AOC and her progressive comrades lost big in primaries

The New York results mirror House races around the country where moderates flexed their muscle against insurgent candidates. In May, Rep. Shontel Brown (D-Ohio) defeated Nina Turner for a second time in a closely watched race that received national attention. Turner had the backing of AOC, while Hillary Clinton had previously thrown her weight behind Brown.

Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) — the only pro-life Democrat in the house — put away Jessica Cisneros, another AOC-backed rising star. Former Rep. Donna Edwards also went down to a landslide defeat against Glenn Ivey in Maryland. Ivey had been the preferred choice of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee — a progressive bête noire — which spent millions on the race.

“What’s going on is simply that people who vote, the Democrats who actually vote, are significantly more pragmatic than the Democrats who talk,” said longtime Democratic strategist James Carville. “I don’t know how many times that voters have to tell these people who they are. You would have thought they learned their lesson in the 2020 presidential primaries.”