A democratic socialist running for a New York House seat has been boasting on the campaign trail of her working class background with a history of “low-wage, customer service jobs” — while leaving out that her cushy suburban upbringing and the fact she attended a pricey art school.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s pick for New York’s 7th Congressional District, Assembly Member Claire Valdez has repeatedly touted her work as a low-wage employee at Taco Bell, Trader Joes and Pizza Hut, more than a dozen times in campaign speeches and interviews. 

But the card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America has left out that she was raised in a four-bedroom suburban house in Lubbock, Texas to an engineer father and a medical technologist mother before she attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago – which now has a hefty price tag of $78,770 per year. 

State Assembly Member Claire Valdez is running for New York’s 7th Congressional District. LightRocket via Getty Images

The candidate has consistently airbrushed her childhood out of her standard talking points –  and even claimed to controversial Twitch streamer Hasan Piker that she identified as a “worker” above all else. 

“I’ve had a lot of bad jobs like many of us. I bagged groceries, I worked at Taco Bell-Pizza Hut combination, I worked at Trader Joe’s for many years,” Valdez told Piker on his channel ‘Socialist Hub’, in February.

“I think before I identified as anything else in my life, I identified as a worker, as somebody who had to come in, walk in, stand on your feet all day, get burns at Taco Bell, freeze in Trader Joe’s coolers,” she said.  

Valdez’s resume notably includes roles in operations at a hip Queens sculpture museum and as an administrative assistant at Columbia University, the latter of which led her to become an union organizer. 

Still, in 10 separate 2026 interviews – she called back to her time working at Texas Taco Bell, rather than her more prestigious, blue-collar Big Apple roles. 

“I worked drive-through windows, I unpacked pallets, I bagged groceries,” she lamented at a January DSA forum. “And in all that time, I was working nights and weekends and unpaid overtime like many, many people in this room and in this district have done.”

Valdez has the official endorsement of Mamdani and her DSA comrades in the Democratic primary race against Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso for retiring Rep. Nydia Velazquez’s seat. 

Mamdani’s endorsement of Valdez jeopardized his relationship with the influential Velazquez – who endorsed her longtime mentee, Reynoso. 

A spokesperson for Valdez did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.