Brad Lander set to challenge Rep. Dan Goldman from the left

NEW YORK — Brooklyn progressive Brad Lander is planning to launch his bid for Congress as soon as Wednesday, challenging Rep. Dan Goldman from the political left in a district that went big for Zohran Mamdani, three people familiar with his preparations told POLITICO.

The city comptroller is expected to open his campaign with a pivotal endorsement from Mamdani, the democratic socialist mayor-elect’s first formal nod since his November election win upended the Democratic landscape. Lander has also sought support from progressive Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, according to two people close to Lander.

Lander shot his campaign launch video, with some scenes from his Park Slope community, two people with knowledge of his operations said. And he is interviewing for the Working Families Party endorsement, four more people confirmed to POLITICO. The people looped into Lander’s plans were granted anonymity to protect a sensitive rollout process.

Lander’s entry will mark New York progressives’ boldest salvo yet in primaries to unseat more mainstream party members on the heels of Mamdani’s ascension to the helm of the country’s largest city. The fiscal wonk and Israel critic is a favorite of left-leaning voters in the liberal congressional district, which encompasses lower Manhattan and northwest Brooklyn and overlaps Lander’s former City Council district.

“These are urgent times when ICE agents are abducting our neighbors, Donald Trump is stealing money from New York City’s bank account. I think people are looking for leaders who will put their bodies on the line,” Lander told reporters Friday after pleading not guilty to trespassing and related charges tied to his September sit-in protesting the detention of migrants at 26 Federal Plaza. He said Friday he had not made a decision on running for Congress but was seriously considering it.

Lander's team did not immediately comment on his plans Tuesday when contacted by POLITICO.

Mamdani defeated Andrew Cuomo in Goldman’s 10th Congressional District by 23 points in the June mayoral primary. In that same contest, Lander placed third in the district, just a quarter of a percentage point behind Cuomo, the moderate former governor. Lander helped clear the democratic socialist’s path to the nomination with a cross-endorsement deal that many in the progressive movement lauded as a sacrifice for the cause. While Lander is a progressive and Working Families Party darling, he is not a member of the Democratic Socialists of America.

Goldman — a Manhattan Democrat, second-term House member and former prosecutor — was lead counsel in President Donald Trump’s first impeachment process. While Goldman is a scion of the Levi Strauss empire and a staunch defender of Israel, he has championed progressive policies as co-sponsor of Medicare for All and Green New Deal legislation. The incumbent has advocated for taxing the ultra-wealthy — including himself — and criticized settler violence in the West Bank. Both Goldman and Lander are Jewish.

Lander and Goldman are aligned in the resistance against Trump’s ramped-up deportation agenda and have even worked in tandem. Both Democrats are a frequent presence at 26 Federal Plaza, the lower Manhattan administrative building where migrants have been detained by masked federal agents as they attend immigration court hearings.

“These are nonviolent, noncriminal people, often escaping terrible conditions in their country, seeking refuge here, and now, they are being yanked away from their families, detained and deported,” Goldman told reporters Monday as he and Reps. Adriano Espaillat and Nydia Velázquez unveiled legislation to protect migrants from arrest as they attend their court dates and follow pathways to legal status.

At least two other progressive Democrats are considering a bid for Congress in the district. City Council Member Alexa Avilés, chair of the council’s Immigration Committee and a democratic socialist, and former Assemblymember Yuh-Line Niou, who came in second place to Goldman in the 2022 primary for the district, also appealed to the Manhattan and Brooklyn chapters of the Working Families Party for their support. Goldman did as well.