Petrifying answer of hyperwoke NYC congressional favorite when asked if she thinks murderers should be imprisoned

By WILL POTTER, US SENIOR NEWS REPORTER Published: 13:42, 25 June 2026 | Updated: 13:55, 25 June 2026 A woke New York City congressional favorite is facing backlash after she refused to answer whether she believes murderers should be imprisoned.  Darializa Avila Chevalier, 32, won this week's Democratic primary for the Big Apple's 13th congressional district on a far-left socialist platform, with some of her most extreme views drawing mounting scrutiny.  Among the Democratic Socialist-backed candidate's stated beliefs is abolishing police and prisons entirely, and she once declared that she hopes to see 'no more police at all, ever' in society.  She has also supported 'abolishing the border,' called for 'seizing all properties from landlords' and handing them to the government, and has been criticized for offensive views on interracial relationships.  When pressed on her prison abolition views in a new interview with the New York Editorial Board, Chevalier offered a vague, mealy-mouthed answer that avoided saying she believes murderers should be imprisoned.  Interviewer Nicole Gelinas asked her plainly: 'What should happen to somebody who has killed somebody else?'  Chevalier responded with a lengthy defense of being a 'prison abolitionist' as someone who looks at the root causes of a crime, and said that she believes prisons unfairly target black and Latino people.  'As someone who has worked with folks who have been incarcerated, who have felt ostracized, for lack of a better term, by so many facets of our society for being poor, for being Black, for being Latino,' she said.  Darializa Avila Chevalier, 32, a socialist who won this week's Democratic primary for New York's 13th congressional district, is facing backlash after she refused to answer whether she believes murderers should be imprisoned The socialist, who is backed by NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani, has faced scrutiny for some extreme views, including wanting to abolish all prisons and police, get rid of the border, and seizing all properties from landlords and handing them to the government  'I work at a public defender’s office where most of our clients are incredibly poor black and brown New Yorkers. And for so many, the crimes that they’re being indicted for are crimes of poverty, or the effects of poverty.'  Chevalier avoided answering whether murderers should be imprisoned as she said she wanted to 'create a society where people feel so safe that they don’t need to pick up the phone and call the police.' The non-answer led interviewer Josh Greenman to interject, asking Chevalier again: 'But what do you do to the murderer though?'  'But and so I’m trying to answer the question, which is that - What we do is that we then put people behind bars in incredibly traumatizing conditions,' Chevalier responded.  'In a context where they cannot actually reflect on the harm that they caused or feel any remorse on that because they’re just trying to survive inside, and they’re being re-traumatized day after day after day while inside.'  Chevalier then defended the perpetrators of violent crime as 'folks who were under so much stress from the conditions that they were facing that they lashed out in a way that was out of character.'  She alleged she had met people who committed crimes so they could receive medical care in jail through her work as a community activist.  Greenman then interjected again to remind Chevalier she did not answer the question of whether murderers should be imprisoned.  Chevalier (pictured being handcuffed by an NYPD officer during an anti-Israel protest in April 2026) skirted the question several times when pressed over what she would do with murderers Social media posts from 2019 shared by Chevalier resurfaced during the campaign, including one where she ranted about interracial relationships and called white women 'ugly colonizers'  'But, did we answer what happens to the murderer? Do you not incarcerate the murderer?' he questioned.  In another answer that skirted the question, Chevalier said: 'You know, again, I’m talking about this question between the distance between the world we want to see and the world that we’re at.  'And tomorrow, you know, when that instance happens, that [incarceration] is what’s going to happen, right? And I don’t think anyone in society questions that that’s what’s going to happen.'  Interviewer Ben Smith interjected for a third time, telling Chevalier: 'But can you get a little less abstract?' Chevalier concluded: 'Well, this is what I’m saying is that when that happens, and as someone who has sat in so many courtrooms, to me, all of that is tragic.' The Daily Mail has contacted Chevalier for comment.  The interview response sparked backlash on social media, as even many Democrats said Chevalier's policy positions are too far-left for their party.  Commentator Jamie Metzl wrote on X: 'I am a lifelong Democrat, but let me be clear: Darializa Avila Chevalier is a racist, anti-American saboteur who should have has no place in the Democratic Party or American government.'  Listing out her controversies, Metzl questioned: 'If the Democratic Party promotes candidates who so clearly hate our country, how could we possibly ask patriotic Americans to support us?'  Writer Robby Soave added: 'I am not a Trump supporter, not a partisan whatsoever, and very critical of many of the candidates Republicans are expecting people to vote for... but Darializa Avila Chevalier seems to be one of the most utterly unacceptable candidates I can possibly image.'  Chevalier sparked backlash on social media, as even many Democrats said her policy positions are too far-left for their party Chevalier also sparked outrage after she said she wipes her hands with the American flag and previously wrote that 'the pyromania associated with anarchism is very intriguing to me' Chevalier won her primary this week despite scrutiny during her campaign on a number of her past, now-deleted social media posts that included rants about interracial relationships.  She wrote that black and Arab men who are with white women 'fetishize ugly colonizer women.'  She also previously called for 'abolishing the border', and when pressed over that view, she responded: 'Yes literally abolish the border, all deportation is wrong.'  Chevalier also sparked backlash for joking about wiping her dirty hands on the American flag, and she has previously described the US as a 'disgrace.' During the 2024 election cycle, Chevalier repeatedly called Joe Biden a 'rapist' and a 'war criminal', and also previously wrote that 'the pyromania associated with anarchism is very intriguing to me.'  When questioned last week about her past social media posts, Chevalier stormed out of an interview with El Vacilón de la Mañana host Excarlet Molina and again refused to answer tough questions.  The host said she was offended by Chevalier previously framing the Dominican flag as 'violent,' but Chevalier said that all she wanted to discuss were the 'issues' facing residents of New York 13. When the hosts began talking over her, Chevalier responded: 'I am not going to sit here and be yelled at by various people,'  before removing her headphones and walking right out of the studio. The exchange came hours before Chevalier's big win in her district's Democratic primary, where she defeated incumbent Adriano Espaillat in what many considered a major upset.  The comments below have not been moderated. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. 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