Virginia Maloney ’10 Is Pushing Affordability in Campaign for New York City Council

In June, Virginia Maloney ’10, a product manager at Meta, won the New York City Democratic primary for the city council district representing Manhattan’s East Side. Maloney, who majored in the School of Public and International Affairs with a minor in environmental studies, is likely to lock in a victory in the deep blue district in November’s general election.

She says she’s had a longstanding interest in public service.

She called her enrollment in SPIA’s policy task force — when she traveled to Washington, D.C., with 12 other students to present research to legislators — a “high impact moment.” Her senior thesis focused on green job creation in the 2009 stimulus bill, using Kansas City as a case study.

“I have a shining example of what public sector leadership looks like through my mother, who served in public office for 40 years,” Maloney says. Carolyn Maloney sat on the New York City Council for a decade before making a successful run for the House of Representatives, where she served New York districts for 30 years until 2023.

In addition to her Princeton degree, Virginia Maloney holds a master’s in public administration from Harvard and a business degree from MIT. After graduating from SPIA, she worked in Washington, D.C., on building high speed rail, before returning home to work for Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s New York City Economic Development Corporation.

“I didn’t know that I would run for office, but New York is at a critical juncture where we need strong leaders,” Maloney says. “I’m a native New Yorker. I’m a New York or nowhere person. I think it’s the best city in the world.”

But Maloney says New York no longer feels like the city she grew up in.

“People are being priced out of their homes. We’re seeing basic services like sanitation [and] health care falling short, and my friends and neighbors don’t feel safe,” Maloney says.

Maloney lists “reining in out-of-control e-bikes” as one of her priorities, citing the increase in delivery services in the city as part of the reason for the vehicles’ increased presence. Maloney received funding from a DoorDash-funded PAC that supported former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the recent heated mayoral primary, but says she received “a broad coalition of support” in the election. She won with 53.2% of the vote in the final round of ranked-choice voting.

Although safety and affordability are the top issues Maloney hopes to address if elected in November, she also says she wants to improve accessibility across the city from “web platforms to subway platforms,” and address mental health.

She notes that members of the Princeton community showed up to support her during the electoral process, including serving as her campaign’s treasurer (Jaimeson Rice ’10) and volunteering to canvass. She even made it back for her 15th reunion P-rade just weeks before the primary, and she says one of her campaign colors is orange.

“I’m a proud tiger.”