A Queens pol operating for Congress backed by NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani and the remainder of the Democratic Socialists of America has repeatedly railed in opposition to billionaires and the unreal intelligence business – whereas quietly pocketing their cash.
Democratic state Assemblywoman Claire Valdez – who’s operating to exchange retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez – accepted $7,000 in donations in January from Silicon Valley-based billionaire AI investor and software program developer Tom Preston-Werner and his spouse Theresa, data present.
Valdez, 36, has additionally collected at the very least one other $1,850 in donations from staff of AI firms. And her marketing campaign — which her newest filings present had taken in $751,680 as of the top of March — can be being closely supported by political motion committees which have acquired a whole lot of hundreds of {dollars} instantly from billionaires and different AI buyers, data additionally revealed.
Valdez has routinely vowed to tackle “the billionaire class” all through the marketing campaign and reject donations from individuals within the AI business – and even bragged her crew is vetting donations rigorously.
She has additionally repeatedly tried to tie AI and tech billionaires to what she feels are systemic financial and environmental issues.
“AI. Fossil fuels. Personal utilities,” Valdez posted Could 11 on X. “The identical oligarchs creating an affordability disaster are burning the planet. The answer should tackle each issues directly.”
The donations aren’t sitting nicely with a few of New York’s most seasoned Democratic operatives.
“Claire Valdez is an entire hypocrite,” mentioned a prime NYC Democratic advisor.
“At some point, she bashes billionaires and Massive Tech then turns round and pockets their marketing campaign money.
“At some point she’s railing in opposition to tremendous PACs and ‘darkish cash;’ the subsequent she is eagerly accepting their help. Washington is drowning in politicians who say one factor and do one other. For all her holier‑than‑thou progressive rhetoric, Claire is proving she’s only one extra of them.”
Valdez’s hypocrisy extends nicely past billionaires and AI.
She’s repeatedly demanded US Immigration and Customs Enforcement be abolished and has promised on her marketing campaign web site to “finish for-profit detention and deportation” by tearing up federal contracts with “surveillance contractors and the ecosystem of companies who revenue off the distress of immigrant detention.”
Nonetheless, data present she’s acquired donations totaling $3,250 from staff who work for ICE distributors, together with $1,000 from a researcher at Magnet Forensics, which has a $3 million contract to offer phone-hacking companies for the company’s investigations unit.
She’s additionally taken one other $250 from Kyle Cushing, a San Diego-based software program developer at Common Atomics Aeronautical Programs, the protection contractor behind MQ9 Reaper and MQ1 Predator drones utilized in ICE border surveillance.
And Valdez’s government dad works for an organization fortifying the Texas border, The Publish reported final month.
Larry Valdez, works for engineering agency Parkhill Smith & Cooper, which has been accountable for a myriad of Border Patrol initiatives in western Texas — together with a $172,000 contract for the build-out of a large border facility on 74 acres in Marfa in 2009.
Valdez beforehand claimed her father had no involvement within the initiatives cited by The Publish.
Her spokesman, Andrew Epstein, insisted Friday that Valdez is operating a grassroots marketing campaign.
“Greater than 20,000 individuals have given a median of fifty bucks to Claire’s marketing campaign,” he mentioned. “That’s considerably extra small greenback donors than each different candidates on this race mixed — and it’s not even shut. No actual property cash. No company PACs. Simply the occasional class traitor.”
Valdez is operating in a crowded area within the June 23 Democratic major to exchange Velázquez in New York’s seventh Congressional District, which incorporates components of Queens and Brooklyn. The district has been dubbed “Commie Hall” for its enormous focus of DSA and different far-left voters.
Whereas she has the backing of Mamdani, US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and the DSA, Velázquez and the far-left Working Households Get together are backing Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso.
