Progressive Analilia Mejia close to upset win in New Jersey primary

The progressive candidate, backed by champions of the left, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, is poised for an upset victory with votes still being counted in the Democratic congressional primary for a blue-leaning seat in New Jersey.

Analilia Mejia, a progressive organizer, has a slight lead over former Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski in the fight for her party’s nomination in New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District by about 900 votes out of more than 63,000 votes counted.

Mejia and Malinowski lead the 11 Democratic candidates vying to fill the seat left vacant by the current Governor. Mikie Sherrill resigned after winning the November 2025 gubernatorial election in the Garden State.

The results of the preliminary showdown are being watched closely by the political world as an early testing ground for the debate between progressives and more mainstream elements of the Democratic Party.

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And a victory for Mejia, who served as national political director for Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign, would be the left’s last stand against the establishment since democratic socialist New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani sent shock waves across the country with her Democratic primary victory in June 2025.

“He represents a progressive populist economic agenda,” Rep. Ro Khanna, California’s progressive leader, said Friday. a social media post. “He will come!”

And speaking to supporters on primary night, Mejia emphasized: “We’ve got to rebuild our party, we’ve got to rebuild what’s going on in our nation. We’ve got to restore our democracy. We know our economy is rigged for billionaires.”

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Here’s a closer look at where Mejia stands on some key issues.

immigration enforcement

During his first campaign, Mejia took aim at President Donald Trump’s unprecedented crackdown on illegal immigration and called for the scrapping of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the federal agency most visible in the aggressive tactics used in the administration’s mass deportation efforts.

“I say abolish ICE now,” Mejia said on the campaign trail in January. “You can’t rearrange it. It can’t be fixed. Take it out.”

Analilia Mejia, a Democratic congressional candidate from New Jersey, called for the repeal of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). (Heather Khalifa/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Mejia, speaking to reporters Friday about his over-performance in the primaries, praised his stance on immigration following a backlash against the Trump administration following the fatal shooting by federal agents of two U.S. citizens protesting immigration enforcement in Minnesota.

““I think it’s incredibly important for me to be brave and not be afraid to tell the truth,” he told reporters. “I think voters think they want to have a representative that truly represents them, and they can’t watch what’s happening in Minnesota, what’s happening in Chicago, what’s happening in California, what’s happening across this district in Morristown.”

Supreme Court

Like many on the left, Mejia opposed the conservative-dominated court’s decisions.

“The Supreme Court has been taken over by right-wing radicals who care more about doing Trump’s bidding than the rule of law,” Mejia charges on his campaign website.

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He supports the “articles of impeachment against Justices Thomas and Alito” for what he calls “corruption and conflicts of interest.”

Mejia also supports “term limits for newly appointed Supreme Court justices, a binding ethics code with real sanction for all federal judges.”

Democratic congressional candidate Analilia Mejia of New Jersey supports term limits for newly appointed justices to the Supreme Court. (Image alliance via Valerie Plesch/Getty Images)

And Mejia said he would support “expanding the courts if necessary to restore balance.”

student loan debt

“We will cancel all student loan debt,” Mejia says on his campaign website.

And he promises to “fight to make college tuition at community colleges and trade schools free for everyone.”

Taxes and minimum wage

as part of it “The economy is on everyone’s agenda,” says Mejia. “If you work 40 hours a week, you should make at least $40,000 a year and not pay a penny in federal taxes on that first $40,000.”

And he highlights that he is leading the fight to “win the $15 minimum wage” in New Jersey.

If he makes it to Congress, Mejia says, “given that the cost of living is increasing every day, it’s time to raise the national minimum wage to $25 per hour.”

Israel

Malinowski, who was deputy secretary of state in former President Barack Obama’s administration and later represented a neighboring congressional district in northern New Jersey from 2018 to 2022 before losing reelection, was considered a front-runner in the race heading into the primary.

However, Malinowski was the target of a series of attack ads published by a group affiliated with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which opposes Malinowski for saying he supports conditions for aid to Israel.

January 15, 2026; Caldwell, NJ, USA; Tom Malinowski during a meet-and-greet hosted by the League of Women Voters of Caldwell University with candidates running for the Democratic nomination to fill the Congressional seat vacated by Gov. Mikie Sherrill. (Michael Karas/USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images)

The AIPAC-aligned super PAC United Democracy Project spent more than $2.3 million targeting Malinowski; whereas AIPAC had previously supported Malinowski in past congressional elections.

But the strategy could backfire because Mejia is much harsher on Israel than Malinowski.

Mejia was the only candidate in the race to raise his hand when asked at a forum last month whether he agreed with human rights groups who accuse Israel of genocide against Palestinians in its war with Hamas in Gaza.

Mejia was strengthened by support on the left. Sanders headlined a virtual rally for her on the eve of the primaries.

In addition to Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez, he has also been endorsed by a broad list of other progressive leaders, including Khanna, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Rep. Pramilla Jayapal of Washington State, former chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

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“Analilia Mejia’s landmark showing proves that voters, given a choice, want Democrats with an inspiring vision who will boldly challenge powerful interests on behalf of working families,” the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC), a leading group on the left, said in a statement. he said.

PCCC co-founder Adam Green, a New Jersey native who knocked on doors for Mejia and spoke at a rally with Mejia and Sanders on the eve of the primary, added that primary voters “have made it clear that they want Democrats who are not just anti-Trump, but who will shake up a broken political and economic system.”

While Mejia was the clear choice of the left wing of the party base, the rest of the field appeared to split the more moderate and center-left vote.

The primary winner will face Randolph Mayor Joe Hathaway, the only Republican to file for an April 16 special election.

Hathaway will be considered the underdog in the race in northern New Jersey’s suburban district.

Sherrill won re-election in the district by 15 points in 2024; That was the same margin he won the district in November’s gubernatorial showdown.

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But then-Vice President Kamala Harris won the district by just eight points in the 2024 presidential election, giving the GOP some hope that she could possibly flip the seat.

The special election comes as Republicans cling to a razor-thin 218-214 majority in the legislature. House of Representatives.