Latimer visits Israel ahead of potential run against Bowman

ALBANY, N.Y. — Westchester County Executive George Latimer toured Israel this week in advance of an announcement on whether he will launch a heavyweight Democratic primary challenge against Rep. Jamaal Bowman.

While many area Democrats expect Latimer to run, he didn’t confirm his plans late Wednesday in a call from Israel. But he did say that if he does launch a bid, his campaign message would focus on his record as “the most progressive” county official in New York.

Latimer has been planning to announce a final decision in early December, and he said he’s sticking to that timing — while offering a sharp contract with Bowman on policy and the Israel-Hamas war in a district with one of the most heavily Jewish populations in the nation.

Bowman “has been in Congress for three years, and I’ve done a bunch of things over the past three decades,” Latimer said in an interview with POLITICO.

“We’ve cut taxes and reduced crime, but we’ve also made the buses environmentally friendly,” Latimer said. “We’ve done Black maternal health; we’ve built recreational communities in the heart of poor communities. I’ve done a ton of things that represent progressive government”

He added, “Right now in Congress, a lot of it is showtime down there. A lot of it is posturing and culture wars.”

Latimer’s trip came as Bowman, a former Democratic Socialist and a member of the liberal Squad, faces criticism locally for not being strong in his support of Israel, including calling for a ceasefire and not signing a resolution in support of Israel last month.

The county executive and former state lawmaker said that his time with Israelis, such as meeting with President Isaac Herzog, taught him that there is “no animosity directed toward the Palestinian people.”

“There’s people that are protesting that they’re pro-Palestine, as if the Israeli position is anti-Palestinian,” he said in an interview while waiting to board his return flight at Ben Gurion Airport.

“There wasn’t a ‘let’s go get those bastards’ kind of mindset,” he said. “The anger and fear is directed at Hamas as the terrorist organization that runs the country and that’s a differentiation you don’t often pick up.”

Bowman has been one of the members of Congress most closely identified with a pro-Palestinian position. Dozens of rabbis publicly urged Latimer to challenge him in October, citing actions such as Bowman’s boycotts of a speech by Herzog last July.

A challenge against Bowman would be one of the highest-profile primary battles in New York’s history. Latimer, who has won every election he’s been in since 1987 while often being one of New York Republican’s top targets, would face off against an incumbent who has been a star of the left since he ousted longtime Rep. Eliot Engel in 2020.

And the race would instantly be treated as the national measuring stick of whether Democrats have any room to deviate from the party’s traditional full-throated support of Israel.

If Latimer does launch a campaign in the next few days, Israel will be a “big issue” but “not the whole issue,” he said.

Latimer said that much of his messaging would be on his record in state and local offices.

“I don’t think you’re going to see me on MSNBC a whole lot, but I think you will see me doing the kind of grunt work that effective legislators do,” he said.

Latimer spent most of Monday through Wednesday in Israel. He was joined by a delegation of area officials that included Assemblymember Amy Paulin and New Rochelle Mayor-elect Yadira Ramos-Herbert.

“Sadness, not exuberant war fever” was the mood he encountered most, he said.

But the Israeli officials he spoke with made clear that this sadness still means that “wiping out Hamas” is an essentiality.

“The case they made is kind of straightforward,” he said. “If the enemy was sitting in Connecticut and they came over the border and killed a bunch of people in your border communities, how would you react to it?”

A permanent ceasefire — like the one supported by Bowman since October — can’t work as long as Hamas keeps hostages, Latimer said.

“You can’t take hostages, keep them, then say ‘OK, let’s negotiate now, let’s be nice, let’s have peace now,’” he said. “I don’t have the George Latimer Peace Plan, it just seems logical to me the first thing you’ve got to do is release hostages. You took hostages.”

Bowman’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Latimer pointed to the history of Ireland as a goal for the Middle East: “Northern Ireland was intractable by any outside observation, and yet somehow they figured out how to get peace. And I think the critical element of that was the necessity of both sides to put terrorism aside.”

Peace is a possibility if something similar happens, but “it’s not going to happen with a ceasefire now” as long as Hamas supports terrorism.

“I’m not a secretary of state level guy,” he said.

But, he added, “I’m thinking about national issues more than I have before.”