The AIPAC backlash

0:02Noel King:Concerns about dark money in U.S. politics date back years, at least to Citizens United, the 2010 Supreme Court decision that removed barriers on corporate spending in elections. During midterm cycles and presidential races, there's always grumbling about dark money. And this year in Michigan, it sometimes seemed like the whole race. The pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC spent about$30 million boosting the campaign of Haley Stevens. Her opponent, Abdullah Syed, drew attention to this again and again, and she lost. APAC is in a difficult position. Its support can now be a liability. And some people are questioning the way the organization disperses money.

0:36I'm going to sound crazy when I say this, but Crush Magapack is affiliated with a different PAC called Save Democracy. And Save Democracy has received$100 ,000 from United Democracy Project, which is APAC Super PAC. So sometimes the layers here are two or three or even four PACs deep.

0:55Noel King:Coming up on Today Explained, the backlash against AIPAC.

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1:59This is Today Explained. I'm David Dayen. I am the executive editor of The American Prospect, a magazine about ideas, politics, and power.

2:10Noel King:What is AIPAC? AIPAC started out as a lobbying organization. It was inaugurated in the 1950s. It's seen and has historically been seen as one of the more powerful lobbying organizations in Washington. And its goal is to strengthen and maintain the relationship between U.S. and Israel. I said, it seems to me that we should really be going to Washington. And that instead of sitting here in New York and talking about these things, why don't we make a determined effort? All of us go to Washington. And that was in 1960. They have annual conventions where pretty much everybody across the political spectrum attends and gives speeches.

2:56One of the many things that I admire about AIPAC is that you fight for this common cause from the bottom up. The lifeblood of AIPAC is here in this room. When the United States stands with Israel, the chances of peace really rise and rises exponentially. But something changed about five years ago, and AIPAC was not content to just lobby members of Congress. They wanted to influence who actually got to Washington. And they began to engage in the use of super PACs to run advertising and other forms of political engagement in campaigns, and particularly in primary campaigns that determine who actually gets to a general election.

3:47Noel King:Why did they want to influence who got to Washington? Maybe that sounds like an obvious question, but it wasn't happening before. So why did it start happening? One thing that happened is in 2018, we saw the rise of what is known as the squad. And that included Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. If you want to know what an unfolding genocide looks like, open your eyes. Ilhan Omar. I believe AIPAC is toxic. Rashida Tlaib. The American people are tired of watching their tax dollars fuel death, destruction and endless war. People who had very strident views, particularly about the U.S.-Israel relationship.

4:28Those progressive Democrats were very successful in winning safe seat races. And I'm not in their head, but it could be that AIPAC wanted to try to provide a counterweight and stop that from happening and use their resources, very prodigious resources, to spend money in these campaigns and to make sure that didn't happen again.

4:55Noel King:All right. So once upon a time, an endorsement from AIPAC was a powerful thing. It could be a huge benefit to a candidate. What exactly did it get you when AIPAC said, this is our guy, this is our gal? I mean, in practical terms, it probably got you$5 ,000 because that's the limit on a corporate PAC. But because AIPAC was powerful and also a bipartisan organization, getting your name on the list of AIPAC and Dorseys was something that you could tout in your election. It was something that showed that you had a commitment to what, you know, has historically been an important bond between the U.S.

5:38and Israel. And it was it was I think it certainly wasn't as controversial in the years before 2023 than it is today.

5:51Noel King:So what changed exactly? Well, I think what happened is the war in Gaza is what happened. And, you know, after October 7th, and we saw what, you know, a lot of people have termed a genocide against the Palestinian people, I think that because of the changing attitudes around the U.S.-Israel relationship more broadly, where large numbers of Americans now view that relationship negatively, I think that has changed what the meaning of an AIPAC endorsement really is. What do we know about how much money AIPAC is specifically spending this midterm cycle? Well, it's a hard question to answer. If you go by the Federal Election Commission disclosures, AIPAC has raised about$100 million this election cycle and has spent in independent expenditures, and that's TV ads and mailers and these kinds of things, has spent about$28 million.

6:53But that is an undercount. When I say those numbers, I am going by the specific super PAC that APAC has created. It's called United Democracy Project. However, United Democracy Project has sent money to other PACs, about$9 million worth. I think the real innovation here is the transfer of money from, in this case, pro-Israel PACs to these pop-up PACs, these shell PACs that are created specifically for a particular election and then funded through AIPAC and, you know, in some cases, other pro-Israel PACs. They are sort of laundering, in some ways, this money through to other PACs. So those other PACs run the ads and it doesn't look like it's coming from APAC.

7:48A perfect example is was the first real major primary state of the cycle, which was Illinois. There were four open seats in the Chicago area that are pretty strongly blue. And millions of dollars went from APAC Super PAC, which is called United Democracy Project, into these two pop-up packs. One called Elect Chicago Women. Melissa B for Congress. ECW is responsible for the content of this ad. And the other called Affordable Chicago Now. Our community is worth fighting for. ACN is responsible for the content of this ad. And those two packs then funded ads for four candidates in those four open seat races.

8:36Now, if you were watching that on television, You would say, hey, elect Chicago women. That sounds like a good idea. I'm going to watch this ad. Or Affordable Chicago Now. I like affordability. The truth is that this money was coming from AIPAC into these ads and supporting candidates that were generally supportive of the U.S.-Israel relationship. Now, those four races ended up, APAC won two of them and they lost two of them. And it was really interesting, I think, where they were successful and where they weren't. In one race up in the Evanston area, it became a big issue that APAC actually was behind these ads from Elect Chicago Women and Affordable Chicago Now.

9:27And the candidate, she was a state senator named Laura Fine, actually was harmed, I think, in the election by this fact that this got out and that this became a major issue in the campaign. I am a Jewish American who has family who were nearly killed in the Kempis League. And how can you take millions from AIPAC? Millions from AIPAC? And she ended up finishing, I believe, third in that primary. A few minutes ago, I received a gracious call from Senator Fein conceding. Despite having millions of dollars supporting her and behind her. AIPAC found out the hard way. The 9th District is not for sale.

10:12There were other races where this wasn't sort of as explicit a factor in the election itself. And those candidates were able to win.

10:26Noel King:This all sounds quite shady, and yet I wonder how unusual is it for an interest group in politics to be doing something like this? I think it's pretty unusual. It's not something I've seen a whole lot of. We saw it to a smaller degree in some other election cycles two years ago, four years ago, but it has become a concerted strategy this time. And so there are these pop-up packs that are specific to a campaign, but also some established packs that have been around for a while are receiving money from APAC and affiliated groups and using that, deploying that in campaigns. And you can start to, like, the mind kind of boggles when you try to figure out where this money's coming from, who it's supporting, where it's intended to go to, et cetera.

11:19Noel King:Last year, Senator Bernie Sanders comes out with a statement. He denounces Benjamin Netanyahu's government for what he says is the, quote, extermination of Gaza. He calls for an end to military aid to Israel. He says people are starving to death. Now, AIPAC attacks Sanders' statement, calling it a hate-filled rant and blood libel, and pointing out that in his statement, he didn't mention Hamas' attack on Israel. So AIPAC is now public in a way that historically it has not been, and it is tying criticism of Israel to anti-Semitic sentiment. Does this help or hurt AIPAC's cause, do you think? Well, I mean, it's a very good question.

12:02I think it depends on the messenger. But the issue, I think, is that there's a very straight line between how this money is being used, transferred, spent, concealed, etc., and a broader critique that I think a lot of Democrats have about money in politics. And so when AIPAC decides, OK, we're going to respond to criticism that, you know, obviously is rooted in in what AIPAC believes and the conditions in Israel and Gaza and the West Bank, et cetera, to saying, you know, any any criticism of what we're doing is anti-Semitic. I think people who see this as a broader problem about money in politics see that as an extremely cynical take.

12:56I don't think that really connects to one of the big reasons why people are really objecting to this, which is that they don't want to see their politicians essentially bought.

13:10Noel King:But it's additionally fraught because there are anti-Semitic tropes where, you know, a cabal of Jews is secretly controlling the governments and finance, right? Like, it feels triply complicated. Yeah. I mean, look, I'm Jewish, and, you know, in having to cover this, I have to go through, you know, try to follow money from, you know, Jewish groups from one place to another, and that can certainly be uncomfortable. And it does add some weight to this issue. But I feel like we are talking here not about somebody's religion, but about a policy. And it's a twofold policy. One is the policy of the U.S.

14:00government funding to the tune of billions of dollars, the destruction of an entire region, and also the policy of allowing super PACs to dictate who ends up making decisions in Washington.

14:26Noel King:That's David Dayen of The American Prospect. Coming up four years ago, APEC spent millions of dollars to boost the opponent of a Michigan congressman named Andy Levin. Levin lost his race. What's he think now?

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18:28This is Today Explained.

18:34Noel King:I'm Noelle King. Four years ago, Michigan lost a seat in Congress, and Representative Andy Levin ended up running in a Democratic primary race against Representative Haley Stevens. AIPAC spent about$4 million to help get Stevens elected, and that time she won. I talked to Levin this morning and asked him how he got on AIPAC's bad side. It was a couple things, Noel. First of all, I think it's just who I am. I'm not just Jewish. I am really like an out there joyously Jewish person I have mezuzahs on all my doors I had in Congress and I was a synagogue president until I won my primary then I figured I better resign because I was, you know, when I was going to Congress and so to have someone like me be so clear about the need to stop warring and start peacemaking in Israel and Palestine.

19:33And the strongest voice in the House, with the simple proposition that there's no way to have a secure and safe future for my people, the Jewish people, in the Holy Land, unless we fully realize the political and human rights of the Palestinian people, that really was difficult for APAC, I guess. And then I introduced a bill called the Two-State Solution Act, which by today's standards, when many, many members of the House and the Senate are voting to condition aid to Israel or stop a certain military aid to Israel, this bill of mine simply said, we need to do everything we can to bring the Israelis and the Palestinians together to pursue a two-state solution.

20:23And there were multiple provisions about helping democracy building in Palestine and pushing for efforts among Israelis to work together with Palestinians, those kind of things.

20:36Noel King:Tell us what happened in your primary election in 2022 and the role that you think AIPAC played. They do a very good opinion research and whatever boosted Haley Stevens or tore down Andy Levin, that's what they did. And they did, mostly they did ads that were very positive about Haley and they just flooded the airwaves with these ads. I mean, and it's also important to note that it wasn't just AIPAC. I believe AIPAC actually spent about four and a half million dollars. That's just dark money, though, Noel. They also raised a lot of what's called hard money or like what people think of as the regular contributions for my opponent.

21:14Noel King:I think people listening are very curious about what it looks like when AIPAC decides you're not their candidate. And I think what I hear you saying is instead of there being ads saying Andy Levin, Congressman Andy Levin is not fit for the job or Congressman Andy Levin is, you know, bad for Israel, you're telling me instead AIPAC money went to ads boosting your opponent, Haley Stevens. That's what I would have seen. Mostly, yes. Mostly they were positive ads about my opponent. To a regular viewer, It looks the same as any other TV ad that's directly for that person. You know, Noel, they decide how much they want to go negative or how much positive and in what ways based on polling and opinion research like focus groups.

22:03So if you look at all the campaigns that they've been involved in, they go more negative sometimes, more positive sometimes. It really depends on – whatever will win for them is what they do.

22:17Noel King:We talked in the first half of the show with a reporter named David Dayen, who's been looking into how AIPAC spends its money. And we talked about how this can become fraught, because AIPAC will say, if you criticize us, essentially it is criticizing Israel or even criticizing Jews. And yet there is also a dark history of anti-Semitism and allegations that, you know, Jews control finance, control all the money, control politics. How do you think about that tension these days? Well, so to me, there's a few strands about this. I grew up in suburban Detroit, right where, you know, in the district.

22:53And I faced a lot of anti-Semitism. And people said to me, you can't be Jewish. You don't have horns. Or your nose, you've had a big nose. Or your nose isn't big enough to be Jewish. And so I've faced anti-Semitism my whole life. this idea that AIPAC pushes that criticizing Israel is anti-Semitic is ludicrous, and it just needs to be called out. If you say, push all the Jews into the sea, that is anti-Semitic. But if you say Israel is an apartheid state, for example, I may agree or disagree with that, but that's not anti-Semitic. If you say Israel committed genocide in Gaza, which I think is undeniable that it did, tragically, that you can't say that that's anti-Semitic.

23:42But AIPAC definitely pushes that line. And not only is it wrong, Noelle, but it's harmful to the vital fight against anti-Semitism, which is a real problem in America and other places in the world.

23:56Noel King:Let me ask you about last week's primary election in Michigan. So this was, in some ways, a similar scenario. AIPAC again spent millions of dollars to back Haley Stevens. This time there was a different outcome. Why do you think Dr. Abdul-Assad won that race? Well, there's a lot that's changed in the last four years. I mean, but the first thing I want to say is what a fantastic candidate Abdul is. I mean, he's just a brilliant public speaker in a large setting. He's great at retail politics. He built a fantastic ground game. But we're living in very different times. I mean, we have had Israel's war in Gaza.