Poll Shows Espaillat at 42% in NY-13 Democratic Primary

A new internal poll puts U.S. Rep. Adriano Espaillat at just 42% support among likely Democratic primary voters in New York’s 13th Congressional District, a number his challenger’s campaign is treating as an opening.

The poll, conducted by Upswing Research & Strategy between March 25 and March 30, surveyed 598 likely Democratic voters across Upper Manhattan and parts of the Bronx by phone and text message. It carries a 4% margin of error. On name recognition alone, Espaillat led challenger Darializa Avila Chevalier 42% to 28%, with fellow Democratic candidate Oscar Romero pulling 4%.

That’s where the Espaillat camp’s preferred reading of the data ends.

After respondents heard positive messaging about Avila Chevalier’s platform, the numbers flipped. She led the five-term incumbent 46% to 35%, according to results shared with The City. Romero stayed at 4%.

Most polling experts caution against treating campaign-backed polls as neutral instruments. The questions get written, and the positive messaging gets crafted, by people with a stake in the outcome. But with the June 23 primary roughly two months out, and no independent poll of NY-13 available this cycle, the Upswing numbers offer the clearest public snapshot of where the race currently stands.

“These poll results show what we have long been feeling on the ground uptown and in the Bronx: that New Yorkers are hungry for change, and they know Darializa Avila Chevalier will deliver that change on June 23rd,” campaign manager Ilona Duverge said in a statement.

Espaillat’s camp didn’t budge.

“On the ground, Congressman Espaillat has built deep, durable support across Upper Manhattan and the Bronx, backed by a record of delivering and a coalition that turns out,” spokesperson Tyrone Stevens said in a statement. “While others are trying to create momentum on paper, we’re organizing in neighborhoods, talking to voters, and building the operation that actually wins elections.”

The money race adds a sharper edge to the poll numbers. Avila Chevalier outraised Espaillat in the first quarter of 2026, pulling in $270,000 to his $230,000, according to Federal Election Commission filings submitted April 15. Espaillat is now the only sitting House member in New York City to be out-raised by an opponent this cycle, according to Politico’s reporting on the FEC data.

He does hold a significant cash-on-hand advantage. Espaillat has roughly $1 million banked to Avila Chevalier’s $220,000. In a primary race that will hinge on turnout operations across Washington Heights, Inwood, and the South Bronx, that reserve matters.

Still, the combination of a fundraising deficit and a soft first-ballot number below 50% gives the Avila Chevalier camp real material to work with heading into spring. Incumbents who can’t clear a majority in their own party’s primary polling, even in internal surveys with friendly framing, rarely find those numbers hardening on their own as primary day closes in.

Avila Chevalier is a member of the United Auto Workers’ legal services local through her position at Neighborhood Defender Services of Harlem, where she is currently on leave to run. She’s also on leave from PhD studies at the CUNY Graduate Center. On Friday, the New York chapter of the UAW announced its endorsement of her campaign. The New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America had already endorsed her earlier this year, at a January 27 event in Morningside Park.

The endorsement geography matters in this district. NY-13 covers some of the densest progressive organizing terrain in the city. DSA’s backing of Zohran Mamdani in the mayor’s race has drawn significant attention this cycle, and Avila Chevalier’s campaign has worked to benefit from that energy in the congressional contest running on the same June 23 ballot.

Espaillat, first elected in 2016 after representing the same neighborhoods in the State Senate and State Assembly, has survived competitive primaries before. His campaign’s argument is that the same infrastructure that produced those wins is currently being built out again, and that the congressman’s record of delivering federal resources to the district is a floor his challengers can’t match.

The Avila Chevalier campaign’s counter is that the poll tells a different story, one where voters who know more about her consistently break her way. Whether that dynamic holds when they’re standing in an actual voting booth, with Espaillat’s name next to his incumbent title, is what the next two months of organizing will determine for both sides.