Darializa Avila Chevalier on Housing, Immigration, & Her Run for Congress in New York's 13th District

The New York Editorial Board's interview with Darializa Avila Chevalier, a Manhattan Democrat running for Congress in New York's 13th District.

The New York Editorial Board spoke with Darializa Avila Chevalier about her campaign in the Democratic primary for New York’s 13th Congressional District (parts of Manhattan and the Bronx) on the morning of June 17, 2026. Avila Chevalier, a democratic socialist endorsed by NYC-DSA and Mayor Mamdani, is challenging Rep. Adriano Espaillat in the primary election taking place in June. (photo by Christina Greer)

[Note: The New York Editorial Board invited Espaillat and Avila Chevalier to interviews relatively late in the primary race. Espaillat’s team said it was too late to add to his schedule before primary day.]

Participating journalists: Nicole Gelinas, Josh Greenman, Christina Greer, Ben Max, Akash Mehta, Ben Smith.

Full Transcript

Ben Max
Thank you very much for being here.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Thanks for having me.

Christina Greer
I have some questions about Black Harlem before we sort of zoom out. There’s been this growing divide between Black Harlem and the diversifying and gentrifying district since Espaillat took office about a decade ago. You remember his longstanding rivalry with Charlie Rangel and then Keith Wright. So how would you begin to proceed — how would you begin to bridge the gap? Whether it’s real or perceived, it does feel that way for a lot of Black Harlemites and Black people in District 13.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, absolutely. I think so much of what we’ve seen is a divisive politics that has served no one, that has made it so that more and more Black Harlemites are leaving the city altogether, more and more Dominicans uptown are leaving the city, right? And I think what we’ve seen is a type of leadership that has engaged in divide-and-conquer politics that have made people feel cynical about government altogether, and that is why we’ve seen such low participation in our democracy as a result. And, you know, I think for so many folks in Harlem, we look around… I live in Harlem, right? And we look around and Harlem is changing year by year in a way that I don’t even recognize, right? And it’s something that is institutional, but it’s also a political choice that has been made by leadership, right? And Espaillat is somebody who has taken over $250,000 from the very corporate real estate developers who are changing the character of Harlem, that are pricing people out of Harlem. And in the last two days alone actually, he just took over $200,000 from both real estate and Wall Street.

Josh Greenman
What policies would stop it from changing?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Well, part of it is that he has not actually engaged in any policies that would support Harlemites, that would support anybody in the district really, and stand up to the bad landlords that are pushing people out. It costs $4,000 right now for a two-bedroom in Harlem or Washington Heights in a district where the median income is $57,000, right? There hasn’t been any meaningful development or investment in NYCHA. There hasn’t been any meaningful investment in truly affordable housing, and when we think about the kinds of projects that he has claimed and claims to be proud of, it’s development projects that have actually priced people out, that a lot of the community has organized against. Be that the Inwood rezoning or other development projects. So I think part of the issue here is that the community is often left out of these conversations around housing, around what the actual make of the community should look like, right? And what are the things and the resources that we need to actually support New Yorkers, who want to stay in New York, right? Who have lived in New York for generations. And, you know, I think so much of not just the fact of the people who are forced to leave because of these policies, but also the culture that gets erased.

Josh Greenman
Do you remember the [One45] fight? The Bruce Teitelbaum development. There was a truck depot and there was going to be some housing that was insufficiently affordable for the council members. Do you remember that fight?...

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah.

Josh Greenman
Would you have wanted to keep that a truck depot, build it as suggested, or…?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, I mean, the thing about that is that a lot of the community felt that it was left out. I went to the community board meeting about that, right? And what kept coming up was that we were left out of that conversation until it was pretty much too late, right? And so I think my point here is that so often these conversations around development, around new builds, leaves out so much of the community. And in that development in particular, that was not truly affordable housing, right? And the impact that that would have on the residents in the surrounding community is that they would then get priced out of the community.

And so I think when we talk about how do we address this housing crisis, how do we fight to make sure that New Yorkers who have been here, who have been here, many of them for generations, how can they stay in their homes? We have to think about housing policy that actually supports them, right? And makes it so that people can actually have truly dignified and affordable housing. Part of that has to do with making sure we are fighting for a Green New Deal for NYCHA, making sure that we are pushing back on bad landlords, making sure that we are also creating pathways to homeownership, investing in community land trusts and HDFCs, and making it so that people can actually stay in the city that they helped build.

Christina Greer
Have you reached out to Keith Wright?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
We’ve spoken.

Akash Mehta
On development, do you see market-rate housing as part of the solution or the problem?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I think we rush to market-rate housing, right? And I think there is a role there. But I think the vision that we’ve been talking about throughout this campaign is one that is far more expansive, one that makes sure that we are addressing multiple pillars of what affordable housing in the city looks like for so many people. In my district, for example, we have the most public housing units in the country, or the most concentrated number of public housing units in the country, and the conditions that people in NYCHA are forced to endure are so deeply shameful, and it’s the result of failed policy, right? We have not made meaningful investments in NYCHA, and now the solution that’s being proposed by so many is privatizing it, which, you know, not only makes it so that people don’t have a truly public option for dignified housing, it also means that over time, you’re going to see less quality investments in that because when you bring in private developers, bring in private contractors, they’re not holding the same standard to the types of repairs that need to happen. They’re not hiring, all the time, union workers, right? They’re cutting corners.

Ben Max
Isn’t it the case that many of the NYCHA complexes that have entered into the RAD-PACT program are feeling better about it than when it was run by just NYCHA, that they brought in private management, and actually that has brought this infusion of cash that’s actually made improvements? I mean, I understand you want a Green New Deal for Public Housing, but in the absence of that massive federal program, hasn’t this alternative been successful to an extent— and it’s not privatizing housing, right? It’s privatizing the management.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
So I think for so many NYCHA residents, they just want things to be repaired. They want an elevator that works. They want the roof over their head to stop leaking. They want the mold to stop growing. And, you know, I think when we have taken away the resources to actually do the investments that need to happen in a public way, to maintain NYCHA as what it was supposed to be, which is a pathway to the middle class, of dignified housing, folks will just say, “Just give us the repairs,” right? And I think for so many, they’re happy about it because they’re getting the repairs that they need, which is great. I’m happy they’re getting that. But the long-term impact of that means that we are turning Section 9 housing into Section 8. We’re making it so that for so many for whom this is their entire community, all of a sudden we’re discussing it as a stepping stone into market-rate housing.

We need to make sure that communities can actually stay in their communities. And, you know, NYCHA was initially created to be a pathway to the middle class. It was created so that people could have a dignified place to live that was truly affordable, and build a community there, right? And the fact that for so many right now it is a last resort is a reflection of a failure of policy. It is a reflection of a failure of a policy that seeks to privatize every industry in our country, right? And we really need to make sure that we are keeping a public option for people in order to make sure that there is always affordable housing in the city, that there’s always affordable housing in this country. Because the more that we feed into the cycle of privatization, the more we allow these things to become not human rights, but commodities.

Josh Greenman
But I mean, it’s a choice. You go to Congress, and if the Congress is not for a massive infusion of federal funding into public housing programs, then the choice is do you support or not support these other means of raising money to help with the repairs. So you’re saying if the money doesn’t come, if the Congress is not going to infuse public housing with millions and millions more dollars, which hasn’t been the case. You know, that’s not been the posture of Congress for many decades. Are you for or against? Would you try to stop RAD-PACT from being the law? Would you want to veto this program, end this program?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, one of the benefits of being an organizer is that we don’t take no for an answer, and we organize until we get the solutions that we’re fighting for. I am somebody who is very used to being outnumbered, very used to being out-resourced, and still having an outsized impact to deliver for my community, whether that is on immigration justice, whether that is on providing communities mutual aid when they were left out of the stimulus program. You know, that is something that I am used to doing, and thinking through strategy with my community about how to deliver.

And I think there are a number of ways that we can fight for funding to make sure that repairs are happening, but we really need a Green New Deal for Public Housing for many reasons. We need it on the basis that we have to repair these buildings. Some of them are in such a state of disrepair that they are structurally unsound. We need to decarbonize them because the impact of that is that the health of so many New Yorkers has been so greatly impacted that NYCHA residents are actually the most likely to have asthma, right? And fully decarbonizing NYCHA would have the impact of taking over 400,000 cars off the street. We also have to think about the economic impact of that, right? A Green New Deal for Public Housing would bring in over 300,000 union jobs to the city over the course of ten years, and it would have an economic impact of $96 billion over the course of ten years. And so not only is this just on the principle of needing to maintain public housing, it is also a public good. It is a net good for the entire city.

Ben Max
Mayor Mamdani has sort-of embraced an all-of-the-above approach to housing. You said earlier there’s a role for market-rate development, but of course, in your view, it can’t be the main focus. Do you think he’s erred in how much he is going in the direction of wanting to cast a very— he’s obviously focused on tenant protections, but cast a wide net of development, including looking at more NYCHA infill development? Is that an incorrect approach? Is that something that just happens when people go into executive office, they change their lens a bit? How do you see his evolution on these issues?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
No, I think casting a wide net on all the possible solutions is a great approach because we have to look at everything. And I think he has limitations as someone who’s working on the city level, right? And so that’s why it’s so important to have federal partners who can also bring in other solutions that someone at the city level can’t bring in. And so when I think about, for example, the funding around NYCHA, oftentimes the city is being forced to make decisions with their hands tied because they don’t have the funds, right? Or they don’t have the infrastructure bills necessary that are passed on the federal level that would support this kind of policy. And so, you know, I think the mayor is doing an incredible job with the resources that he has at his disposal, and I think again, he’s also an organizer, right? He’s using all the levers at his disposal to actually deliver for New Yorkers, and that is the kind of work that an organizer does. We come to our community, we hear the urgency, and we fight to find solutions that are sustainable.

Akash Mehta
You had a critical mention of the Inwood rezoning in your first answer. I think the city is projecting 3,600 new apartments from that rezoning, 2,600 of which are projected to be affordable. Could you talk more about your position on that rezoning?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of the community has actually pushed back on that rezoning for a number of reasons. One, a lot of folks are being priced out of the area as a result. And the fact that the community was left out in the process of that rezoning and that development I think speaks volumes as to who is benefiting, right? When it’s contractors that are coming in and making these decisions about how affordable — quote-unquote affordable — housing is being built, but then you look at what the actual costs are, right? It’s not truly affordable for so many people. When I say the going rate for a two-bedroom in Harlem or Washington Heights is $4,000, that is what is considered affordable, and that is not affordable to the vast majority of people in this district, right? That is why so many people are getting pushed out of our city, because they just simply cannot afford it.

Akash Mehta
When you say people are being priced out because of the rezoning, could you just talk a little bit more about what you see as the link between additions of new housing and people’s ability to stay in their neighborhoods?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Well, I mean, if you look, even just looking at some of these new developments, like the max number of bedrooms, for example, is a two-bedroom, right? Where are you supposed to put a family in a two-bedroom apartment? And oftentimes, these two bedrooms, again, are $4,000. They can’t afford that, and that’s raising the market rate for the people around them, right?

And so when folks who can afford those buildings move in, right, that also has an impact on the market, has an impact on the, quote, unquote, affordability for folks who are coming in because the average income is now dramatically changing as well. And so the folks who don’t make quite as much, who are living in surrounding buildings, who are often fighting against bad landlords, who are not doing the repairs that are necessary, who are leaving so many homes vacant, and having an impact on the market in that way, they are the ones that are getting screwed over, right? They’re the ones who have to deal with the economic impact of these rising costs.

Josh Greenman
So what do the feds do about this specifically?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, well there’s a lot here in terms of the fact that so many on the federal level for example take money from these very developers—

Josh Greenman
But I don’t want to—

Darializa Avila Chevalier
No but I think part of that has to do with the fact that we are not investing in creative solutions to actually address this. So I say that as an issue of accountability, right? Because that is why we see a representative who we currently have who hasn’t signed on to things like the HOMES Act, who hadn’t signed on to the federal Tenants’ Rights to Organize Act until I called him out on it, right? Who hadn’t really fought for meaningful investments in NYCHA, and who hasn’t as far as I know, advocated for a Green New Deal for Public Housing. And so I think that speaks volumes in a community that is in desperate need for affordable housing.

Ben Max
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the HOMES Act creates a social housing development authority. How would that not go the way of NYCHA eventually in terms of divestment, in terms of a lot of finger-pointing, in terms of the feds potentially walking away from funding? I mean, how is more government- basically -built and -run housing the answer to the crisis that people are facing given what’s happened with NYCHA?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Well, that’s because government is supposed to be a solution to these problems, right? And we have for decades developed this notion that somehow government is supposed to be hands-off, that it’s the private market that should address our social issues, but government is supposed to address these social issues. We need to actually ensure that government is doing its job and serving the working people of our community, right? And this neoliberal notion that we just need to gut every institution from our government that actually helps people is one of the—

Ben Max
I’m not talking about gutting it. I’m saying if we’re creating something new — how do you ensure its success?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
But the idea that it wouldn’t succeed because it’s coming from government is directly tied to this notion that we have to gut all these government services. The reason why NYCHA is a last resort for so many people is because we have not had government that is actually investing in it. It’s because we have government that has currently abandoned NYCHA residents. And if we had government that was actually accountable to them, we would have a system that would actually serve them.

Christina Greer
What are some bills in the queue right now in Washington, DC that would address some of these issues, and who are some of the legislators that you’d be working with?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, the HOMES Act, for example, was introduced by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Tenants’ Right to Organize Act, by Delia Ramirez. You know, there are a number of bills around housing that are already being proposed that the incumbent has not signed on to. I mean, the Tenant Rights to Organize Act, for example, it wasn’t until I pushed him on Brian Lehrer that he then that same day signed on. And so these are things that we could have been addressing a long time ago, where we could have made a lot of headway.

And I think also about the fact that we could be organizing our own community around pushing for these policies. But so often we have representation that just goes into these spaces and that feel like to so many a massive smokescreen where they don’t know what’s actually happening, don’t know what the policies are that are impacting their day-to-day lives. And, you know, these representatives ask us to trust them, but our day-to-day lives are getting harder. And so to involve people in that process of governance and involve all of them in the process of thinking about, how do we write legislation? The Green New Deal for Public Housing was actually drafted by public housing residents and organizers who are knowledgeable about NYCHA and public housing, right? And so to involve the community in that process of creating the legislation that’s going to directly impact them is also worth noting here. Because I think so often, we push them out of their own process of governing.

Ben Smith
I have a community question about that. A lot of the housing crisis in New York is driven by communities, particularly single-family, probably middle-class communities who really don’t want more housing in their low-rise neighborhoods. Should they have the same right to be consulted that tenants in Inwood do? Because it does seem like that is the path to no more housing.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I think a lot of folks think of this as, like, folks who are more wealthy who are coming in and buying this type of housing, low-rise housing and having this Not In My Backyard kind of conversation. But in places like Harlem, you’re talking about Harlemites who have been there for generations, right? Who are impacted by this. And so you gotta think about, like, what is the human impact of having a grandmother who has been in her building for generations having to leave and then being told, “Well, will I still have an apartment here after this is rebuilt?”

Ben Smith
But I guess I’m saying, do you feel like that same claim can be made by, you know, your colleagues in Congress who represent Bay Ridge and big chunks of Queens. They’re basically going to say the same thing. And that logic is sort of the reason nothing’s been built in New York for many years.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, but I think the fact that what’s happening in Harlem, for example, is that things are being built in a way that is actually hurting our community, right? I’m not going to speak for Bay Ridge, that is not my community, but I think for Harlemites, for folks uptown, we’re left out of the process so often. And the impact of that is that not only are people being pushed out for these buildings to happen with no guarantee that they can come back, but then they’re getting priced out of their neighborhoods, and then the character of the community is changing dramatically.

Ben Smith
Do you think the character– I mean, there’s a lot of people upset in big parts of white ethnic Brooklyn and Queens, over many, many years about the changes in the character of their community. Is that a legitimate concern, do you think?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
When I say in Harlem the character of the community is changing, for example, I live near where Lenox Lounge used to be. It is now an ugly Wells Fargo. And all that’s left of Lenox Lounge is a plaque, right? And this is a community that is the capital of Black America, the cultural capital, the political capital of Harlem, right? And to lose the character of Harlem is to lose so much of the history of Black America. That is what I’m talking about when I’m saying the character of the community is being lost because of these corporate interests, right?

Akash Mehta
How would you have voted on City of Yes in the City Council? And how did you vote on the housing ballot props last year?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah. I voted yes on the housing ballot props because I do believe that we need affordable housing, and I do believe that we need to engage in all types of solutions. But I also think that it requires community input when we do engage in new buildings, right? I’m not against—

Josh Greenman
The ballot props quiet community consultation, don’t they? Don’t they work against community consultation in some instances, and you want more community consultation?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yes, and also, I was also thinking in the context of who are we asking to engage in these conversations. And I was voting for Mayor Zohran Mamdani, someone who has been very open about the way that he wants community to be part of this process of governing. And I think that was part of my logic, where we’re thinking about— yes, we need more housing, we need to think of all of the possible avenues to get affordable housing for people, and also, we need to do it in a way that actually consults the community and protects it, right? It was a hard choice for me because I was like, “Do I trust the leadership that’s going in to engage with this responsibly? Yes. Do I know who the leadership is going to be after that? No.” So that was where the question for me really lied. I decided to vote yes, because I do trust the leadership that’s going in there with these issues, and also, it was a hard decision for me to come to because I don’t know who’s going to be mayor in eight years.

Christina Greer
Sorry, can I double back really quickly?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah.

Christina Greer
When I asked you if you had been in touch with Keith Wright and you said you had spoken. Because of your concerns, and I think a lot of people’s concerns about the disappearance of Black Harlem, specifically, can you tell us a little bit of the nature of your conversation, and has he been helpful?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I mean, I haven’t spoken to him about anything he’s comfortable with me sharing, and so I don’t want to speak out of turn for him. I just will say I think I’m somebody who cares deeply about Harlem. I’m somebody who cares deeply about making sure that our communities get to stay in our communities and that has been at the heart of my conversations with everybody on these issues.

Christina Greer
Did you him ask for an endorsement?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
No, I did not. But I speak to all Harlemites. And he’s a Harlemite.

Nicole Gelinas
Can your district build enough affordable housing to satisfy global demand for affordable housing in the district? And if not, how do you decide who gets to live there and who doesn’t? Is it favor people already there over newcomers?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I think that’s a hard question to answer because the people come in and out of this district all the time, right? And so to think about what is global demand is a hard question. But I think by and large, we all know that we just need more affordable housing, and we need to make the housing that is already there also affordable and dignified because for so many people— You know, I was just in Tracey Towers the other day, and I was told that they’re raising their rents by 28%. That’s an eviction notice to so many of its residents.

Nicole Gelinas
But that’s because the costs are going up. How would you solve that problem, the energy cost, the labor cost for the people who work in the building? That’s not a market profit-driven cost increase [it’s Mitchell-Lama].

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Right. But what I’m saying is that when we’re talking about affordable housing and creating more affordable housing for the folks who are there, one, the problem is that a lot of folks are getting pushed out, right? Their rents are rising. And so that creates even more concerns around well, where are they going to go? And if we’re not even doing the bare minimum of making sure that people can stay in their homes, then this question of, well, do we need more affordable housing, I think is one that de-centers the problem at its core. We’re raising the rents on the people who are already there. Where are we asking them to go?

Ben Max
One more, quick on this. Just to touch on some of the politics involved here, I feel like there’s a little bit of a tension in that so many of the people you’re talking about who have moved into the district in recent years are likely to be your voters. Not your only voters, but how do you think about that tension and the fact that you have a lot of people who have moved into the district in recent years who are gentrifying, a lot of them are white, moving into Harlem, share a lot of your politics, how do you think about that confluence?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, I think it’s a reflection of a larger social structure failure, right? A systems failure, where we are seeing across the city people being priced out of their communities and having to move to other communities where rent is more affordable. And I think a lot of those folks, to your point, share a politic that is about ensuring that housing is a human right. That is a politic about ensuring that we are supporting our families, that we are actually investing in them, right? And I like to remind folks that the crisis that we’re seeing, we’re seeing it under our current leadership. It is our current leadership that has failed to address this problem. It is our current leadership that has been engaging in political games that are pushing people out of their neighborhoods into other neighborhoods and out of the city altogether. And so I think when we’re talking about the human impact, it’s people who are having to leave the homes that they have known for a really long time, moving into new areas while the people who have lived there for a really long time are also forced to leave. So it is a larger systems failure.

Josh Greenman
I wanted to ask about immigration. You’ve obviously studied immigration a lot as an academic. You’ve talked about it plenty as a candidate. And you’d have a big role in shaping federal immigration policy if you went to Congress. What should our federal immigration policy be? And start specifically with deportations. The DSA does not like deportations very much, believes in free flow of people across borders. Is that where you stand? If you are OK with some deportations, under what conditions ought people to be able to be deported?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I am not OK with any deportation. I think all deportation is wrong because I think it is an incredibly cruel punishment that is really only relegated to people on the basis of where they were born. And, you know, I think that we just should not have a system that allows deportation to happen at all. And I have been very vocal about that. I studied deportation as a part of my doctoral research, and I have yet to come up with a reason for why deportation has been used in a way that isn’t rooted in deeply racist ideology.

Ben Smith
Are there countries historically you can think of that don’t have borders, don’t deport people who aren’t there legally? Like, is there a model for that?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Well, first of all, we can think about nation state borders as a larger, longer, more philosophical concept—

Ben Smith
I would like your philosophical view. I think that is not a usual view.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I mean, it’s a very modern— the view of bordering is a very modern construct, actually. It’s one that’s only happened over the last couple hundred years and borders are constantly shifting, even today, right? We are constantly debating. So much of the global conflict we’ve seen over the last few centuries has been over bordering. And so much human life has been lost over it, right?

And, you know, when we talk about the border, a lot of people think about it as like a hard line in the sand, but really it is a system. It is like a social system that we’re engaging in, and more and more, it’s a militarized project. It’s one that is deeply dehumanizing to so many people. And so when I think about, like, what is immigration, and what is the benefit of having an immigration system, there are benefits in the sense that we can use our government to actually integrate people into our community, support them, allow them to have the resources that they need to be members of our community who can actually contribute to our community. But when we force people to live in the shadows, when we force them to live in degrading conditions because they are afraid that they’re going to be detained and locked away in a concentration camp and then deported and ripped away from their families, we can’t allow them to actually be part of our community

Ben Smith
You’d be a federal official — would you, if you could, remove the checkpoints at the northern and southern borders of the U.S.?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, again, I think when we’re talking about these philosophies—

Ben Smith
No, because I mean, I’m not trying to ask you your opinion on the Trump administration policy right now. But more kind of thinking about it broadly, because a couple hundred years is a long time, actually.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, no, and I think about the fact that we’re not going to change— we’re not going to do the work that’s been done over a couple of centuries, overnight. And also, I think we need to start doing the work of actually creating immigration policy that allows people to have their dignity, that allows immigrant communities to feel like they are full members of our community. So when we think about people coming in and out, we can be using that to actually support people to access the resources that they need to be integrated into our community. But instead, we use them as a system of punishment, as a system of policing and degradation.

Josh Greenman
So, if no deportations, what does a path to citizenship look like? It kicks in immediately when you come here. Is that right? Or how do you get to be a full-fledged American where you vote in elections?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, for so many people, the first thing that they want to do here when they come is they want to establish roots. They want a good, dignified job. They want a place to live and raise their kids. And for so many, they can’t even do that, right? They can’t work because they don’t have a pathway to a work permit. So, allowing people to do that, to have a work permit, to be able to put their kids in schools, to be able to lead a dignified life, and to have a pathway to citizenship, right? And part of that can be starting with folks who have arrived here as children. So many of them still don’t have a pathway to citizenship even though this country is all they know.

Josh Greenman
Should only citizens be able to vote or should other people vote?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I really believe that a democracy is something that impacts every single person in this country, whether or not you are a citizen, and I think New York has engaged in a project of trying to expand enfranchisement to folks who are non-citizens. And I think that that is an idea that I would love to explore, but also one that frankly right now I’m focused on trying to make sure that folks are getting out of concentration camps, right? And that’s where a lot of my research and my focus has been in those questions.

Nicole Gelinas
So under a no-deportation policy, an individual who arrived here under the Biden open-borders policy and went on to commit a violent crime or series of nonviolent crimes, should that person have a right to stay in the U.S. indefinitely?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, we have a criminal system, right? And everyone who has committed any type of criminal infraction is brought to that criminal system. That is true of someone whether they are a citizen or a non-citizen. And to subject non-citizens to both the criminal system and then the deportation system is inherently double jeopardy on the basis of where someone was born, right? And there are so many fewer protections under our immigration system for folks who are being detained by ICE, who are then also subject to this additional form of punishment of deportation, oftentimes to countries they don’t even know, that they’ve never even set foot in. And if they are from that place, often they haven’t been there in over half their lives or more. So they don’t have anybody there. And often they’re being deported with nothing but the clothes on their back.

That is so incredibly cruel, and again, it’s literally just on the basis of where someone was born because they’ve already been subjected to the criminal system, right? They’ve already done their time, paid their debt to society. And then often what we’re seeing as well is that people who are deported on these criminal infractions, it’s retroactive, right? It’s after they have been back in the community for years, have been rebuilding their lives, been productive members of our society, and then they’re picked up by ICE, detained into a facility, and then deported.

Ben Smith
Do you think that the sort-of story of the last 10, 15 years of global politics has been the left getting totally destroyed by populist right-wing parties who are running on these issues and on popular anger about immigration? It’s true here, it’s also true across Europe…I wonder if that’s changed how you think about the politics of this at all.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
In what sense?

Ben Smith
Because it just sounds like the politics that you’re voicing, which I think probably are popular in your district, are very unpopular in the United States and helped get Donald Trump elected. So I’m just curious what the left is learning from that, if anything.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, something that I’ve noticed as this campaign has progressed is folks who have very reasonable questions about how I came to my positions and why I believe that they are the path forward, but who often are framing them from a what’s possible question, what’s realistic, right?

Ben Smith
Right. That is the question.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
And the thing about being an organizer is that half of my job as an organizer is to envision the world that I want to see, regardless of what’s possible right now, and the other half of my job is to close that gap between what is right now and what we want to see. And if we don’t start naming and describing the world that we want to live in, we’re never going to get to it.

And so thinking about, well, how do we close that gap between now and there. Thinking about, what are the policies that are creating the condition that we currently have? Does that mean that we have to repeal some of these policies? Yeah, absolutely. Actually, especially when it comes to immigration. So often we’re talking about, well, what additional new policies can we bring in? We also need to repeal a lot of these incredibly harmful policies that have hurt so many people. But we also need to start thinking about, what are the conditions that led to the point where we’re at, where we have a fascist in the White House? And how do we fight back on that?

Ben Smith
Do you think that open borders are part of how you got there?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know— Again this is like a philosophy—

Ben Smith
That’s sort-of the consensus, though.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, yeah. And it’s a philosophy again that where it’s like this is the ideal vision of what you, where we’re... Because right now what we currently have is a system where capital can move freely across the world, but people are trapped.

Nicole Gelinas
Speaking of idealism meets reality, Mayor Mamdani ran on moving a lot of policing responsibilities to civilian agencies, particularly in mental health issues. He said he would get rid of the Strategic Response Group, he said he would get rid of the gang database. And he said he would not increase the size of the police department. He hasn’t done any of those things, and he’s increasing the size of the police department. He’s now six months into his term. Is the DSA right to start criticizing him? Is he making a mistake here in not sticking to his campaign policies?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I can’t speak to what the mayor’s calculations are here. What I can say is that I think the mayor is someone who is constantly having to make calculations and I trust his calculation will always be around, “how am I best serving my community,” right? And I think, you know, I don’t know what the conversations are in City Hall around those issues, and I just can’t comment on them. But I think there are a lot of different dynamics that one has to work around. And as someone who is an organizer who comes from community work, and now I’m finding myself being in contexts where I have to make decisions in a split moment, right? I trust my community to know that I’m making those decisions with them at the top of mind constantly.

Nicole Gelinas
But isn’t one of the calculations— I mean, he clearly wants to keep crime down. He knows that that’s an important metric for him. And the whole DSA philosophy is, you can do this without relying on policing, and here he is relying on more policing. I mean, isn’t that kind of a big deal?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I think that ignores that he’s also working on his Department of Community Safety. He’s also trying to fund the actual infrastructure that makes communities safer. And we know, you know, I know from my own research, that looks into criminology, right? That reduction in crime is actually correlated with funding with social safety nets that allow communities to lead dignified lives. It’s funding education. It’s funding our libraries. It’s funding the programs that allow our kids to have a place to spend their time after school. It’s making sure that people have a dignified home to come to. Dignified work. I think so often folks forget that a job isn’t just a means for how to pay your rent. It’s also the thing that gives so many of us purpose in our lives. And when people don’t have purpose, you start to see all these negative consequences in our society. And so making sure that we’re actually investing in good, dignified jobs, making sure that we’re investing in our children, making sure that we’re investing in housing, are all essential parts of actually increasing community safety.

Christina Greer
So I’ve got a quick question, though. So much of what you’re saying is deeply rooted in ideology and a deep philosophy. So one, who are your political mentors as you’re running for office? And two, a lot of what it sounds like you’re trying to solve, when you think about Tip O’Neill, it would be on a local level. So why Congress as opposed to, say, City Council, where you’d be directly impacting communities, or even Albany, where you’d be in charge of such a large budget for New Yorkers directly?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I think part of that has to do with the fact that this is— Yes, it, we can see it all in the local, but this is national, right? The impact is absolutely national. And thinking about the way that so much of our country’s politics have, to your point, Ben [Smith], shifted to the right, has meant that it is hard for us on a local level to work with what we’ve got. To actually deliver for our community. And so we need to actually be taking this fight to scale.

The scale of the issue right now is national, and so we need to take this fight to the national stage. We need to make sure that we are bringing in the federal funding that we need to actually deliver on a lot of these projects. We need to make sure that we are pushing the narrative that it’s [not] only the right that is fighting for its ideological views, right? We, on the left, have a vision for what this world can be for working families, and we’re willing to fight for it, and we’re willing to fight for it on the national stage. And I think for so many, we haven’t had an opportunity to do that, because we’ve just had representation that has given up that fight, that has gotten complacent, has not worked with all levels of government, be that federal, city, or state, to actually deliver on a lot of these issues. And that has to do with the fact that on the federal level, we have representatives who are being bought and paid for by the same institutions, the same corporations, the same donors that are funding Republicans and Trump.

Christina Greer
Who are you looking to as your political mentors as you move forward in Congress?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, I am very grateful to have the mayor’s endorsement, and we’ve been talking more and more. Honestly, I look up to a lot to my own community; a lot of academics who have thought about these issues deeply over the course of their careers, including a lot of my professors and colleagues. I have been very grateful to be able to connect with folks like [State Senator] Robert Jackson, who’s also supported this campaign. He is an example of, I think, what leadership should be on every level of government, who really focuses on the community for every political decision that he makes

Ben Max
Have you tried to get AOC’s endorsement? And why do you think she’s not backing your campaign?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I’ve reached out, and we’ve talked, and we’ve had very positive conversations. But I’m not in her head. I don’t know what her—

Ben Smith
What did you make of the “She’s the next AOC” cover [of City & State magazine]?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I think the congresswoman is an incredible fighter for our community. She means so much to so many—

Ben Smith
But personally, what was your reaction when you saw that?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I think my reaction has been the same to all the comparisons I have gotten to anyone in political office right now. 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.

Ben Smith
We’re a little short on time. I can’t believe we haven’t asked about your tweets yet, but a lot of the campaign is being fought about your tweets. I saw [City Council Member] Chi Osse tweeted the other day, “Woke 1 was crazy,” with like nine exclamation points. Do you agree with that?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
“Woke 1” was indeed crazy, and I think to that point, we often forget that people who go into politics are people who have their own journeys, thinking about the world, these social structures, and how to also communicate them, how to communicate their values. And I regret my tweets because I think it’s taken so much away from the vision of what we’re trying to actually deliver to people.

Josh Greenman
I heard you say that last night as well [in the NY1 debate], that you regretted and you were sorry to the Vice President [Kamala Harris], but would you actually say specifically that what you tweeted was incorrect, was wrong, or do you just regret the effect distracting from this campaign?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
To her? Is that—

Josh Greenman
No, I’m saying of all the tweets that have been discussed, are there specific things that you tweeted that you would today say, “This was incorrect. This was wrong. I should not have said this thing,” or do you just regret the effect of the tweets?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Well, I mean, there are a couple thousand tweets there so I won’t speak to each and every one of them individually.

Ben Smith
We have time.

[laughter]

Darializa Avila Chevalier
But I think to her [Kamala Harris] specifically, like that was wrong. And I think as someone who really values human dignity, accountability, justice for our people. The critiques I had of her record as a prosecutor, I think I can still have those, right? And what I said was just wrong. That was not fair to her. That was not actually a critique of her as a prosecutor. And I think to Chi’s point of Woke 1.0, like, we grow and we recognize that a lot of—

Ben Max
What was crazy about it, though? Was it the way people expressed themselves or the degree to which people were sort-of, for lack of a better term, super politically correct? Like, is it the expression or is it the substance, or both?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, at the core of what it means to organize is to bring people together behind a vision. And you can’t do that when you are spending time trying to show who’s more progressive or who’s more woke or who’s more— you know, that actually causes more division, and it makes folks feel that there is no space for them in our movements. And as I’ve grown, I’ve really thought about, “Well, how is it that we bring people into our movements,” right? And I always laugh when I think back to an era where so many people were like, “Well, it’s not my job to explain things to you.” I was like, “Yes, actually, as an organizer, that is your job.” It is your job to explain social systems to people, and to do it in a way that actually invites them to be part of changing them. And I think as someone who really values the work of community— Mariame Kaba has this saying, “Anything that’s worth doing in this life is worth doing together.” There is no togetherness when you’re engaging in divisive rhetoric.

Nicole Gelinas
So does this philosophy of regretting and growing, would this apply to a young white Republican man who made similarly sexist, racist, misogynistic, ageist posts? Maybe he said, older woman of a different race was ugly, or he slammed a door in her face. Should he also be able to grow and move on from that, or does that disqualify him from office?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I think the thing about being human is that all of us are just as capable of doing incredibly shameful things as we are of doing incredibly beautiful and heartening and empowering things, right? There is always accountability at the heart of that. There is no way to grow as a person without taking accountability for when you do fall short. We all do, and there are various degrees of falling short, obviously.

But I think, you know, if we don’t allow folks a path to be accountable and to feel that they can be back with their community in a way that tends toward repair, then we’re just going to continue to see more of this growing division in our country, more of this rising fascism, where I think a lot of people feel pushed towards that because they feel shame around the cruelty that they have engaged in. And rather than being accountable and seeing, “Okay, that was cruel. Let me do better,” we engage in this, this politics that throws people away, and we should instead be welcoming people to be accountable for the harm that they’ve caused and do better. We can’t punish people for engaging in the behavior we want to see from them.

Ben Max
Can I come back to the borders issue with a specific foreign policy issue that you would very likely have a voice in? You seemed in the past to maybe express some sympathy toward Russia in invading Ukraine, and maybe that’s tied in with some of your philosophy around borders. But could you just sort-of clarify how you see that war and whether in Congress you would support U.S. military aid to Ukraine or how you would envision impacting this conflict?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, I will be clear. I don’t think I have ever felt— Like, I’ve never seen Russia’s invasion on Ukraine as one where Ukraine wasn’t the victim of an invasion. I have always seen that as Russia invading Ukraine, and violating its sovereignty. And if I remember correctly, my larger critique was one of global systems where you have imperialist powers engaging in constant violence in a war machine, right? And where we rush to engage in armed conflict over diplomacy.

I think with regards to Ukraine, so many lives have been lost, and from the very beginning, I’ve said I worry about the impact of this war on the larger global context, where now we’re seeing more and more wars since that one started across the globe. And, you know, I think we really need to make sure that we are putting diplomacy first to actually save human lives. And I think we have de-centered that in these conversations, the human impact of this war machine, this constant rush to engage in armed conflict.

Josh Greenman
Now that we’re back to borders, I have one item…This is looping back to something that we were talking about before. But I’m curious, during what was called the migrant crisis, there were lots of people coming. We have a right to shelter in this city. There was a scramble to find places for them to sleep. If not for the flow of those people abating, if that had continued, where, in your view, would it or should it have ended? Where should policy have gone if we had continued to have to absorb more and more individuals being bussed from Texas all the time? What should have happened?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I think what we forgot here is the question of why so many people are coming into our country to begin with. And a lot of that has to do with U.S. foreign policy, and the fact that our foreign policy has really engaged in a lot of destabilization across the globe. And if we’re not going to be honest and frank about our country’s role in why people have to migrate to begin with, then this question of, how do we deal with all the folks coming in is moot, right? If we are constantly pushing them to migrate to begin with, we can’t then turn around and complain that they’re coming here.

And to this question of, how do we deal and, and manage the resources to actually support communities when they come here, we are the richest country in the history of the world, and yet we barely provide for our own people who are already here. That is a problem that is not caused by the people who come here. That is a problem that is caused by the people in power who create these policies that allow so many people who live here, who are citizens, who have been here for generations to live so deeply undignified lives because of their political choices. Because they are OK with corporations profiting billions upon billions of dollars, with individuals like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos continuing to hoard wealth and not invest and pay their taxes. And so I think it really is a larger systems failure where we are continuing to prioritize profit over people and then complaining when human lives are impacted by that. And that people have to make these really tough choices about where they live and if they can live in the places they call home.

Christina Greer
You’ve answered this in other forums, but I just want to ask you sort-of on our record, if you’re successful and you go to Congress, would you support Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, that’s a decision I’d have to come to with my community. I’m really focused on the primary, and two things would have to happen before we got to that question: I’d have to win my primary, and we’d have to win back the House. And I’m really committed to winning this primary because I think it matters that Democrats do take back the House, and it matters what kind of Democrats we put in.

Christina Greer
Right. So let’s just say those two things happen. When you say consult with your community, what would that look like? Would you go to your community and say, “Should I support him?” In many ways he kind of represents this middle-of-the-road, milquetoast Democrat that you’re fighting against. Would you wait and kind-of see who ran against him? Or, like, asking your community, how does that work—

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, there are many months between then and now, and again, there are a number of variables that can and will likely change along that timeline. And those are the things that I’d have to consider and have to weigh with the community. I am someone who really spends a lot of time thinking about this question of principle and strategy, right? And the thing about principle is that you stand by your principles no matter how hard they get, because that is the point of having them. But strategy is something that we’re constantly having to think about, constantly having to shift in order to be able to actually reach a point where we are achieving the world that we want to live in.

Ben Max
One more on borders. This could be a whole conversation, but we don’t have time for that. I’ve heard your opponent say he favors a two-state solution for an Israeli state and a Palestinian state. I don’t think I’ve heard your view on that. Do you think there should be a two-state solution? Do you believe Israel should continue to exist as a country?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I say this as someone who does not live in the region and believes that the people of the region should have a final say on what their government and their country looks like. I deeply believe that the only path forward is for a country that holds all people to equal standing, regardless of race, religion, ethnic background. And any system that prioritizes one group over the other is inherently an apartheid system. And what we’ve seen time and again is that Israel is engaging in more expansion. And so, this notion of two states, where? Because whenever there is an agreement around these borders, that is repeatedly violated. And I think the only path that will actually allow everyone to live in safety and dignity is one where everyone in the region is equal before the law.

Josh Greenman
In the United States, is everyone equal before the law in the United States as you see it currently, including non-citizens? Or does the United States feel like an apartheid system by that definition?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I think in a lot of ways, yeah. When you look at how communities of color are treated before the law. But the thing about the United States versus what you see in Israel is that in the law, we don’t have an apartheid system, right? In the state of Israel, there are many laws, over 50 laws, that are specifically targeted towards one particular community. That is inherently an apartheid system, when you have a difference in treatment under the law.

And, you know, I think a lot of times folks are like, “Well, what will happen?” It’s like, well, what happened in South Africa? We got rid of the apartheid system in South Africa. Are things completely equal in South Africa? No. But there’s a path where folks have been working for generations now, to make sure that people can live in equal dignity, as equal citizens before the law. And that is something that we should always be striving towards.

Ben Smith
You have a lot of voters in this district who deeply disagree with you on this, and are really committed to Israel, and feel very threatened by the movement you represent, like physically threatened. How would you engage them? How would you think about that?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, I think about the fact that what I am advocating for is something that at its core is about human dignity and ending a cycle of violence. A cycle of violence that has continued in such a way where every few years, thousands upon thousands of people lose their lives, right?

Ben Smith
But do you ever meet with, talk to the kind-of pro-Israel folks in your district?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yeah, I do. I do. The thing about the organizing I do around Palestine is that I’m constantly engaging with folks from all perspectives on this issue. You know, I’m someone, I’ve been organizing for a really long time, with organizations like Jewish Voices for Peace (JVP), organizations that are Palestinian-led, organizations that are-

Ben Smith
Right but those are the folks who agree with you.

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Yes, and a lot of the work that JVP does is actually engaging with their community who holds a very different view.

Ben Smith
Do you think people who disagree with you on Israel should vote for you anyway, or is this such a core important issue that it should be kind-of a real dividing line for voters?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
No I think they should because I think one, a lot of the folks uptown, for whom they might disagree with me on Israel, they agree with me on almost everything else. And also, at the core of what I’m talking about here is about valuing human dignity at the heart of all of this, and humans, and the safety of the people who live in the region, the safety of New Yorkers, right? And so, you know, we can disagree, but there’s so much space to have conversations around this, right? And I think so often, the conversation around Israel-Palestine is had in a way that feels really toxic to a lot of people. And the fact that I have been engaging with this conversation for well over a decade and willing to have those conversations even when it is really hard-

Ben Smith
Do you think the campus protests at Columbia and the style of those protests contributed to the toxicity?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
No, I think the campus protests were directly addressing the role of the university in its complicity with the corporations that profit from the genocide and profit from Israeli apartheid. And listen, it is a hard conversation because it would force folks to acknowledge that what is happening is a genocide. It would force folks to acknowledge that what is happening is an apartheid system.

Ben Smith
So you don’t think that there were voices in those protests that talked about— Especially the way the word Zionist got used, that was part of what was so toxic. You don’t think that your side of this has any responsibility for that?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I think Zionism is an ideology that is looking to create a political system where one group of people has more standing before the law than another group of people. And I understand that there are folks who don’t view it that way, but that is the origins of the ideology of Zionism.

Ben Smith
But it is interesting, like you said, it was sort of a toxic conversation, which I think…everyone can probably agree on. Do you think that the anti-Israel side of that bears any responsibility for how toxic it is?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
I think that for so long when folks like myself talk about Palestinian human dignity and human rights, I immediately get labeled a terrorist sympathizer, which is so incredibly dehumanizing. What I’m saying is that, whenever we try to voice this position, you know, we are immediately shut down. And so it’s really hard for me to sit here and say, you know, who has more weight when I have been subjected to doxxing, to attacks on my life, to attacks on my dignity as a person, when I have been called some really incredibly heinous things for saying that Palestinians deserve human rights.

Nicole Gelinas
Just speaking of human rights and human dignity, you’ve been a prison abolitionist, a decarceralist. What should happen to somebody who has killed somebody else? I mean, I went to a sentencing last week, a man killed another man, didn’t know the person, just sitting on a stoop, got a 18-year prison sentence. Should that person not go to prison? And what should happen instead?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
So, you know, for prison abolitionists, I think a lot of folks misunderstand what that vision of the world actually is. And it is one that actually centers this question of harm. At the heart of what we’re asking is: What, why is it that there is so much harm in our society?

And how do we, A, prevent it, and B, deal with it when it happens. And as someone who has worked with folks who have been incarcerated, who have felt ostracized, for lack of a better term, by so many facets of our society for being poor, for being Black, for being Latino. I work at a public defender’s office where most of our clients are incredibly poor Black and brown New Yorkers. And for so many, the crimes that they’re being indicted for are crimes of poverty, or the effects of poverty.

And when I think about this question of harm, I think how do we create a society where people feel so safe that they don’t need to pick up the phone and call the police. And when harm does happen, how do we actually create repair? Because what we have right now is a system in whenever harm happens, there’s more harm being perpetrated, not only on the folks who engaged in the harm, but also on the victims of the harm. I’m someone who has actually been the victim of crimes, of violence, and gone to the police as a young person thinking, doing the thing that society told me to do, and all that did was traumatize me more.

Josh Greenman
But what do you do to the murderer though? Or what do you do—

Darializa Avila Chevalier
But and so I’m trying to answer the question, which is that— What we do is that we then put people behind bars in incredibly traumatizing conditions in a context where they cannot actually reflect on the harm that they caused or feel any remorse on that because they’re just trying to survive inside, and they’re being re-traumatized day after day after day while inside. And then when they’re released, they’re bringing that trauma back to our community, and that is having a reverberating effect on everyone in our society. And so as an abolitionist, you know, when you think about this question of harm, we have to think not only about interrupting that cycle of harm but also preventing it from the onset. And part of that has to do with thinking about, what are the systems that actually reduce that harm from happening in the first place?

And I have spoken to clients at public defender’s office where you hear the larger story of what happened, and it was folks who were under so much stress from the conditions that they were facing that they lashed out in a way that was out of character, in ways that they deeply regret. They don’t have a way to actually repair now because they don’t have a pathway towards that. You see folks who just need access to medical care. I had, at one of the jobs I had many years ago, a client who would actually intentionally get arrested because being on Rikers was the only way that he could get access to his bipolar medication. And this is a reflection of a larger failure of our system to actually protect our people from harm, to think about harm in a more expansive way, and actually address it meaningfully and effectively.

Josh Greenman
But, did we answer what happens to the murderer? Do you not incarcerate the murderer?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
You know, again, I’m talking about this question between the distance between the world we want to see and the world that we’re at. And tomorrow, you know, when that instance happens, that [incarceration] is what’s going to happen, right? And I don’t think anyone in society questions that that’s what’s going to happen.

Ben Smith
But can you get a little less abstract? Like she was watching a jury vote on the guy’s guilty, should he be sentenced or not?

Darializa Avila Chevalier
Well, this is what I’m saying is that when that happens, and as someone who has sat in so many courtrooms, to me, all of that is tragic. The fact that the murder happened is tragic. The fact that there was a circumstance in which that could even come to pass is tragic, and all of that is a reflection of systems that allowed that circumstance to be possible. And so, you know, I have always focused my attention on how do we create systems where that’s not even the possibility.

Everyone
Thank you.