The 12th Congressional District of New York is currently based in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens. But, as indicated by Politico, that is set to be changing soon.
A round of re-districting is moving the boundaries of the 12th District. Beginning early next year, it's to be located entirely within Manhattan. The newly-created New York Congressional map would also set up a massive Democratic primary showdown.
House Judiciary Committee Chair Nadler faced off with House Oversight Committee Chair Maloney
Carolyn Maloney holds a seat in the United States House of Representatives from New York's 12th District.
The current version of the 12th, that is. This most recent episode of New York re-districting has been stirring up controversy for a while. Axios notes that a court rejected the state legislature's initial new map for being too gerrymandered.
But even the in-theory-less-controversial map has caused a political tizzy. Attention quickly zeroed in on what would be the new 12th District. And that it would pit two Democratic mainstays in Maloney and Jerry Nadler against each other.
The two have been colleagues, and supposedly friends, for nearly three decades. But the battle to try to stay in the House of Representatives would turn ugly. Including Maloney inferring that Nadler was going senile.
But those particular attacks did not seem to be effective.
Some might even argue that they were detrimental to Maloney's cause. Nadler has won the Democratic nomination for the newly-drawn 12th District, and the race was not even close.
Early vote tallies indicate that Nadler won the nomination by a roughly 30-point margin of victory. Suraj Patel, a faculty member at New York University, finished in a distant third place.
Patel had previously unsuccessfully challenged Maloney twice before in Democratic primaries.
Nadler currently represents the 10th District of New York
Jerry Nadler is a native of Brooklyn. He later graduated from Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan, followed by Columbia University. After completing his studies at Columbia, Nadler began working as a law clerk, initially with the Corporation Trust Company.
Other jobs Nadler would take on include serving as a legislative assistant with the New York Assembly. He would be elected to the Assembly for the first time in 1976. At the same time, he was enrolled at the Fordham University School of Law. From which he received his law degree.
Nadler would be re-elected to the Assembly six times. During his tenure, he created and chaired its subcommittee on Mass Transit and Rail Freight. In 1985, Nadler ran in the Democratic primary for borough president of Manhattan. He lost to former State Assemblyman and future New York City Mayor David Dinkins. Nadler was still a candidate in the general election as the nominee of the Liberal Party of New York. But he again lost to Dinkins.
Four years later, Nadler made a run for the Democratic nomination for comptroller of New York City. He would lose to Brooklyn District Attorney and former U.S. Representative Elizabeth Holtzman. Holtzman herself unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for the new iteration of the 10th District.
In 1992, longtime U.S. Representative Ted Weiss was running for re-election from the 17th District of New York. But Weiss would pass away in the midst of the campaign. Nadler was nominated for the seat in his stead. He went on to win the race to fill out the remainder of Weiss' term. As well as the term that Weiss had been running for. He has won another 14 terms in the House since then.
Following his first win, ensuing re-districting has moved Nadler to the 8th, 10th and now 12th Districts.
In 2017, he became the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee after Michigan Democrat John Conyers resigned. Since 2019, he has been the committee's chairman.
Maloney previously represented the 14th District
Carolyn Maloney, originally Carolyn Jane Bosher, is a native of Greensboro, North Carolina. After graduating from Greensboro College, she settled in New York City. She worked as a teacher and with the New York Board of Education. Like Nadler, she would be employed by the state legislature. In Maloney's case, in top staff positions with both the Assembly and the New York State Senate.
In 1982, Maloney was first elected to the New York City Council. Over the course of about a decade on the council, she became the inaugural chair of its Committee on Contracts.
In 1992, Maloney defeated Republican incumbent Bill Green in the race for New York's 14th District. And, also like Nadler, she'd win 14 more terms in the U.S. House of Representatives in the years following.
Maloney would be named the vice chair of the Congressional Joint Economic Committee in 2019. She held the post until early the following year. Also in 2019, Maloney became the chairwoman of the House Oversight Committee. She had been preceeded by Maryland Democrat Elijah Cummings, who died that year.
