Meeks regains ground in AOC's backyard

NEW YORK — Over the last few years, a series of strategic missteps seemed to make the political fiefdom of Rep. Greg Meeks irrelevant.

When not chairing the House Foreign Affairs Committee in Washington, Meeks (D-N.Y.) heads the Queens County Democratic Party in his home borough of 2.3 million people, a population larger than most U.S. cities. Yet for his senior stature in the House and skill as a powerful fundraiser, Meeks’ run at the head of the Democratic organization has been a puzzling affair.

In 2019, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America nearly bested his candidate for Queens district attorney. In the presidential primary, he endorsed Michael Bloomberg, who dropped his bid after winning only American Samoa on Super Tuesday. By the time Meeks backed a New York City mayoral candidate who received just 3 percent of the vote last year, he had several other defeats in his wake, putting the future of the organization and the political instincts of its leader in doubt.

Yet all of a sudden, 2022 is looking up for the seven-term lawmaker. He helped elevate the leader of New York City’s Legislature, which could pay dividends for his political standing at home. And voters in the city and beyond recently embraced a middle ground of Democratic politics where Meeks has long camped: His vote-rich district, made up largely of middle-class Black homeowners, was crucial to electing Mayor Eric Adams, an outspoken moderate from Brooklyn.

“I think what’s happening broadly is a power shift in terms of Black politics to the outer boroughs, from Manhattan and into parts of Brooklyn and Queens,” said Basil Smikle, a political consultant whose mayoral candidate was endorsed by Meeks. “And I think that bodes well for Greg and for Greg’s influence on citywide politics.”

New York’s moderate swing is part of a broader conflict between mainstream Democrats and the party's left wing that will come into focus as House Democrats attempt to maintain their majority in the upcoming midterms. President Joe Biden appears eager to chart a course back toward the center. And as head of the Congressional Black Caucus Political Action Committee, Meeks could play a major role in primary season.

His changing fortunes can be traced to shifting political trends, deal-making prowess and a little bit of luck.

Regicide in Queens

The problems started in 2018. When Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez beat Joe Crowley in a Democratic primary that year, she didn’t just topple a potential heir to the House speakership. Crowley was also the head of the Queens Democratic organization.

The party had long held a strong grip over ballot access and patronage jobs marbled throughout New York City government, and took care to elect loyalists from Congress down to county committee members representing just a few city blocks. With its longtime patriarch gone, Meeks was elected as Crowley’s replacement in 2019. Things went downhill from there.

In his first big test, Meeks’ candidate for Queens district attorney initially came in behind Tiffany Cabán, a public defender and member of the Democratic Socialists of America who had never held office. Cabán, who is now a member of the City Council, was ultimately defeated by 55 votes after a recount, but still damaged Meeks’ credibility.

That same year, a candidate for civil court judge backed by the party suffered an almost unheard of loss. Judgeships are important as both a form of patronage and a stream of income: In some cases, jurists funnel lucrative estate cases to particular law firms, which in turn provide the party with legal services that give the organization an edge over unaffiliated candidates.

The following year saw several party-backed incumbents swept out of state office. And in Meeks’ own district, the candidate he was supporting for an open seat lost to a 24-year-old named Khaleel Anderson who is now the state’s youngest Black Assembly member.

The retrenchment of the organization was also evident in June city primaries: The Queens Democrats backed eight candidates of the borough’s 14 seats and won in just six of them.

But an obscure race unknown even to most New Yorkers has injected new life into Meeks and his party apparatus.

Every four years, New York City’s 51-member Legislature picks a speaker following months of backroom deal-making. And after a surreal race that included two candidates declaring victory, the body elected Council Member Adrienne Adams, an ally of Meeks who hails from his district in Queens.
Adams — no relation to the New York City mayor — is a member of the Queens Democrats, and won over her colleagues with a coalition that included labor unions and the Congress member, who supported her even as the mayor’s team went hard for a different candidate.

“In many ways the weak link here could have been the county parties, but Meeks ensured that was not the case in Queens,” said one source involved in the negotiations. “Being able to resist the approach of the incoming administration and to hold firm takes some courage.”

An alternate reality is not hard to imagine. One of Meeks’ colleagues in the House immediately jettisoned their preferred candidate once the mayor made his preference known.

That decision ended up costing Rep. Adriano Espaillat political capital: Members in his corner of the city have far less input into the new Legislature, whereas Adrienne Adams has been kind to her home borough since taking over in January. Several members aligned with Meeks and the party received prominent committee assignments, and Queens members make up a plurality of coveted spots on a team that negotiates the city budget.

The new speaker’s Queens roots also reduce the likelihood she will sweep away patronage jobs given to party loyalists over the years. (The Council’s central staff is rife with Queens ties: its former chief of staff was a close ally of Crowley, and Meeks’ own daughter worked for recently term-limited Speaker Corey Johnson.)

“What Queens had been known for previously was its ability to stick together,” Meeks said in an interview. “We wanted to go back to that, and the speaker’s race shows that … when we do, we can make a tremendous difference in citywide politics.”

Despite Meeks’ longstanding relationship with Adams — he swore her into office in January — he did not make a concerted push for her to lead the Council at the outset.

Meeks spent months checking in with his members to see who they preferred, declining to push a particular candidate himself. And at an annual getaway for New York City’s political class in Puerto Rico, he spoke at events hosted by several hopefuls. It was not until late November, less than two weeks before the race would descend into pandemonium, that the Queens leader brought his borough’s delegation together over dinner to suggest they vote as a bloc, according to three people with knowledge of the meal’s discussion.

However, once the mayor’s team began pushing a rival candidate, Meeks was instrumental in elevating Adrienne Adams and bringing together a coalition that included labor leaders, candidates and the Democratic party from the nearby Bronx, according to two people involved in the race who were granted anonymity to speak about private deliberations — even as many members in his home borough were not directly allied with the party.

That coalition ultimately vaulted Adrienne Adams to the front of the pack. And in the ensuing scramble to whip votes, Meeks and his team offered guidance and weighed in on committee assignments.

“For Greg, some of this is luck, some of this is skill, but optics are everything in politics,” said a source involved in Queens party politics. “In a sense, it doesn’t matter if he orchestrated it or not — he held his delegation, they helped pick the speaker and it happens to be one of his close allies.”

Everything in moderation

Meeks has been a steadfast moderate during his 24 years in the House, even as the left wing of the party at home and in Washington, D.C, has grown more vocal. He is the only member of the city’s congressional delegation who is part of the New Democrat Coalition, with the exception of Rep. Tom Suozzi, a centrist Long Island lawmaker who represents a small slice of Queens.

Meeks was also a vocal proponent of the Obama-era Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, which was opposed by most Democrats, even officials in his own district. And he has been a staunch defender of Israel, donating campaign cash to two pro-Israel political action committees in the last year, according to records with the Federal Election Commission. The left’s support of the Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement is just one of the reasons Meeks has been at odds with that wing of the party.

As chair of the Black Caucus’ PAC, Meeks raises millions of dollars for the organization’s preferred candidates, which in some cases have faced primaries from the left. Last year, for instance, the CBC backed Rep. Shontel Brown in the hotly contested Ohio special election against Nina Turner, an ally of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).

Meeks’ fellow delegation member and potential successor to the speaker, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, has similarly waded into primaries to guard the left flank of more moderate Democrats. And President Joe Biden took care to denounce the defund the police message during his recent State of the Union address.

Similar efforts have already succeeded in New York City.

“I think that Eric Adams is good for the city and Eric Adams’ politics are good for the city because he … believes strongly in organized labor, but he also believes the city should be open for business,” Meeks said. “That is what my career has always been about.”

Meeks did not initially endorse Eric Adams, instead backing Ray McGuire, the former Citigroup executive whom he has known for years. (Meeks later listed the mayor as his second pick in the city’s ranked-choice voting system.) The two subsequently found themselves on opposite sides of the race for Council speaker, further straining their relationship.

They have since made amends to a degree. Meeks checked in consistently throughout the speaker's contest. And having a mayor who openly boasted of beating the left gives validation to Meeks’ ideology. The ascension of Speaker Adrienne Adams similarly bodes well for politics in his backyard.

“He is very anti-DSA, so having a speaker who does not amplify them is helpful,” said someone involved in speaker’s race negotiations. “And the fact that several allies on the Council are empowered is good local politics for him.”

A new era?

Meeks is known for his deep connections in Washington, D.C. In addition to his perch atop the CBC fundraising arm, he beat out a longer-serving member, California Rep. Brad Sherman, for the foreign affairs committee chair spot in a body where seniority typically rules. In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, his post has become more relevant. The Congress member has led delegations of his colleagues to Kyiv and Poland, met with the Ukrainian president and briefed committee members on classified information from the Biden administration.

Multiple members of the Queens Democratic Party who spoke to POLITICO painted Meeks as an approachable elder statesman who gives his cell number to party members far down the pecking order and has a reputation as a straightforward negotiator by others in local political circles.

“I will always listen and talk to everyone, even individuals I disagree with on policy,” Meeks said. “My job as chair of the Queens Democratic Party is not necessarily to get involved in policy, but in politics.”

With wins both practical and ideological under his belt, the upcoming election cycles will show whether Meeks can regain some of the party’s lost influence in the borough.

Patrick Jenkins, a New York political consultant and adviser to Meeks, said that the Congress member inherited problems a long time in the making. New population growth and demographic changes in parts of Queens brought residents aligned with the left who were skeptical of party politics and emboldened by former President Donald Trump — with AOC’s win serving as the canary in the coalmine.

By the time 2020 rolled around, he noted, some longtime white representatives elsewhere in the borough were woefully out of sync with the racial makeup of their districts. And because of the byzantine structure of the Queens Democrats, Meeks did not have unilateral authority to dictate endorsements that might have better performed.

Facing those challenges, Jenkins argued, the Congress member has kept the party stable, earned a recent win for a borough-wide post and is on track to turn things around.

“I see him taking a party that has been taking it on the chin for a while and bringing it back,” Jenkins said. “And it’s still a work in progress.”

While the DSA and the Working Families Party, which also represents liberal Democrats, scored big wins over the past several years, they have had limited success more recently in the city’s most diverse borough. WFP did not win any of the three Queens Council races they endorsed in last year, for example, and the DSA organizations won one of two.

“The obituary for the Queens Democratic Party has been written more times than I can count in my own career,” said Howard Wolfson, a top Bloomberg political adviser. “The truth is that the party has more staying power than its critics would like to believe.”

But serious obstacles make a return to the party’s previous station unlikely.

The Queens Democrats' sphere of influence has shrunk dramatically over the last few years, and several factions of reformers are gaining a toehold on the lowest rungs of the organization, attempting to build strength from the foundation up. They have their eye on some of the party’s most coveted powers, such as judgeship nominations.

The Working Families Party recently announced two endorsements for state races in Queens this year, one of which is in Meeks’ district. And candidates following the mold of AOC or Cabán are attempting to expand the electorate beyond triple-prime voters who have historically sided with the Queens Democrats.

Along a commercial street in Sunnyside, a diverse neighborhood in the borough, sits a two-story building owned by the Anoroc Democratic Club, once a breeding ground for the type of boots-on-the-ground forces that gave the Queens Democrats their power. The building is now entirely leased out to other entities and the club does not functionally exist, according to Émilia Decaudin, a district leader who is a member of DSA and WFP.

And as the club system erodes, the party has not reached out to the younger activists taking its place, according to Decaudin, instead seeing them as the enemy.

“As much as they think there is a way to regain strength, I think that demonstrates a lack of understanding of what made the party powerful in the first place,” she said, “which is the ability to adapt to local conditions.”