Judge voids Nikki Lucas's election as Brooklyn Democratic chair and orders the party to redo its September meeting

A Brooklyn judge has thrown out the Brooklyn Democratic Party's most recent rules and the election of its purported new leader, handing the party's reform wing a win after months of court fights, and setting up another showdown over who will run the borough's Democratic machine.

In a series of decisions on Tuesday, Nov. 10, state Supreme Court Justice Peter Sweeney ruled against former party chair Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn and her allies, City & State reported. He voided the bylaw changes they pushed through in August and September and the Oct. 4 vote that made Assembly Member Nikki Lucas chair of the party's executive committee.

What the judge decided

• The new bylaws are invalid. The amendments, which added dozens of seats to the executive committee and erased the majority reformers won in the June primary, were not adopted the way election law and the party's own rules require. "It is undisputed these procedures were not followed," Sweeney wrote, according to Brooklyn Paper.
• Lucas was never elected. In a separate ruling, Sweeney called the Oct. 4 meeting "a nullity" because it lacked a quorum under the 2024 bylaws. No chair or other officers were elected there, and anything that executive committee did afterward has no effect, he wrote.
• The September meeting must be redone. The Sept. 23 organizational meeting was so irregular that the court could not sort out who was properly elected to the newly created seats, Sweeney found. The party must reconvene under its 2024 rules, consider any rule changes, and only then elect a chair. The executive committee cannot meet to pick a chair before that.

Who is in charge now

For now the party runs under its 2024 bylaws. Rep. Nydia Velázquez, who chairs the county committee and is retiring from Congress, is effectively the party's leader and would preside over the new meeting. She is aligned with the reformers.

The reform coalition, aligned with New Kings Democrats, wants to elect Sunset Park district leader Julio Peña III as chair. Peña called the decision "a victory for Brooklyn Democrats," Brooklyn Paper reported. Bichotte Hermelyn, who said in late September that she would not seek another term, told City & State she had not yet read the rulings. Lucas did not respond to either outlet. In an Instagram post that was later deleted, the party called the decision "neutral," according to Brooklyn Paper.

What happens next

Sweeney ordered both sides back to court on Tuesday, Nov. 17, to settle the ground rules for the new meeting. No date for that meeting has been set. The fight may not be over: both outlets noted that Bichotte Hermelyn and Lucas are still expected to hold a majority of county committee votes by proxy, so they could try to pass the same rule changes again. City & State also noted that an appeal is possible.