Cabán and Nurse will lead NYC Council Progressive Caucus

Queens democratic socialist Tiffany Cabán was elected by her colleagues to serve as co-chair of the New York City Council Progressive Caucus, joining Sandy Nurse at the helm of the bloc. The caucus also selected two Brooklyn council members to serve as its co-vice-chairs: freshman member Kayla Santosuosso and democratic socialist Alexa Avilés. 

With the exception of Nurse, who is finishing out the last two years of her tenure as a chair, the caucus’ new leaders will steer the group over the next four years. They are taking over for Council members Shahana Hanif, Jen Gutiérrez, and Carmen De La Rosa whose terms expired at the close of last session. All three remain in the caucus. 

The leadership decision comes roughly two weeks after the caucus voted in six new members – growing the group’s ranks to 24, just shy of a majority in the 51-member council. 

After years of battling against former Mayor Eric Adams’ budget cuts, Cabán said the caucus sees lots of opportunity over the next few years. While political ideology varies even within the Progressive Caucus, there’s still a lot of common ground between its members and democratic socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Perhaps more so even than with the council’s more moderate speaker, Julie Menin.

“The challenges are big – the fiscal challenge obviously is a big one, but it’s an opportunity too. Instead of fighting an administration, I think there’s going to be a lot of good cohesion,” Cabán said. “We’re eager to work closely because I think a lot of our goals and values are very similar.” 

While the caucus likely won’t release a set of legislative priorities for this term until closer to the summer, members are already clear on many of the big priorities. Some of that, like protecting immigrant and LGBTQ New Yorkers from attacks from the federal government, as well as expanding affordable housing and free child care, are “areas of synergy” with the speaker, Cabán said. As for other caucus priorities like public safety, police accountability and corrections – areas that could lead to potential disagreement – Cabán pointed to the caucus’ numbers. “We’ll push,” she said. “We’ll make sure. I mean we’re almost half of the conference at this point.”

Mamdani is slated to submit his first budget proposal by Feb. 17, the first step in what will be a lengthy negotiation with the council to hammer out a final adopted budget for fiscal year 2027. He and City Comptroller Mark Levine recently sounded the alarm about a $12.6 billion budget gap in this fiscal year and next, setting the stage for some tough spending decisions.

“Wherever we see gaps or lack of political will from people in power – whether it’s the speaker or the mayor – I think the caucus is well positioned, even more so than last time around, to be a force that pushes beyond that,” Cabán said.