By Gus Saltonstall
West Side Rag readers will recognize Patrick Timmins from his recent campaign for Manhattan District Attorney.
Timmins, a Morningside Heights local, is now one of the many candidates running to succeed Rep. Jerrold Nadler in New York’s 12th Congressional District. There are a total of 10 Democratic challengers vying for the open seat, along with seven Republican candidates, and three Independent candidates, as of March 23.
West Side Rag is looking to profile as many of these candidates as we can. Most recently, we spoke with Timmins, a longtime New York litigator and adjunct law professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
Our interview included questions about his background, stances on immigration, housing, affordability, and why he chose to run.
The interview has been edited lightly for clarity.
WSR: You recently ran for Manhattan district attorney; what made you want to seek election once again, but this time as a member of Congress?
Timmins: It’s far different race. When you’re the lone challenger to an incumbent, like I was in the DA race, that’s a different campaign altogether. What triggered this run is probably what triggered other people. It’s a vacant seat. I’m the only one who has run in the entire 12th Congressional District and we received more than 50,000 votes in the 12th CD. With that type of support, even though we lost, I felt that with that base of tens of thousands of people pulling your lever seven months ago, it made me say, ‘Hey, let me jump in.’
I’ve always wanted to serve and to serve in Washington is very exciting.
WSR: How similar is your platform to when you ran for district attorney?
Timmins: There’s no real similarity with it. Then, it was about crime, and issues with the handling of the Manhattan district attorney’s office. In Washington, it might be more difficult to do things about crime in the 12th CD, but with my knowledge in the subject, I will push for improvements in that. I still believe that subways should be an easy, convenient ride and they’re not. People are still being shoved in front of trains.
This campaign is about a wide variety of issues from term limits to Medicare to immigration to energy to affordability.
WSR: What do you think sets you apart from the other candidates?
Timmins: We’ve heard a lot from candidates in this race about abolishing ICE and impeaching Trump. In my opinion with ICE, the agency doesn’t need to be abolished but needs to bring all of its officers back. Bring them back to wherever they trained them, and retrain them. Take the masks off of them. Enforce body cameras. Create stricter background checks for new recruits. Make them an effective but not violent force.
WSR: Any other thoughts on the topic of immigration?
Timmins: I have an idea for a “Democratic Blue Card.” “The Blue Card” gives people who have been in the United States illegally for at least 10 years and haven’t got in any sort of trouble, a legal status, and an easier pathway to permanent, legal residence.
WSR: You mention Trump; if elected, you would be joining into a relationship with the executive branch; how would you view it?
Timmins: Being in opposition with the executive branch is not a smart campaign. The Democratic Party has to be a party of ideas, not reactionism or emotionalism. What I want to do is get to Washington and focus on creating bills. We need laws. I’m hoping that maybe President Trump wants to leave a legacy of new laws, so I would push for that.
When it comes to impeaching Trump, if I’m elected by the good people of the 12th CD, I would be sworn into office in January of 2027. If you begin an impeachment, you’re losing time on creating laws that help people and if it’s ever successful, which I don’t think it would be because of the Senate, you’d get J.D. Vance. That’s bad politics.
WSR: What are some of those other subjects you’d look to build legislation around?
Timmins: Medicare, it should include dental and vision. That’s a no brainer, if you want people to have longevity, they can’t have rotting teeth or bad eye sight. Immigration. Energy. Term limits. No taxation on Social Security; I don’t care about how much you get each month, that will help affordability.
There also has to be a review of the tax code at certain income levels so people have more money in their pockets to pay rent. On the topic of safety, if you’re apprehended or arrested with an illegal gun, I would like to see the federal courts handle those cases, [as] opposed to the state, country or city. The process would go faster. We also have to stop the guns coming from these gun-friendly states.
WSR: Why is the subject of federal accountability such an important part of your campaign?
Timmins: When I decided that term limits for Congressional members was necessary, I was thinking about elected officials like Senator Charles Grassley, who is 92 years old. There are Democrats who are real old timers too. You can’t be that effective when you’ve been around for so long. We need good leadership that is always changing. That’s why I signed the National Pledge for Term Limits, which says three two-year terms for Congress members and two six-year terms for the Senate. You’re going to get a more robust, energized Congress by implementing that. I don’t want people winning an election and thinking it’s a generational seat, but that’s what’s happened. In my years of working, generally, you get the best production from a worker in their first five to eight years.
WSR: Affordability is another central issue in the campaign. What would you look to get done on the topic within New York-12?
Timmins: Right now, I’m connected with the effort to stop the demolition of 18 buildings down by the Chelsea Houses. The people do not want that. These projects never seem to work out for the people that live there. The Section 9 housing in the 12th CD is very important. These people need to live good lives, lives where they’re not afraid and can prosper.
12th CD also has lots of co-op and condominium housing. That community of people who own their homes in that way, OTI, oil, tax, and insurance, is always the reason that is given to raise your maintenance. If we have better energy policy, where we can reduce the cost of electricity, it will put money back in people’s pockets. We need to find a way to convert waste to power. Waste can be converted to methane, which can be used for energy, which we desperately need.
Other affordability issues, we need to look at our transportation. I’m all for fighting Trump when it comes to speeding up the Second Avenue Subway project or the New York and New Jersey Gateway Tunnel, because it creates jobs and also will provide people with a faster way to get around.
WSR: You also point to voting rights as a major issue in your campaign?
Timmins: I want everybody to vote. There is a difficulty for people to vote, so far as getting out the house, if they’re not well. In New York City, many people don’t have a car or the ID that comes along with it. Let’s make things easier for people to vote. It’s important that everybody gets involved in the civic process. It’s difficult to realize that most registered voters don’t vote in a given election. In my most recent Manhattan District Attorney primary race, a total of 32 percent of registered Democrats in the borough got out to vote. That’s a shame. We need more openness. We need more public announcements about the races.
WSR: On a more local level, do you have any personal favorite spots on the Upper West Side and in the district?
Timmins: I’ve lived a full life in the district. Whether it was as a Harlem Little League manager for seven years or a West Side Soccer manager for four years, I’ve been a resident of this district. I know the issues.
I like Riverside Park a lot. I just had a great Irish dinner at The Ellington. I love Madison Square Garden. It’s iconic. The subway system. That has helped me so much, and helped my children so much.
WSR: Before the final question, anything you would want to mention that we haven’t covered?
Timmins: What’s happened with the city and country so far as anti-Semitism and how it has really grown tremendously as a guy who was born in Manhattan. My grandparents were immigrants from Ireland. Anti-semitism has to be dealt with in different ways. We have to educate on the topic, we have to create opportunities for familiarity with our Jewish communities. The Jewish community has helped build the city as much as any group.
WSR: What would your 30-second pitch to voters be?
Timmins: I’m a radical pragmatist. I have vast experience in terms of managing and running things. My focus will be on proposing and passing bills in Washington D.C. that help people in the district in their day to day lives. I just ran a race last June and got a total of 70,000 votes. People know me. Given that experience, I’m the best person in the race to take home the nomination.
You can find out more about Timmins on his campaign website — HERE.
Read More:
- A WSR Conversation With Candidate Nina Schwalbe in the Race to Represent the UWS in Congress
- Meet the UES Candidate Running to Represent Both the UES and UWS in Congress
- Meet Karen Ortiz, an Independent Candidate Running to Represent the UWS in Congress
- A WSR Conversation With Candidate Laura Dunn in the Race to Represent the UWS in Congress
- Meet Caroline Shinkle, a Republican Candidate Running to Represent the UWS in Congress
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No, ICE doesn’t simply need reform; it and DHS need to go. DHS should never have been.
Timmins wasn’t a serious candidate for DA and he’s not one for the House.
Yes. Get rid of ICE. And the NYPD as well. Also the Health Department. Especially them. People are just trying to make a living by selling food, but those health inspectors are like the gestapo, kicking in refrigerator doors and slapping arbitrary, racist letter grades in everyone’s window.
Dino,
Massive false equivalence, but the NYPD certainly needs reform.
By the way, since you don’t know: ICE was INS, and it needs to go back to that.
NB: try not strawmanning; it’s a form of prevarication.
Learn what the strawman fallacy actually is before you use it as a buzzword.
I used strawman correctly, even if you don’t like the results.
classic debate tactic: completely exaggerate a perfectly reasonable point and maximize the minimum to make yourself look…what exactly? reasonable? It probably sounded much better in your head.
If the disintegration of ICE seems like a “perfectly reasonable point…” well…I think some re-evaluation of reality is in order.
the disintegration of ICE does seem like a “perfectly reasonable” point, especially when it’s being run by an Administration that thinks shooting US Citizens in the face warrants no investigation, and protects its officers over the Citizens it *claims* to be serving. The only re-evaluation needed is anyone who thinks that’s normal.
We’re still waiting for the disintegration of the Minneapolis police department for thinking that a knee pushed into someone’s neck for 8 minutes is reasonable. Call us when that’s done (no reforms, no re-training, just disintegration) and we can talk about ICE.
Former MPD officer Chavez is in prison for killing Mr. Floyd.
Trump’s Border Patrol killers aren’t even being investigated.
Write your Senator to continue to demand investigation.
Schumer and Gillibrand don’t care.
Following George Floyd’s murder, Minneapolis implemented sweeping police reforms, including
banning chokeholds and no-knock warrants, establishing a mental health crisis team, and adopting a new disciplinary matrix. Wake me when they do that for ICE.
Oh, so now you’re open to reforms, not disintegration. Wake me up when you make up your mind.
cool hyperbole
Joker.
People will differ. I think Timmins sounds more reasonable than some of the other candidates. I voted for him against Bragg.
This guy makes way too much sense to be elected.
Reforming ICE doesn’t make sense.
Sure it does. The last administration let in 11-12 million illegal immigrants, many of whom have proven to be violent criminals. You can’t continue to look away and pretend this isn’t a problem.
Nope, those were and remain documented immigrants allowed in for assylum.
You need to get your information from more reliable sources. The net population of illegal immigrants increased by 3-5 million over the course of the Biden administration. And it’s been demonstrated many times that immigrants (even illegal ones) commit violent crimes at a lower level than the population as a whole. And I think it would be a pretty good guess that ICE agents commit violent crimes at a higher level than the population as a whole. Maybe we should deport them?
Why do I feel good about this guy?
Very reasonable! Unfortunately that probably means he doesnt align with much of the neighborhood, but he seems to take a much more common sense approach than the other dems interviewed so far
I don’t love his positions but he pragmatic and solution focused. That’s a huge improvement over many of the other candidates.
Democrats and Republicans are the pilot and copilot of the same airplane. Until we voters demand that they work together, we’ll get the nonsense of the past decade, which serves nobody except the politicians.
Mr Timmins is saying a lot of rational and intelligent things.
Unfortunately, this means he has no chance to win an election on the UWS.
The solution is maybe the UWS sharing a district with Staten Island as NY loses congressional seats!
Okay, I think I’m going to vote for this guy — he sounds even-handed with rational solutions here.
It’s a shame that Pat Timmons did not defeat DA Bragg. He appears to be a level headed candidate. I hope he doesn’t become a perennial loser. Nice to see a common sense Democrat on the UWS. A vote for Patrick is definately to be considered.
No thanks. Candidates like this will further doom our precarious future.
He got my vote.
The others were a big collective woke joke.
Finally a common sense democrat.
Agree!
The best Democrat of the bunch by far! Not reading from the same script that all of the other candidates were just handed. Refreshing!
Hopefully his view on the current “outreach teams” segues well with this:
https://www.city-journal.org/article/new-york-homeless-outreach-policy?utm_source=virtuous&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=cjdaily&vcrmeid=hCNbnFUHUO7qWMTBEzI8A&vcrmiid=vggP4PrVeU2LpeB35rM6kw
First who is this guy? Not a single question on his real background. Is he supported by the city hall Zohranatolla and DSA? Another democrat dark horse chosen materializing fron smoke filled back rooms of the progressive uber alles party machine? Remember the last ‘dard horse’ Bragg who upended law and order in the city thats still reeling from da’s office equity idiocracy hamstrining the court system with catch release policies still terrorizing women and elders?
1. Retrain ICE? Rather than focus on ICE agents bedside manner; how about addressing illegal activism opposing federal and ICE agents job on the ground basically a TDS gladiator spectacles funded by dem ngo $ creating a scenario of immed physical danger for all that never occurred under democrats.
2 He wants a new dreamer act for 10 year holdovers including 1000s of anchor babies for future dem ballot demographics?
But it gets better he says “everyone” to vote? Really? does that men skewing the harbored and increasing current intake of illegals under hochcul illegal migrant settlements voting farms right back to the party paying their bills with taxpayer $.
Caroline Shinkle seems a bit more rational on these matters altho the matter of illegals voting and benefits and drivers licenses healthcare and no english needed, etc. not address in the current Rag interview.
American and NYC need paradigm shift from what has proven NOT to work in the greater interests of society and constiutents. For the money that sanctuary theorists earmark for fake migrants you could throw them all out of the country give that money to citizens to buttress the current legal population demographics with tax deductions for additional children which is a looming issue for the country. But that is not the idea here rather multicultural identitarianism & racialist demagoguery rules gestalt along with destruction of the real middle class that needs that assistance. .
That one take on my position and sticking to it. It’s spring finally blessings to all.
Well, I’ve ruled out another candidate.