Then he beat up on Mr. Espaillat.

“…If you had this choice to make and there was two applications. A guy who has been there, done that, brought it back to his community, has been a life whole leader in the things that you believe in: justice, anti-discrimination, health care, education, stopping the war … and the other guy says I want to have the same job. I haven’t done a damn thing. I don’t know where Washington is, but you ought to give me a chance because I’m young.”

Coincidentally, or maybe not, Mr. Espaillat traveled to Washington, D.C. on June 7 as part of a New York lawmaker delegation to lobby the federal government to intervene against the city’s “stop and frisk” tactics. Who else was there? You guessed it: Mr. Rangel. 

There hasn’t been a ton of mudslinging in this campaign. Mr. Rangel has called out his opponents for not having the experience he has. Mr. Espaillat has opted for a more passive approach, like with the video and repeatedly saying things like “change is in the air.”

The closest Mr. Espaillat has come to bashing Mr. Rangel came on Monday night at a debate hosted by the League of Women Voters in Manhattan.

Mr. Espaillat responded to Mr. Rangel when he said something similar to his comments from the video about his application being the strongest.

“I think that what happens when one feels like he’s been on the job too long is there’s absolutely nobody on the planet who can do as good job as you do,” Mr. Espaillat said.

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