In November 2020, Abreu announced his 2021 campaign to succeed the term-limited Levine in the City Council's 7th district, which covers Morningside Heights, Manhattan Valley, Hamilton Heights, and parts of the Upper West Side, Harlem and Washington Heights.[8] Garnering endorsements from Levine, U.S. Congressman Adriano Espaillat, and most of the city's major unions, Abreu was regarded as the frontrunner in the race.[9] Abreu endorsed Eric Adams in the 2021 mayoral primary.
Five of Abreu's eleven opponents – Maria Ordoñez, Stacy Lynch, Marti Allen-Curmmings, Dan Cohen, and Corey Ortega – sought to counter this advantage through ranked-choice voting and formed a coalition, wherein each of the five candidates advised their own voters to rank the other four coalition members on their ballot.[10]
On election night on June 22, Abreu led the field with 27 percent of the vote, with four members of the opposing coalition coming in second through fifth. When ranked-choice votes and absentee ballots were taken into account two weeks later, Abreu maintained his lead, with 63 percent of the vote to Ordoñez's 37 percent; Abreu formally declared victory on July 2, and his opponents conceded in the succeeding days. In the November general election, Abreu won with over 88% of the vote.[11]
In 2023, Abreu was reelected to the City Council from the 7th district. In the November 7 general election, he received 13,061 votes; the remaining votes cast in the contest were write-in votes.[12]
In 2025, Abreu won the Democratic primary for the 7th Council District, defeating Edafe Okporo and Tiffany Khan in the first round of ranked-choice voting with 20,927 votes (63.0%).[13] He then won reelection in the November 4 general election, receiving 37,859 votes on the Democratic line and 7,584 on the Working Families line, ahead of Republican Manual Williams and West Side United candidate Edafe Okporo.[14]
From the beginning of 2024 until the end of 2025, Abreu served as the Chair of the Sanitation Committee.[15] While on the committee, he worked with the New York City Department of Sanitation to create a trash containerization pilot program in West Harlem to remove trash bags off the streets and reduce the rat population.[16] Following the pilot program's success, the sanitation committee and council voted to expand on-street trash containerization citywide for larger residential buildings.[17]
Beginning in the 2026 legislative session, Abreu chairs the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee.
In 2022, Abreu voted with other Democratic members of the City Council to cut $215 million from the Department of Education—a vote for which many members later expressed regret.[18] After initially joining the Progressive Caucus, Abreu left in 2023 after refusing to sign onto the group's statement of principles.[19]
Abreu sponsored a bill passed in 2023 that banned weight and height discrimination in hiring and housing across New York City, adding them to a list of protected classes.[20] In 2024, the council passed a bill banning forced brokers fees which was originally co-sponsored by Abreu.[21] In 2025, Uber and DoorDash sued the City of New York over two laws introduced by Abreu that regulate food-delivery app tipping options intended to protect consumer transparency and worker pay.[22]
In 2024, Abreu opposed a ballot measure introduced by Mayor Eric Adams to expand the authority of the Department of Sanitation's enforcement against unlicensed street vendors in New York City.[23]
Abreu is a member of the Vote Blue Coalition, a progressive group and federal PAC created to support Democrats in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania through voter outreach and mobilization efforts.[24] He is on the board of governors of the Jim Owles Liberal Democratic Club.[25]
