Rusking Pimentel, a senior adviser on unpaid leave from Rep. Adriano Espaillat’s congressional office, drew condemnation after making racist and Islamophobic comments about Darializa Avila Chevalier in Spanish-language media during the Democratic congressional primary. In those remarks, he accused her of working with Mayor Zohran Mamdani to push Dominicans out of Washington Heights and replace them with Muslims and Haitians.
The comments surfaced publicly as the campaign entered its final stretch, which is why they landed with more force on Monday. That same day, Mamdani denounced the remarks at a press conference, saying the use of “Haitian” as a slur was unacceptable and calling out the anti-Black narratives aimed at Avila Chevalier in NY-13.
Pimentel made the accusations in an interview with the YouTube channel Las Exclusivas de José Peguero. He said Mamdani wanted Washington Heights to become a bastion of the Haitian, Muslim community allied to him, said the neighborhood should not “continue to be Dominican,” and claimed Haitians were converting to Islam in high numbers and should be moved to the Dominican district. He also cast doubt on Avila Chevalier’s Dominican identity, saying she came from Florida, identifies as an Afro-Latina and supposedly has Dominican parents.
Avila Chevalier said the attacks on her included a coordinated wave of Islamophobia and slurs that used Haitian as an insult. She said the smear campaign against her was racism dressed up by her opponent, and her social media posts were inundated with comments from anonymous Espaillat supporters accusing her of being Haitian. The pattern matters because it went beyond one interview and spread into the campaign’s online orbit, turning identity into the weapon.
Espaillat’s campaign disavowed Pimentel’s comments and said he was neither an official nor unofficial surrogate, but the line between the campaign and his role was already blurred. Pimentel was on unpaid leave from Espaillat’s congressional office, and he had joined that office as senior adviser in September 2024 after serving as communications director and senior adviser to Luis Sepúlveda until then. On Monday, Espaillat also told supporters not to question Avila Chevalier’s Dominican heritage, saying, “She’s Dominican, she’s Dominican,” but the broader question left hanging is whether that public rejection will be followed by any formal action against Pimentel.
For now, the political cost is clear: the comments have forced Espaillat’s camp to answer for a figure in its orbit while Avila Chevalier faces attacks that fuse ethnicity, faith and campaign warfare. The campaign has already disavowed the remarks; what remains unresolved is whether that disavowal is the end of the matter or the first step toward something more definite.
