief program that had been championed as a way to keep seniors from abandoning the state.
• Advocates for trans youth are calling on organizers of Sunday’s annual NYC Pride March to ban the participation of hospitals that have ended gender-affirming care for minors under pressure from the Trump administration.
• The NYPD has punished one of its officers for failing to help arrest an unlicensed fruit vendor and her 14-year-old daughter during a 2024 confrontation in Lower Manhattan.
• MTA Chair Janno Lieber this week dismissed an offer by Amtrak to become a "fully involved" partner in the Trump administration’s reconstruction of Penn Station, saying the federal government’s oversight of the project has been "bizarre" and has "the appearance of impropriety."
• The long-abandoned Jacob Riis Bathhouse is set to begin reopening as a private club and hotel at the end of July.

• Sticker entrepreneur and amateur rapper Anthony Constantino, who earned President Donald Trump's endorsement, won the Republican primary in New York’s 21st Congressional District.
• "There weren’t as many helicopter parents in those days, and a lot of people lost track of their children. On a busy day like July 4, one shack might see two dozen lost kids": Janet Fash, New York City's first female chief lifeguard, has a new memoir about her years in the Rockaways. 
• “Long Island golf fans are a stain on the game of golf,” said Golf Channel analyst Eamon Lynch in response to hecklers at the recent US Open at Shinnecock Hills. 
• A Whole Foods is opening next to House of Yes in Bushwick.
• Here's everything you'd want to know about Yankees infielder Jazz Chisholm and his lollipops.
• Where does "the Hamptons" begin?
• Sperm whale dialects.