Pro-Israel groups spent big to oust two Squad members in primaries

Incumbents rarely lose primaries, and 2024 was no different. Just four members of the U.S. House of Representatives overall — two Republicans and two Democrats — came up short in renomination contests over the past six-plus months of primary races. Notably, both of the Democrats who lost their primaries — Reps. Jamaal Bowman of New York and Cori Bush of Missouri — were defeated in contests heavily shaped by the involvement of outside groups motivated by the conflict in Israel and Gaza.

Both of these races put on display the ongoing role of heightened disagreements over U.S. policy toward Israel within the Democratic Party, which fueled the intervention of outside groups focused on the issue throughout this cycle's Democratic primaries. This intraparty dynamic also sparked particularly well-funded opposition campaigns against both Bowman and Bush, who are part of "the Squad," an informal but high-profile group of around nine progressive House Democrats who have drawn criticism for their outspoken pro-Palestinian stances. Although prominent national progressive groups spent resources to help defend Squad members, pro-Israel groups vastly outspent them.

Here then is a look at how groups focused on American relations with Israel and Gaza acted — and at other times did not — to influence the primary contests involving Squad members, and Democratic primaries in 2024 more broadly.

Pro-Israel groups focused on two Squad members

After Hamas attacked Israel in October 2023, the Democratic Party found itself mired in internal conflicts over the party's stance toward Israel and Gaza. Long critical of Israel and its policies toward Palestinians, the Squad led calls for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Meanwhile, some fellow Democrats and pro-Israel groups argued these high-profile progressives were insufficiently supportive of Israel or even that their rhetoric was antisemitic. Amid this atmosphere, five of the nine House Democrats associated with the Squad label (to varying degrees) faced primary challenges bolstered by their position on the Israel-Hamas conflict.

In the end, Bowman and Bush went down to defeat, making them the only incumbent Democrats to lose renomination in Congress this cycle. On top of that, Bowman, Bush, Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar and Pennsylvania Rep. Summer Lee had four of the nine weakest primary performances out of all House Democrats seeking reelection this cycle. Among the five Squad members who had to deal with contested primaries, only New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez could be said to have handily dispatched her principal primary challenger.

Pro-Israel groups clearly played a significant role in challenges to the Squad, investing gobs of money to take down these progressive incumbents: Of the $38.4 million spent by outside groups across all primaries involving Squad members, almost two-thirds ($24.7 million) came from the pockets of groups that support politicians who are committed to bolstering the U.S.-Israel relationship, based on data compiled by OpenSecrets.

Anti-Squad forces as a whole vastly outspent pro-Squad entities, $30.7 million to $7.6 million, with pro-Israel groups accounting for most of that money. Far and away, the biggest player was the bipartisan American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), whose affiliated United Democracy Project (UDP) super PAC spent $23.2 million against Squad members or in support of their primary challengers. The other pro-Israel group of note was the Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI), a Democratic super PAC that invested $1.5 million in these races. The pro-crypto Fairshake PAC ($3.5 million spent) and the Mainstream Democrats PAC ($1.5 million) were the other two major anti-Squad forces here, although those groups aren't organized primarily around the issue of Israel in U.S. politics.

Three major national progressive outfits did spend to defend incumbent Squad members, but at a far less prodigious rate. The Justice Democrats forked out $3.4 million and the Working Families Party spent $2.0 million backing Squad renomination bids, while the campaign arm of the Congressional Progressive Caucus — the leftmost party caucus on Capitol Hill — spent another $275,000.

Of course, not all of these races attracted nearly the same amount of attention. In fact, $36.3 million of the $38.4 million in total outside spending in Squad primaries by pro- and anti-Squad groups came in just two contests: Bowman's tilt against Westchester County Executive George Latimer and Bush's against St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell. UDP and DMFI only spent in those two races out of the five contests involving Squad members, while AIPAC used its donor portal to funnel at least $5.5 million in direct individual contributions to Latimer and Bell — but not to the main primary challengers to Lee, Ocasio-Cortez or Omar.

But while pro-Israel groups went two for two when they jumped into contests against Squad members, other factors were at play that complicate the narrative about their sway. Fact is, Bowman and Bush were arguably the most vulnerable Squad members this cycle, making them perhaps the lowest-hanging fruit for anti-Squad groups. In his first reelection campaign in 2022, Bowman only won 54 percent in his primary against multiple challengers. He then attracted ample negative attention last September when he was censured and had to pay a fine for pulling a fire alarm in a Capitol office building before a House vote to avoid a government shutdown, and was found earlier this year to have engaged with unfounded conspiracy theories about 9/11 on an old blog. Bush had a better 2022 showing than Bowman — she won 70 percent — but was also dogged by scandal as she faced federal investigations into alleged misuse of funds to pay her security team, including her husband.

Another lurking differentiator was Bowman and Bush's lack of previous officeholding experience, the kind of service that establishes deeper ties to local party bigwigs and voters. Bowman and Bush defeated incumbents in 2020 primaries as outsiders: Bowman had been a middle school principal, while Bush had entered politics as an activist after the 2014 shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. By comparison, four Squad members previously served in their state legislatures — Lee, Omar, Illinois Rep. Delia Ramirez and Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib — while two others served as city councilors — Reps. Greg Casar of Texas (Austin) and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts (Boston). Now, Ocasio-Cortez also lacked prior service, but she is the most prominent Squad member and has raised the most money in the 2024 cycle ($9.0 million as of June 30, with Tlaib next with $7.3 million as of mid-July).

These factors combine with the intervention of pro-Israel forces to help explain why strong primary challengers entered the races against Bowman and Bush. For example, AIPAC encouraged Latimer to challenge Bowman, and as a long-serving county executive and well-known face in local politics, he had the ties to raise a lot of money and mount a serious campaign. Although he had help from AIPAC's outside spending, Latimer also outraised Bowman in their campaign, $6.4 million to $5.7 million as of late June. For his part, Bell had established himself in the St. Louis area after the unrest in Ferguson, winning a seat on Ferguson's city council in 2015 and then winning the post of St. Louis County's prosecuting attorney in 2018. Bell initially entered Missouri's 2024 Senate race, but switched to challenge Bush in October 2023 amid the uproar over the conflict in Israel. He went on to markedly outraise her, $4.8 million to $2.9 million as of mid-July.

Conversely, more highly touted figures were unwilling to run against the other Squad members. Of the other three who had primary challengers, Omar seemed perhaps the most endangered, after she defeated former Minneapolis City Councilor Don Samuels by only 2 percentage points in 2022. But while Samuels decided to run again in 2024, anti-Squad groups only ended up spending $110,000 against Omar — perhaps because Samuels wasn't their preferred candidate. Jewish Insider previously reported that AIPAC wanted a sitting Minneapolis councilwoman to run against Omar — she declined — and the Times of Israel reported that pro-Israel groups felt Omar was taking her primary more seriously and that their spending wouldn't be enough to help Samuels. Tellingly, Omar ended up outraising Samuels $6.8 million to $1.4 million as of late July.

In theory, Lee also could have faced a more serious challenge, having won by only 1 point in her 2022 primary for the open 12th District in and around Pittsburgh. But in her 2024 reelection bid, Lee's only primary opponent was Edgewood Borough Council member Bhavini Patel, whom Lee outraised $2.7 million to $700,000. As for Ocasio-Cortez, she faced a quixotic, mostly self-funded challenge from former insurance executive Mary Dolan (who initially ran against Bowman). Dolan mainly garnered attention from conservative media outlets — an unlikely place to win over Democratic primary voters.

How Israel-focused groups did in primaries

The groups that played a part in defeating Bowman and Bush also had a pretty strong track record when it came to endorsements in other primary races this season. AIPAC endorsed 118 Democratic incumbents in Senate and House races, but just three Democratic candidates in open races and two (Latimer and Bell) who were challenging incumbents. All of their endorsees won, however. (AIPAC also endorsed 190 Republicans in their primaries — 185 were incumbents — and its only defeat came in an incumbent-versus-incumbent GOP contest in Alabama where the group endorsed both contenders). Meanwhile, UDP, the super PAC affiliated with AIPAC, went four for five in the Democratic primaries it spent money in, with attorney Joanna Weiss's loss in California's 47th District top-two primary as the lone exception. Weiss was also the only Democratic candidate of 102 endorsed by DMFI who lost in a 2024 primary.

Tellingly, J Street, another Israel-focused group that's more pro-Palestinian and critical of AIPAC, didn't have as much success with its endorsements as AIPAC/UDP or DMFI — in part because it didn't spend any money on primaries in this cycle. Now, all 109 Democratic incumbents that J Street endorsed won renomination, although nearly half of those were incumbents that AIPAC also endorsed. But J Street found less success in open primary races, with only 19 of 34 endorsees advancing to the general election. This included defeats in all four open primaries in which a J Street-backed candidate faced an AIPAC/UDP- or DMFI-supported candidate. In Maryland's 3rd District, J Street-backed former U.S. Capitol police officer Harry Dunn lost to state Sen. Sarah Elfreth, whom UDP spent $4.2 million to support. Meanwhile, J Street-backed candidates lost to DMFI-endorsed contenders in Arizona's 3rd District, New York's 1st District and Oregon's 5th District.

Ultimately, pro-Israel groups made gains in Congress by taking out two of the more vocal critics of U.S. support for Israel while also influencing the direction of other primaries. Nevertheless, the Democratic Party remains divided in its views toward Israel and the conflict in Gaza. As long as the conflict continues, the issue could cause further party ruptures — and affect how outside groups lobby and electioneer for or against candidates.