Longtime observers of New York politics seem to agree about Nadler’s chances against Maloney. Among them is Peter King, a former congressman who represented nearby East Queens and Nassau County in the House for nearly 30 years. In an interview with National Review, he said the twelfth-district race is tilted in favor of Maloney, given the substantial overlap between her old and new districts. Unlike Maloney’s old seat, Nadler’s was rather heavily gerrymandered, stretching bizarrely from Upper Manhattan to the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in South Brooklyn — like a long snake along the length of the city — parts that have now been stripped away by the special master’s process. “[Maloney] has a clear advantage,” King said. Nadler, meanwhile, “isn’t looking too good.” Polls seem to suggest this, with the most recent Emerson College poll showing Maloney in the lead with 31 percent — ten points above Nadler, with an edge among both men and women.

Nadler’s defeat would be of great satisfaction to Republicans, putting to pasture an old Democratic hand with seniority in the House. It would especially be celebrated by Donald Trump, who has had a multi-decade feud with him since the 1980s when both were engaged in real-estate fights in New York City. Long before Trump’s entry into politics, he battled Nadler over his attempts to use his congressional perch to block various deals, mortgages, and other initiatives in the city. To see Nadler leave Congress now, primaried out by his party, would be a boon for Trump personally and a victory for Republicans generally, after they challenged the original congressional maps in court.