Inside NYC’s overlooked primary
At a Bayside Queens town hall, Chuck Park, a former member of the foreign service and a Democratic challenger to Rep. Grace Meng, D-N.Y., was met with a packed room of supporters who had come to hear out the progressive candidate. As the June 23 primary approaches, Park, whose bid has operated in the shadow of high-profile progressive campaigns in other parts of New York City, is betting that a grassroots, volunteer-driven campaign will be able to win the day.
The town hall in Bayside was standing room only ahead of Park’s appearance, with about 140 voters packed into the Hana Adult Day Care center in northeast Queens. The crowd was a mix of older and younger supporters, who were excited to see a challenger to Meng, the 13-year incumbent in the district.
At the town hall, Park told a story he often tells at campaign events and in media interviews that sparked his decision to run: In August 2025, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers detained Dayra, a six-year-old girl from Queens, and two of her family members, following a routine check-in at immigration court.
Park explained his decision to run in an interview with Salon, saying he reached out to Meng’s office following the arrest and was dissatisfied with their response.
“Her office responded to me with an intake form for the family, and I thought that that was not good enough. I didn’t think that met the urgency of this moment,” Park said.
While Meng’s office later told the press that they were in contact with the child’s family, the die had been cast, with Park announcing in November that he would be challenging Meng in the Democratic primary in the district.
Since then, the campaign has been overshadowed by buzzy races in other parts of the city, such as in New York’s 12th District, where Jack Schlossberg, a Kennedy relative, is competing with other familiar names like George Conway, a high profile lawyer and commentator, or the race in New York’s 10th District, where former city comptroller and mayoral candidate Brad Lander is looking to unseat Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y. Park was also passed over from some big name progressive groups, like the Working Families Party, whose membership voted to endorse Park with 90% support. WFP leadership, however, in a rare move contrary to party membership, decided not to endorse any candidate in the race.
Furthermore, the attention on the race has likely been depressed because of a lack of the typical moments that drive coverage. For example, there have been no debates and none are planned at the moment, and the lack of polling means that horse race coverage is nonexistent. Meng’s campaign website doesn’t even maintain an events page.
(Photo Credit: Jesse Rodriguez)
However, in the roughly six months on the campaign trail, Park has assembled a serious on-the-ground operation that is being put to the test ahead of the June primary, with canvases launching every day, averaging four to six most days, thanks to an army of some 750 people knocking on doors across the district every day of the week.
On Saturday alone, Salon attended canvas launches at both the campaign’s Forest Hills headquarters (which is just a section of a shared art space on Austin Street) and at Bayside, with at least 30 volunteers showing up across the two events.
Some of the enthusiasm for volunteering seems to have spilled over from the political engagement the city saw during Mayor Zohran Mamadani’s mayoral campaign. One canvasser, Timothy Nikonorov, explained that he had been an active volunteer with Mamdani’s campaign before becoming a frequent canvasser for Park, and an occasional canvassing lead. He said one of the most common sentiments he hears from voters whose doors he knocks on is broad dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party.
“When I canvass for Chuck, sometimes I ask people, ‘What do you actually think about the state of the Democratic Party?’ And people never say, ‘Oh, it’s in good shape,’ Nikonorov said. “It’s more, ‘Oh, it’s confused, we have to get our act together, we need leaders in the party.’ And when I talk to voters, one of my pitches for Chuck is ‘Hey, let’s transform the Democratic Party and make it more progressive, like let’s make it a party that represents the needs of working people, and not just simply an anti-Trump party.’”
The race has followed some of the contours of other Democratic primary battles around the country in that Meng is a relatively liberal House Democrat who is a co-sponsor of the House Medicare for All bill and a member of the progressive caucus, with Park running to her left. The key issues in the race from Park’s point of view, however, are a mix of national issues like the abolition of ICE, and local issues like the planned casino at Citi Field, right next to Flushing Meadows Corona Park.
On ICE, Park has hit Meng on a June 2025 vote, where she supported a resolution that included a line expressing “gratitude to law enforcement officers, including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel, for protecting the homeland.”
Meng has responded to criticism of this vote, noting that thanking ICE was not the only provision in the resolution, which condemned the attack on Jewish community members in Boulder, Colorado, on June 1, 2025.
Policy-wise, Park has outflanked Meng on ICE, supporting the abolition of the agency, which President Donald Trump has remade in his image in his second term. Meng, on the other hand, has criticized the agency but stopped short of supporting its abolition, despite the fact that some 77% of self-identified Democrats support dismantling ICE, according to a March YouGov survey.
“I’m 100% grassroots. I haven’t taken a single penny from any PAC, any organized money.”
On the planned casino, Park has voiced strong opposition to the project, citing concerns over the effect that the casino could have on local communities, such as increasing gambling addiction. Meng, on the other hand, has not expressed a strong view on the project, noting in an interview with the QNS that she has concerns about the project but doesn’t see it as her role to intervene as a federal legislator.
The third major difference Park articulated focused on the mechanics and operations of their campaigns as much as policy.
“I’m 100% grassroots. I haven’t taken a single penny from any PAC, any organized money, and when I say that, I mean it’s not just corporate PACs and AIPAC. I haven’t taken a single penny from groups, because they’re progressive PACs,” Park said. “I’ve only taken donations from real-life human beings.”
In the fundraising race, Park trails Meng considerably. The latest FEC filings from late March indicated that at the time Park had raised some $283,000 to Meng’s $1.4 million, though Park’s campaign says they’ve now raised more than $400,000. An examination of those fundraising receipts, however, does show that Park has raised that money entirely from individuals, whereas Meng has raised considerable money from political action committees, which range from union-affiliated PACs to PACs associated with major corporations and Democratic leadership.
Tied to the question of campaign finance is the issue of both candidates’ positions on American support for Israel amid their alleged genocide in Gaza, invasion of Lebanon and the ongoing war with the U.S. against Iran. While Park has been vocal in his criticism of American support for Israel and the pro-Israel lobby’s influence in American elections, Meng has received more than $200,000 from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in the 2026 cycle alone, according to the latest available FEC filings.
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It’s still unclear who is winning the horse race, as there has been no public polling yet. Park’s campaign says that Meng’s campaign has commissioned two polls in the district, but has not released either. Meng’s campaign did not immediately respond to an inquiry about that polling.
Therefore, as the June 23 primary date approaches, the race could be a sleeper to watch. Meng has not faced a primary challenger since 2020 and has faced few well-organized opponents since her initial election to the House in 2012. Still, the dearth of data in the race makes it hard to test just how close things might be.
For the Park campaign’s part, they are projecting confidence that they will be able to pull off an upset win in the primary, in which they are hoping to drive up turnout in neighborhoods like Woodside, Elmhurst, Rego Park, Forest Hills and Corona, where they enjoy bases of support, while rallying support from immigrant communities throughout the district.
And, there are signs that Park’s progressive message is hitting home even beyond parts of the district that are more favorable to his brand of politics, with one Bayside resident whose door canvassers knocked on on Saturday, telling canvassers that Salon was observing that he and his whole household would be supporting Park, in no small part because they wanted fresh leadership in the district.
When asked whether he would commit to running again in 2028 in the event of a loss, Park said that he planned to run for re-election in 2028.
“I’m hoping to win by a lot, because our reception of the doors has been incredible,” Park said. “People are sick and tired of a broken status quo; they’re ready for change.”
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