AIPAC’s Next Top Target? Rep. Jamaal Bowman
The Israel lobby is expected to start a $20 million ad blitz backing its handpicked candidate against the incumbent Squad member.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee is expected to launch its first ads in the coming weeks against its next top target this cycle: Rep. Jamaal Bowman in New York’s 16th Congressional District.
AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project, is expected to run new ads against Bowman, a member of the progressive “Squad,” as the Democratic primary election for the solidly blue House seat approaches next month, according to Bowman’s campaign and another source with knowledge of the race.
“We’ve heard from inside sources that AIPAC is planning to spend up to $25 million dollars against Congressman Bowman, making this the most expensive House primary in U.S. history,” Bowman campaign manager Gabe Tobias said in a statement to The Intercept. “Their MAGA billionaire donors are spending everything they have against us because they know that Jamaal Bowman speaks for a majority of Democratic voters — from a ceasefire in Gaza to Medicare for All — and that our Democratic coalition can only be defeated with millions of dollars spent to divide our communities.”
Bowman’s challenger, Westchester County Executive George Latimer, was recruited by AIPAC. The group has helped Latimer raise just under $1 million so far, including almost half of his total contributions in the final quarter of 2023 and about a quarter of his total haul so far.
Latimer has raised $3.6 million to Bowman’s $2.7 million, including from Republican donors and supporters of former President Donald Trump. The two will face off in the primary on June 25. (Neither the United Democracy Project nor Latimer’s campaign responded to requests for comment.)
AIPAC planned to spend at least $100 million this cycle to oust members of the Squad, who have led calls for a ceasefire in Gaza and an end to U.S. military support for Israel. The lobby group’s threat would make it the largest player in the Democratic Party primary season. The group, however, has now distanced itself from the pledge after one of its top targets, Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa., won her primary last week.
AIPAC spent $5 million against Lee in 2022 and had tried and failed to recruit at least two candidates to challenge her this cycle. AIPAC had reportedly been in touch with challenger Bhavini Patel’s campaign, but Patel has not said whether the group recruited her to run against Lee. And AIPAC withheld a formal endorsement in the race.
The lack of an endorsement allowed AIPAC to claim a total victory in Pennsylvania; after Patel’s loss, AIPAC celebrated without mentioning the Pittsburgh race. The group posted on Twitter that all six of its endorsed candidates in Pennsylvania had won their races. “Being pro-Israel is good policy and good politics!” AIPAC tweeted.
“The policies AIPAC stands for are deeply unpopular with Democratic voters, that’s why their ads don’t mention Israel ever,” Lee tweeted on Tuesday. “You know what Dem voters overwhelmingly support? A permanent ceasefire now. Conditioning military funding to [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu. Policies that we’ve led on from the beginning. AIPAC is livid that our Democratic voters are not aligned with their Republican megadonors who want to send billions in bombs & weapons to incite another endless war abroad. Being pro-peace and anti-war is what our voters want.”
GOP Cash, Attacking the Squad
Following Lee’s victory, AIPAC is now focusing its efforts on ousting Bowman, but other members of the Squad remain in its sights. The group is also targeting Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo., and backing her opponent Wesley Bell, but that primary won’t take place until August.
AIPAC is expected to spend at least $20 million in each race, according to Democratic operatives with knowledge of both primaries. The group was also expected to put significant resources into ousting Reps. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., and Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich. Tlaib has two challengers who have not yet had to report fundraising numbers, including one who was a write-in candidate in the 2018 primary that Tlaib won. Omar has far outraised her opponents, including her AIPAC-backed challenger from 2022, Don Samuels.
“AIPAC started this cycle promising to take out every single member of the Squad and they have already failed at that goal with Summer’s resounding victory last week,” said Usamah Andrabi, the communications director of Justice Democrats, a progressive group that backs the Squad members, in a statement to The Intercept. “Now, their Republican billionaire megadonors want to go all-in to make up for their failures by trying to defeat a former middle school principal and educator because nothing is a greater threat to right-wing power than everyday people having a megaphone in Washington through a Congressman Jamaal Bowman and Congresswoman Cori Bush.”
Bowman is one of the reasons AIPAC started spending directly on elections after having been primarily focused on lobbying, one of the group’s longtime directors wrote in a blog post in 2022. Bowman’s ouster of longtime AIPAC stalwart Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., in 2020 came as a shock to the group, which launched its new political action committees the next cycle.
As AIPAC has started to spend directly on elections, the group aligned itself with far-right Republicans. During the 2022 cycle, AIPAC endorsed more than 100 Republicans who voted to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
Since then, AIPAC-supported Democratic primary candidates have taken support from the most extreme wing of the GOP, including donors who have supported Republicans like Trump; Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas; Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo.; Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis; and Republican Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake. Patel encouraged Republicans to switch parties to vote in the primary against Lee, and an AIPAC donor urged Republicans to switch parties to vote against Bowman.
Latimer, for his part, has raised money from Republicans while trying to distance himself from the party. Trump fundraiser Steve Louro, who has given $5,000 to Latimer’s campaign, announced earlier this month that his Republican friend would host a fundraiser for Latimer in May. Latimer’s campaign distanced themself from Louro’s invitation and said they had no control over who hosts the fundraiser.
Latimer has raised more than $80,000 from donors who supported Trump and more than $200,000 from other Republican donors. One of more than a dozen Republicans who recently gave to Democratic Sen. John Fetterman’s campaign told The Intercept he recently switched his party registration to Democrat so he could vote against Bowman.
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https://theintercept.com/2024/05/03/portland-aipac-susheela-jayapal-maxine-dexter/
AIPAC Is Secretly Intervening in Portland’s Congressional Race to Take Down Susheela Jayapal, Sources Say
The pro-Israel group is funneling money through a “pro-science” PAC, according to two members of Congress.
In April, a super PAC ostensibly committed to supporting “pro-science” candidates began dropping eye-popping sums of money on a Portland, Oregon, congressional race. 314 Action Fund, which is not known for spending big in congressional primaries, has spent $1.7 million in support of a single candidate in the 3rd Congressional District’s open Democratic primary, according to federal filings. That sum is equal to what the political action committee spent on independent expenditures supporting or opposing candidates during the entire 2022 election cycle.
314 Action Fund, which describes itself as helping to elect “Democrats with a background in science to public office,” is throwing its weight behind Maxine Dexter, a state representative and local doctor. The news outlet Jewish Insider floated Dexter as a potentially pro-Israel candidate before she entered the race.
By waiting until April to launch its spending blitz, 314 Action is able to delay disclosure of its donors until May 20. The election is scheduled for May 21, but ballots have already begun arriving to voters by mail. In other words, the identity of the donor or donors won’t be documented in campaign finance reports until it’s too late.
What is publicly known, however, is that former Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal, the sister of Rep. Pramila Jayapal, was considered the candidate to beat before the sudden influx of money last month.
And what The Intercept can reveal is that Susheela Jayapal is being targeted by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, which is secretly funneling money into the race by washing it through 314 Action, according to two Democratic members of Congress familiar with the arrangement.
The pro-Israel community telegraphed its intent to target Jayapal early on, primarily for suspicion that her politics on Israel–Palestine may align with her younger sister’s, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus who called for a ceasefire early in the current war on Gaza.
On December 5, a story landed in Jewish Insider, which closely tracks congressional primaries, headlined “Jayapal sister’s congressional candidacy alarming Portland Jewish leaders.” The article noted that “local pro-Israel advocates … have yet to coalesce behind a viable candidate,” and it named Dexter as a possibility. Given the politics of Portland and the surrounding area, the pro-Israel community had little chance of nominating a candidate unapologetically and unconditionally supportive of Israel’s war effort, but Dexter had potential. Dexter launched her campaign later that same day.
The last-minute spending in the race is enormous: on track to climb north of $3 million in a short period of time in an inexpensive media market. On Friday, a brand-new super PAC got involved with nearly $1 million worth of negative ads against Jayapal.
Some of the money directed to 314 Action — close to a million dollars by early April — had come from a single Los Angeles-based AIPAC donor, according to the members of Congress, who asked for anonymity to preserve professional and political relationships. The plan was openly discussed at a recent AIPAC fundraiser in Los Angeles, as well as a fundraiser in the Pacific Northwest, said the members of Congress, who learned about it from colleagues in attendance or were themselves in attendance.
AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project, has not spent any money on the race. AIPAC did not respond to requests for comment.
Jayapal and Eddy Morales, another candidate in the race, held a joint press conference Thursday to decry the lack of transparency and call on Dexter and 314 Action to open up about the identity of the donors. News cameras that were expected to attend, however, were instead covering a police crackdown at Portland State University, where students have been protesting against the war in Gaza and occupying the library.
Morales and Jayapal issued a joint statement following the press event, saying, “Maxine Dexter claims to be for transparency in politics, but she and 314 Action are engaged in a dishonest and cynical ploy to obscure the donors propping up her campaign until just one day before the primary. At a time when MAGA Republican mega-donors are interfering in Democratic primaries across the country, particularly against qualified candidates of color, voters deserve to know who is trying to buy this seat for a centrist candidate who doesn’t even live in the district.”
Dexter’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment. In a statement posted online, Dexter said she was “deeply disappointed to see a new dark money group enter this race to disparage one of my opponents.”
314 Action’s website states that it is “committed to transparency: although not required by law, we voluntarily disclose all our donors over $250 in a two year election cycle.” 314 Action did not respond to multiple requests to disclose its recent donors.
Jayapal launched her campaign in early November after Rep. Earl Blumenauer announced his retirement. As of December, pro-Israel groups had yet to coalesce behind a single candidate to oppose her, giving Jayapal a significant advantage, Jewish Insider warned at the time. “While the elder Jayapal, 61, had no discernible history of public engagement on Middle East policy until recently, her approach to the war between Israel and Hamas suggests there is little distance between the two siblings on such matters,” reported JI. “A pro-Israel leader in Portland, who asked to remain anonymous to protect his privacy, said there is growing concern among other like-minded local activists that Jayapal’s Middle East policy positions ‘will not differ that much from her sister.’”
The same article elevated Dexter as an alternative for pro-Israel voters to coalesce around, though she had yet to formally announce a bid. JI reported that Dexter “has been characterized as a pragmatic progressive but does not appear to have issued any statements on Middle East policy” and that she had told JI that “she has received ‘strong encouragement’ to run.”
Sharon Meieran, described by JI as the lone Jewish member of the Multnomah County Commission, told the outlet she was “excited about her potential candidacy.”
“I can’t speak to her views on Israel, but I was impressed that she attended an event hosted by Congregation Beth Israel in Portland last night to learn about the Zioness movement,” Meieran told JI. “The focus was on intersectional identities and how standing up for social justice and Zionism are not mutually exclusive, but rather are inextricably linked. Showing up and being willing to listen and learn matters, now more than ever, and Maxine walks that walk.”
Organizations supportive of Palestinians rights have since unsuccessfully tried to extract more from Dexter on her position. Last month, a coalition of local groups — Jewish Voice for Peace Portland, Healthcare Workers for Palestine Portland, Jewish-Palestinian Alliance of Oregon, American Council for Palestine, and Portland Democratic Socialists of America — organized a forum on the conflict and invited all the candidates. Dexter’s campaign manager responded that Dexter was busy that evening and couldn’t attend. The group offered to move the date, asking him to offer any available date. He declined. “Between her commitments at the hospital and the number of existing scheduled events, she is not able to add an additional forum at this time,” her campaign manager responded in an email provided to The Intercept.
The coalition asked if she would instead fill out a questionnaire laying out her positions. Her campaign manager stopped responding. Jayapal did respond to the questionnaire, saying she supports putting conditions on military aid to Israel, supports an immediate ceasefire, and would reject money from AIPAC or its affiliates.
On Thursday, campaigns in the district were informed by consultants who buy television ads that a brand-new political action committee, this one with the practically satirical name “Voters for Responsive Government,” had purchased nearly $1 million worth of airtime. There is no prior record of the PAC existing. It was registered on April 1. Had it been registered one day earlier, the PAC would be required to disclose its donors by now. Instead, it can withhold that information until May 20.
On Friday, the PAC went live with a website. The “About” page links to its Federal Election Commission filing, listing Los Angeles as the city where it was registered and attorney Cary Davidson as its treasurer. The PAC and Davidson did not respond to a request for comment.
“Voters for Responsive Government” launched with two negative ads targeting Jayapal on Friday. Neither ad mentions Israel or Gaza; one of them literally accuses Jayapal of abusing and starving cats and dogs, with a heartrending image of a suffering puppy and kitty. The attack ads set the new PAC’s strategy apart from 314 Action, which has so far spent only on positive ads boosting Dexter, apparently unwilling to be the vehicle for attack ads against a popular Democrat.
314 Action Fund’s largest disclosed contribution this cycle came from Ray Rothrock, who donated $500,000 on February 15. Rothrock, a venture capitalist, has said that the investment he’s “most proud of” has been in Check Point Software, an Israeli cybersecurity company where he serves as a board director. He was also an early investor in Toka, a startup geared toward fighting “terror and crime” that is backed by former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. (Rothrock did not respond to a request for comment.)
At the end of March, 314 Action Fund reported having just $1.4 million in cash on hand, meaning new contributions were required to cover the spending underway now.
Relying on “pro-science” or vaguely named, brand-new PACs in order to obscure a donor’s true agenda blows a gaping hole in campaign finance law, which is based on the idea that donors should be able to give and speak freely, but voters have a right to know where the money is coming from, and on whose behalf they are speaking.
AIPAC previously pulled such a maneuver in Manhattan during the 2022 cycle, routing at least $400,000 through a super PAC called New York Progressive, attacking Yuh-Line Niou in a successful effort to elect Dan Goldman, now a member of Congress. Only after the race was over did AIPAC claim credit for the spending.
Pramila Jayapal, meanwhile, has a week to learn whether AIPAC will be successful in recruiting a challenger to her. Multiple local elected officials already turned down such entreaties, relaying the recruitment effort to Jayapal’s campaign or its allies, according to a campaign spokesperson. A recent field poll in Seattle, where Jayapal is an incumbent, tested Jayapal’s popularity as well as potential messages that could be used against her, such as the claim that she is “too extreme” or “out of touch.” According to local Democrats in Washington’s 46th District, one tested message in the poll asked if it bothered voters that Jayapal opposed President Joe Biden sometimes on principle from a progressive direction.
After learning of the recruitment drive, the Jayapal campaign put its own poll in the field. The survey found her with a 69-19 percent favorability rating. When told Jayapal supported a ceasefire in Gaza, 40 percent of Democrats said they were much more likely to support her, and another 29 percent said they’d be more likely. Just 7 percent said that calling for a ceasefire made them less likely to support her.
In Oregon’s 5th Congressional District, Democratic Majority for Israel, an AIPAC-aligned group, has endorsed Janelle Bynum but has not spent on her behalf. Instead, 314 Action Fund has spent $180,000 supporting her. The link to science is even more tenuous with Bynum than it is with Dexter. Bynum previously studied to be an engineer, though is now a McDonald’s franchise owner.