Rep. Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.) chimed in with a reminder on Wednesday that he has no plans to mount a third-party bid for his House seat.
“Still not running,” Crowley tweeted, in what appeared to be a response to former Sen. Joe Lieberman’s (I-Conn.) Wall Street Journal op-ed calling for voters to support the New York Democrat on the November ballot as the nominee of the Working Families Party.
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Crowley suffered a shocking defeat in his primary last month against Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old first-time candidate who spent far less than Crowley in the race and emerged with 57 percent of the vote.
Crowley’s loss was widely seen as a blow to Democratic congressional leaders. Crowley is the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus and was seen as a possible successor to Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
In an op-ed published in the Journal on Tuesday, Lieberman argued that Ocasio-Cortez, a democratic socialist, is too far outside the mainstream Democratic Party to be a productive member of Congress and urged voters to back Crowley in a third-party bid.
He also pressed Crowley to remain on the ballot in November as the nominee for the Working Families Party — a plan that Crowley ruled out last week, although he said it was unlikely that he would have his name officially taken off the ballot.
“Lots questions about WFP line. Was honored to have their support,” he tweeted. “I’m not running. For record you can only be removed from the ballot if 1) you move out of NY; 2) die; 3) be convicted of a crime; 4) accept a nomination for another office (in a place I don’t live).”
“I don’t plan on moving out of New York, have a clean record, hope God’s will is that I don’t die, and won’t commit what I honestly believe to be election fraud,” he added.
Crowley’s tweets last week came after Ocasio-Cortez accused him of refusing to concede the Democratic nomination to her and preparing to mount a third-party challenge in November.
He responded to those accusations, saying that he had made his support for her clear, and that her team had not followed through on arranging concession phone calls.
“Alexandria, the race is over and Democrats need to come together,” he tweeted. “I’ve made my support for you clear and the fact that I’m not running. We’ve scheduled phone calls and your team has not followed through. I’d like to connect but I’m not willing to air grievances on Twitter.”