State Assembly Member - District 53
Maritza Davila
Assembly member for District 53 since 2013, when she won a special election to fill the vacancy left by Vito Lopez; re-elected in November 2024 with 99.3% of the vote.
Issues Maritza is raising
Public assistance and food aid
Sponsored a 2025 law extending current income and resource exemptions in public assistance programs, and a bill, vetoed in 2025, creating a task force to study fiscal cliffs in those programs. Sponsors a bill, passed by both houses in 2026, barring finger imaging as a SNAP requirement, and sponsored a 2024 bill, vetoed, requiring the state to post information on rental and shelter supplement plans.
State budget
Voted for three state budget bills that became law in 2024: aid to localities, the 2024-25 education, labor, housing and family assistance budget, and the 2024-25 health and mental hygiene budget.
Medical aid in dying
Co-sponsored the Medical Aid in Dying Act, which covers a terminally ill patient's request for and use of medication for medical aid in dying, and voted for it when it passed the Assembly 81-67 in April 2025; it became law in February 2026.
Buildings under appointed administrators
Sponsored a 2024 law extending until June 30, 2027 the state's rules for new owners of buildings that have been placed under an appointed administrator.
Climate costs, electric vehicle charging and gas service
Voted for laws creating a climate change adaptation cost recovery program and fund, and requiring electric vehicle charging stations and electric vehicle ready parking spaces in new construction with off-street parking. Voted for a 2026 law on gas service to new customers.
Background
Based in Bushwick, Brooklyn
Was appointed chair of the Assembly's Committee on Social Services in January 2023. Born in Cataño, Puerto Rico, she moved to Bushwick as a young girl and raised three children there as a single mother.
- Member of the New York State Assembly for District 53 since 2013, first elected in a Nov. 5, 2013 special election to fill the vacancy left by Vito Lopez
- Won re-election on Nov. 5, 2024 with 99.3% of the vote; defeated Humberto Soto in the Sept. 13, 2018 Democratic primary with 82%
- Appointed chair of the Assembly Committee on Social Services in January 2023
- Appointed chair of the Assembly's Puerto Rican/Hispanic Task Force in 2018
- Her Assembly tenure includes a $250,000 funding allocation to the START Treatment & Recovery Center on Myrtle Avenue in Bushwick
- Served as president of the Community School District 32 board of education
- Founding member of the North Brooklyn Coalition Against Domestic Violence, serving on its board for two years; founder of the Northern Brooklyn Residents Association
- Joined the Ridgewood Bushwick Senior Citizens Council in 1996
- Associate of Arts degree in political science from Long Island University, 2013
- Advanced to the 2026 general election without appearing on a primary ballot after the June 23, 2026 Democratic primary for the seat was canceled
Support
No endorsements beyond the Democratic nomination were found as of Oct. 1, 2026.
Money
$16K
raised
Top donors: Joel Waldman, 1199 SEIU PAF, Yoel Jacobowitz