In the 11th episode of “Talk It OUT: LGBTQ Voices In A Queer Election Year,” we zoom in on a competitive US House race in New York State.
In 2022, during what was supposed to be a Red Wave that never really materialized, Republicans did manage to flip four seats in New York, which meant that the state contributed 80 percent of the seats the GOP needed to capture control of the House of Representatives.
As we approach the November elections, pundits believe that four or five Republican seats in New York could be captured by Democrats, helping their party retake the House.
One of those seats is the 17th Congressional District in the Hudson Valley, north of New York City. There, Mondaire Jones, a gay Black Democrat who held the seat from 2020 until 2022, hopes to win back the district against freshman Republican Mike Lawler.
Because of redistricting following the 2020 election, two Democratic incumbents, both gay — Jones and Sean Patrick Maloney — could have contested the seat in 2022, but Jones bowed out in favor of Maloney, who went on to lose to Lawler by less than one percent.
Jones and Lawler now battle it out in a Democratic-leaning district that includes Rockland and Putnam Counties, as well as northern Westchester County.
My guests include Shannon Powell, the co-founder of Indivisible Westchester, a grassroots group of progressive activists founded in response to Donald Trump’s 2016 victory.
I also speak to Anthony Nicodemo, president of the Hudson Valley Stonewall Democrats, an LGBTQ club active in Westchester County and beyond.
“Talk It OUT” is presented by Gay City News.
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(Music courtesy of IMG via uppbeat.io.)