Yuh-Line Niou will not run for Congress in November

Yuh-Line Niou, the assemblywoman for the Financial District who ran for the 10th Congressional District and lost narrowly to Tribecan Dan Goldman, has decided not to run in November on the Working Families Party ballot line.

In a video on Twitter, sounding often like she was on the verge of tears, she said that enough of the absentee votes had been counted and she was conceding the primary, which was held on August 23.

She also used the video to accuse Goldman of buying his seat, since he put millions of his own fortune into his campaign, and of being out of touch with the majority of voters because of his wealth and privilege. (See a breakdown of candidate spending here.)

“Oligarchy is a system where people with economic power use that power to grab political power which they in turn to use to consolidate even more economic power,” she said in the video. “Let’s call it by it’s name and commit ourselves to dismantling it…We have a Congress that has more millionaires than people of color.”

(Fact check: the 117th Congress had 124 lawmakers who identify as Black, Hispanic, Asian/Pacific Islander or Native American, or 23 percent. And 50 percent of the members of Congress are millionaires, as checked by Politifact and OpenSecrets.)

Niou was encouraged by her supporters to run in November, especially since she so narrowly lost the election. In an 11-way race, Niou finished with 23.7 percent of the votes; Goldman had 25.7 percent. And the rest: Mondaire Jones – 18 percent; Carlina Rivera – 17 percent; Jo Anne Simon – 6 percent.

The Times has a fuller analysis of the political support — or lack of it — for a three-way race.

 

1 Comment

  1. I was really disappointed that so few people participated/voted in this election. Yes, it was ridiculous that we had two primaries close together but people could have voted by mail in/early instead of just sitting on the sidelines because they were on vacation or busy. C’mon people democracy requires a little bit of work….

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