Progressive Analilia Mejia, a Bernie Sanders ally, will win New Jersey special primary after rival concedes

By Molly English, CNN

(CNN) — Analilia Mejia will win the special primary in New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District in a tight race over former Rep. Tom Malinowski, a major win for an ally of Sen. Bernie Sanders and other progressives.

Malinowski conceded on Tuesday in a statement in which he gave Mejia “unequivocal credit for running a positive campaign and for inspiring so many voters on Election Day.”

A win by Mejia, who served as political director on Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign, is a major success for national progressive leaders who had backed her run. Thursday’s primary to replace now-Gov. Mikie Sherrill was seen as an early testing ground for the debates that will shape the Democratic push to retake the US House in this year’s midterms.

“Like many Democrats in this moment, I am not only appalled at MAGA, at Trumpism, at Donald Trump’s administration – their overreach, their corruption, their blatant hypocrisy – but I’m also ticked off at my own Democratic leadership,” she told CNN during the campaign.

Trailing the top two vote-getters were former Lt. Gov. Tahesha Way and Essex County commissioner Brendan Gill, among a ballot of more than a dozen Democratic primary candidates.

Meija will face Republican Randolph Township councilman Joe Hathaway, who ran unopposed, in the general election on April 16, and will be favored in a district that voted for former Vice President Kamala Harris by nearly nine percentage points in 2024.

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