Reses, who’s been in his role since Vance and President Donald Trump took office in January 2025, is perhaps the closest Jewish official in Vance’s orbit. He has had a close relationship with the vice president since Vance’s 2022 Senate campaign in Ohio. 

A source familiar with the matter confirmed NBC News’ initial report that Reses informed Vance of his decision months ago, after his wife became pregnant. Vance said in a statement on Thursday that he will “miss him dearly, but he won’t be far, and I plan to keep his counsel close until our paths cross again.” Reses’ plans for his next role are currently unknown.

Vance has recently drawn the ire of some Jewish Republicans who say that he has refused to confront antisemitism on the right, including from former Fox news host Tucker Carlson. (Carlson’s son was also a Vance staffer until April, when he left to set up a political consulting firm.) A New York Magazine profile published in March suggested that Reses was on board with Vance’s approach, and revealed that Reses used his private X account to amplify voices calling on Jews to embrace, rather than resist, the Christian nationalist current surging within the GOP.

Reses has been “by my side for my whole career in public life,” Vance said in a statement.

“I can’t imagine having been on this life-changing journey without him,” Vance said. “From day one of my time as a Senator-elect, I could not have asked for a more loyal and discerning advisor and friend as my chief of staff.”

The personal bond between the two men was on display in January, when Vance took part in Reses’ wedding to Rachel Altman at a synagogue in Rockville, Maryland, delivering a Jewish prayer under the chuppah. Chabad of Princeton University, Reses’ alma mater, posted a photo of the couple with the vice president, celebrating the occasion as an expression of Jewish pride.

That closeness, and Reses’ reported alignment with Vance’s stance on right-wing antisemitism, have not spared Reses from becoming a target of antisemites. In one instance, a white-nationalist website ran an article about him headlined, “Another Nail in the Coffin — Jew Runs J. D. Vance.”

A Jewish Telegraphic Agency profile published in 2024, when Vance was selected as Trump’s running mate, traced Reses’ Jewish identity and his journey from a Democratic-leaning Jewish teenager in southern New Jersey, whose grandfather escaped the Holocaust in Lithuania, to one of the most influential conservatives in Washington. His trajectory included internships for Hillary Clinton and John Kerry, a political conversion at Princeton and stints at the Heritage Foundation and in the office of Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley.

On Thursday, Republican leaders and Trump administration officials sang Reses’ praises in statements shared with JTA.

“Jacob Reses has been an invaluable, loyal, and trusted hand to Vice President Vance and President Trump,” said Matt Brooks, CEO of the Republican Jewish Coalition. “As a proud Jewish American, whose own family story carries the weight of our people’s history, Jacob brought both conviction and clarity to one of the most consequential roles in Washington.” Brooks added that the RJC has “no doubt he will continue to play a critical role moving forward.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who’s seen as a possible challenger to Vance for the 2028 presidential nomination, said that Reses served Vance and the entire administration “with distinction,” and that he “understands the moment we’re in and he spent every day fighting to deliver results for the President.”

Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, said he was proud to have Reses “by my side in negotiating some of the toughest deals for the President.”

“Don’t let Jacob fool you — beneath his kind exterior he’s a killer,” Witkoff said. “It’s been a delight to get to know him through the Vice President, and our foreign adventures from Israel to Pakistan have been historic.” 

He added, “We haven’t seen the last of him.”

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State Assembly member Jasmeet Bains, a moderate, received around $500,000 in ad buys from Democratic Majority for Israel, according to a Sacramento Bee review of Federal Election Commission filings, in her bid to represent the state’s 22nd district, in the Central Valley. 

In the days after California’s June 2 primary, Bains appeared on track to come in second, meaning that she would face off against Republican incumbent Rep. David Valadao — who has pro-Israel lobbyist AIPAC’s backing — in November.

But late Tuesday, the Associated Press formally called the race for school board member Randy Villegas over Bains. As of press time, Villegas held 32% of the vote to Bains’ 27%, with 90% of total votes tallied. Valadao was in first place with 40% of the vote.

The result sets up another front line in the Democratic Party’s effort to gain control of Congress amid rapidly shifting voter sentiment about Israel. Democrats are hoping to flip the 22nd district, where most residents are Latino, after statewide redistricting this year.

Villegas, who is backed by Jewish progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders, called for a ceasefire in Gaza in January 2024 and has called Israel a “genocidal regime.”  According to FEC filings, he received support from American Priorities PAC, a pro-Palestinian super PAC; multiple media outlets also noted that Villegas had backing from a Republican PAC.

During the campaign, DMFI president Brian Romick told Jewish Insider that Villegas “consistently has an anti-Israel record.” But most of the group’s spending in the race did not mention Israel. Instead, the group bought ads insinuating that Villegas had been complicit in covering up abuse of minors at his local school district. The ads were misleading, local media reported. 

In a sign of how pervasive anti-Israel sentiment has grown among Democrats, Bains, too, said Israel committed genocide in Gaza prior to DMFI’s entry into the race. After receiving its backing, the candidate walked back her stance.

“While we’re disappointed at the outcome of this race, we remain enthusiastic about our record so far this primary cycle,” Romick told JTA in a statement. He pointed to DMFI’s backing of Texas Democrat Johnny Garcia against Maureen Galindo, and the success of another DMFI-backed candidate elsewhere in California.

Yet for DMFI, the loss adds to a mixed record in a primary season that has seen Democrats turn sharply against pro-Israel spending. Other candidates endorsed by pro-Israel groups in Illinois, New Jersey and elsewhere have lost to critics of Israel.

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The bill, a House companion to Jewish American Security Act in the Senate, would increase Nonprofit Security Grant Program funding to $1 billion, extend funding to Jewish organizations and allow additional funds to be directed towards law enforcement.

It would also mandate that the Department of Education appoint a dedicated antisemitism coordinator and force social media platforms to explain their handling of online antisemitism.

“Jewish communities across the United States are facing a real and growing security crisis, and the federal government has a responsibility to ensure that all Americans can gather, worship, and live openly and safely as who they are,” Eric Fingerhut, the CEO and president of the Jewish Federations of North America, which has promoted the bill, said in a statement.

Goldman, a Jewish New York Democrat, cited the March car-ramming attack on Temple Israel in Detroit, saying in a statement that the attack underscored “how essential security is for every single Jewish institution” and that the government should support those costs.

“We should not have to pay a Jewish tax to be able to go to synagogue, and this will not only increase the funding, but it also expands the range of areas that can be funded by the Nonprofit Security Grant to include, very clearly, security personnel and other types of security that have not currently included and that are now clearly essential,” Goldman said.

Lawler, a New York Republican, said in a statement that houses of worship and nonprofit institutions should be “focused on serving their communities, not worrying about whether they have the resources to protect their members from violence.”

“I can walk into my church without passing a security guard stationed outside,” Lawler, who is Catholic, said. “Jewish Americans don’t have that luxury, and it’s outrageous, and it should anger each and every one of us.”

The bill adds to a growing list of attempts to advance antisemitism legislation in Congress, including the Antisemitism Response and Prevention Act, which was introduced by progressives in the House, and the Antisemitism Awareness Act, which failed to pass despite backing by Jewish groups.

On Wednesday during a press conference in Washington D.C., Lawler and Goldman were joined by a host of Jewish leaders, including representatives from the Anti-Defamation League, Jewish Council for Public Affairs and American Jewish Committee as well as organizations affiliated with the Reform and Orthodox movements.

Amy Spitalnick, the CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, threw her support behind the bill Wednesday, saying in a statement that it is “vital that we invest in whole-of-government and whole-of-society approaches that will keep Jewish and all communities safe.”

“Make no mistake: There is no truly inclusive, pluralistic democracy unless antisemitism is addressed and Jews are safe,” Spitalnick said. “So, too, does Jewish safety require protecting the democratic norms and values that have long protected us — and we will continue to reject the false choice we’re too often offered between countering antisemitism and protecting our democracy and our rights.”

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Davidson, who is running for Congress and used to serve on the board of Bet Am Shalom Synagogue in White Plains, New York, immediately called up Rabbi Lester Bronstein, who retired from the synagogue in 2024. (Davidson’s son was Bronstein’s final bar mitzvah student.)

“That’s my Rabbi!” Davidson wrote on Instagram, adding, “You inspire me every day in my work to protect our immigrant neighbors and realize our American — and Jewish — promise to welcome the stranger.”

Davidson is no stranger to opposing ICE, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. As a legislator in Rockland County just northwest of New York City, Davidson sponsored legislation earlier this year that would restrict how county employees can interact with ICE. 

“He and I are very much in lockstep,” Davidson told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in an interview.

Davidson, who converted to Judaism in 2004, credits Jewish values such as tikkun olam, or repairing the world, and “welcoming the stranger,” as well as her time on her synagogue’s board, with driving her public service.

With the primary coming on June 23, Davidson is vying for the Democratic nomination to unseat Republican congressman Mike Lawler in November. Lawler is being backed by AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobbying group, whose super PAC has $95 million in its war chest.

Davidson is a Jewish candidate running in one of the country’s most heavily Jewish districts — New York’s 17th — and a district that is seen as vulnerable to being flipped by the Democrats, having voted for Kamala Harris in 2024. 

As Democratic voters in deep-blue areas are electing a growing number of staunch Israel critics to Congress, Davidson is pitching herself as a candidate who’s committed to supporting Israel — a commitment shared by the staunchly pro-Israel Lawler — while marrying that with a liberal agenda and commitment to fighting Donald Trump.

“To Jews that have felt lost in the Democratic party, as I’ve heard over and over again, who’ve felt homeless — I’ve said from the beginning, you have a home in my campaign,” Davidson said, adding that she wants to “reunite this party that is so sharply divided.”

Davidson wrote about her personal connection to Israel in a 2025 position paper, which included a trip to Israel with her husband and two children five years after she converted to Judaism. Her teenage daughter also traveled to Israel with her summer camp, Camp Havaya, just two months before the Oct. 7, 2023 attack. “For me and for my family, championing the sanctity and safety of Israel is not an abstract political stance or foreign policy issue,” Davidson wrote, instead calling it “deeply personal.”

Davidson trailed her opponent Cait Conley, a former Biden national security adviser, 29% to 22% according to the latest poll, which was commissioned a month ago by a pro-veterans group that endorsed Conley and is spending $1 million to boost her. A previous poll conducted in late April had Davidson ahead of Conley, 26% to 15%. 

Effie Phillips-Staley, the staunchly pro-Palestinian candidate who drew backlash after appearing on streamer Hasan Piker’s show, commissioned the April poll and sat in third in both surveys with single-digit percentage points.

Mondaire Jones, the former congressman who represented much of the current 17th district, endorsed Davidson last year and said she would be “a real, bipartisan leader willing to stand up to her own party if it means protecting lower Hudson Valley residents,” referring to the district’s geographic area that includes Rockland and Putnam Counties, as well as parts of Westchester and Dutchess counties.

Davidson told JTA that she would “stand strong against antisemitism” and be a “strong voice for Israel” if elected, as well as a “strong voice for clean water, public schools, our daughter’s reproductive rights [and] so many of the other values that we share.”

Throughout Davidson’s time on the board of Bet Am Shalom, a Reconstructionist synagogue, Bronstein — who was a rabbi there for more than 35 years — said she exuded natural leadership qualities.

“She came in with no agenda other than to help and do her part and contribute in whatever way she was needed,” he said, calling her a “great team player” and “coalition builder” in the role. “She was so clearly a leader type, that the board people immediately latched onto her.”

One moment that has stuck with Bronstein was a speech Davidson gave on the second night of Rosh Hashanah in 2018. During it, she spoke about issues including police violence; the Flint, Michigan, water crisis; disproportionate suicide statistics among LGBTQ people; long-term illnesses contraced by 9/11 first responders; and the first Trump administration’s immigration policies. 

She brought up NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick, who never played after openly supporting the Black Lives Matter movement, as an example of someone who sacrificed his livelihood to stand up for what he believes in, then asked congregants, “In this year that we begin today, what are your works going to be? What are you prepared to sacrifice? And what will you stand for?”

“It was a very strong sermon — you know, it stuck with me,” Bronstein said.

Among the issues at play in the NY-17 race, Jewish-related issues, including antisemitism and Israel, have played a major role.

They came to the fore in a particularly unique way when Lawler was confronted in a Capitol Hill bar by Sen. Rand Paul’s son in May. William Paul, who mistakenly thought Lawler was Jewish, told the congressman that if anti-Israel GOP incumbent Thomas Massie lost his upcoming Kentucky primary it would be because of “your people.” (Massie did lose the primary, and Lawler, who is Irish-Italian Catholic, later joked, “I am so proud of my people” at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s “America 250” gala.”)

Asked about that incident, Davidson said antisemitism “has reared its ugly head” during the campaign, and said it exemplified how people “feel like they have the license to attack and say those kinds of things that I don’t believe we’d say about any other community.” Davidson said she doesn’t tolerate antisemitic remarks being directed at anyone, including the person “who will presumably be my opponent in the fall.”

Davidson said she supports and has a personal appreciation for the need to bolster security for houses of worship — both as “a mom who drops her kid off at Hebrew school,” and as a Bet Am Shalom board member who was required to to wear a panic button around her neck while volunteering as a greeter for High Holiday services.

She supports the statewide bill to enact 50-foot buffer zones outside houses of worship, which lawmakers introduced in response to pro-Palestinian demonstrations held outside of synagogues hosting Israeli real estate events that included promotion of West Bank settlements. 

Davidson said she supports the State of Israel while opposing the Benjamin Netanyahu-led government, similar to how she opposes the Donald Trump administration while being pro-America. 

Some of Davidson’s positions put her in the minority of Democrats regarding Israel. Only seven of 47 Senate Democrats voted “no” on a pair of recent, Bernie Sanders-led resolutions to block certain weapons sales to Israel. Davidson said she’d want to speak with New York Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer about their reasoning, and would have likely voted “no” alongside them if she were in the U.S. Senate. 

She supports a path to Palestinian self-determination, and pointed specifically to the “23-state solution” put forth by liberal pro-Israel group J Street, which would foster an agreement between Israel and 22 Arab states. 

J Street lists both Davidson and Conley as “primary approved” candidates on its website. Meanwhile, pro-Israel group Democratic Majority for Israel has endorsed Conley, while AIPAC is continuing to back Lawler. Davidson has not been boosted by any super PACs in the race, and raised about $1.8 million, compared to Conley’s $2.6 million, as of March 31. 

When asked about whether anti-Zionism amounts to antisemitism, Davidson said it “depends on the person saying it and the context.”

“When someone challenges the right of the State of Israel to exist, or says something like ‘From the river to the sea,’ I do find that to be antisemitic,” Davidson said. “But I just really try to unpack what their point is, what their feeling is. I’m always loath to paint anyone with a broad brush.”

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Multiple news outlets called the race within 90 minutes of the polls closing, with only a fraction of the votes counted.

The victory was seen as a foregone conclusion after Platner’s primary opponent, Gov. Janet Mills, suspended her candidacy in late April, saying her campaign could not afford to continue.

Still, the final tally suggested that not all Mainers had embraced the political neophyte whose campaign was dogged by controversies, including the revelation that Platner had a Nazi Totenkopf tattoo on his chest for nearly two decades until he drew criticism for it on the campaign trail. He denied knowing it was a Nazi symbol.

Mills, who remained on the ballot, drew about one in five votes in the first 10% of ballots counted, according to the tally published by The New York Times.

The result sets Platner up to face off in November against incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins, who has received substantial support from pro-Israel donors. The latest polls suggest a tight race.

“I’m humbled and proud to officially be your Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate to take on Susan Collins and the billionaire class she represents. Together, we will win this seat back for working Mainers,” Platner tweeted on Tuesday night. “Thank you, Maine.”

While Democratic leaders officially threw their support behind Platner after Mills halted her campaign, many of them remained circumspect about him. Their balancing act grew more delicate in the final days of the primary race, as Platner drew allegations of antisemitism over his characterization of donations channeled to Collins by the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC and as he faced new allegations of misconduct toward women. (He said he had been a “far from perfect boyfriend” during some periods of his life but denied engaging in misconduct.)

Now, top Democrats will have to decide how hard to gun for Platner, who has become a standard-bearer in the party’s anti-Israel shift at a time when the chamber is narrowly divided.

They are already facing pressure to disavow him. “Chuck Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish elected official in America, and every Senate Democrat propping up Platner’s campaign, should be ashamed,” the Republican Jewish Coalition said in a statement after the polls closed. “Their continued support of Graham Platner, who wore the symbol of Hitler’s SS on his chest for 18 years is an outrage. Schumer must withdraw his support immediately.”

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The Democrat’s first online ad, released in August, boasted that, unlike his competitors, he would never get AIPAC’s endorsement because he believed Israel had committed genocide in Gaza. Last week, he suggested that AIPAC funding meant his Republican opponent was “bought and paid for by Benjamin Netanyahu,” drawing allegations of antisemitism from a range of Jewish groups.

Along the way, Platner has courted multiple rounds of controversy over Israel and Jews. And in the race’s final days, new reports about Platner’s past behavior toward women have fueled anti-Israel rhetoric among some of his supporters — and further splintered Democratic support for the oyster farmer and political neophyte whose spirited run for office has alarmed many Jewish leaders.

Now, Mainers are heading to the polls with Israel and antisemitism allegations looming large.

Platner, 41, ran as a populist promising to inject progressive energy into a Senate race where both the incumbent Republican and the establishment Democratic pick, Gov. Janet Mills, are in their 70s. (Mills suspended her primary campaign as Platner soared in polls, but she remains on Tuesday’s ballot.) In an election cycle when anti-Israel rhetoric is surging on the left, Platner — who has Jewish extended family, including a stepbrother who lives in Israel and works on Israel policy issues for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies — embraced the stance by making genocide accusations a key part of his stump speech.

That has earned him support in some corners. In a viral video from a rally over the weekend, a Platner supporter dismissed concerns about his tattoo of the Totenkopf symbol, a skull-and-crossbones image worn by Nazi concentration camp guards, which Platner tattooed over earlier this year amid criticism even as he insisted that he hadn’t known it was a Nazi symbol.

Then the supporter asserted that if Platner had a different tattoo, it would have been a dealbreaker for her: an Israeli flag.

“I don’t support genocide, and he doesn’t either, and that would show that he’s being inconsistent,” the woman told the New York Sun.

The exchange exacted disbelief from some. “Are you kidding me? A tattoo of the Israeli flag is worse than a Nazi symbol?” tweeted Democratic Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, who is Jewish. “This should not be welcome in the Democratic Party!”

Pro-Israel donors have responded accordingly, shoring up the war chest of Republican Sen. Susan Collins.

“Susan Collins’s latest financial report just came out. A staggering one-third of her money raised this quarter came directly from AIPAC,” Platner tweeted on June 1. “Senator Collins is bought and paid for by Benjamin Netanyahu, and she votes accordingly.”

Sen. Susan Collins, right, attends a Senate Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee hearing in Washington, D.C., June 2, 2026. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

Collins has described herself as broadly “pro-Israel” but also recently provided a crucial vote for a measure to end the joint U.S.-Israeli war in Iran. OpenSecrets, the nonpartisan campaign finance information website, confirmed to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that its analysis of public Federal Election Commission data showed that a third of donations to Collins in the previous quarter were gifts from individuals who used the pro-Israel lobby as an intermediary. Collins also received a small donation directly from the group’s super PAC.

Still, Platner’s tweet ignited sharp criticism for suggesting that AIPAC represented Israeli influence, rather than donations by American supporters of Israel.

The Anti-Defamation League said the remark “invokes classic antisemitic rhetoric” and added, “Such accusations call up the age-old dual loyalty trope that casts Jewish Americans as more loyal to Israel than their own country.”

The Nexus Project, an antisemitism watchdog that is more forgiving of some forms of criticism of Israel than the ADL, also criticized the tweet.

“The insinuation that the government of Israel is ‘buying’ or directly controlling any politician who receives AIPAC funding or any American political donor that donates through a pro-Israel conduit is reductive and wrong,” Jonathan Jacoby, Nexus’ president, told JTA in a statement.

Undeterred, Platner on Saturday again invoked AIPAC while going after a member of his own party: Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, a staunch Israel supporter. Fetterman had recently criticized Platner in harsh language, telling CNN, “When I was growing up, if someone had a clear Nazi tattoo on them, you probably could conclude that they’re a Nazi sympathizer.”

Fetterman, Platner said in response, had “become a stooge for AIPAC and the Republican party.”

Reached for comment on the phrasing of his AIPAC remarks, a Platner campaign spokesperson said, “Whether it’s private equity, billionaires, corporations, super PACs, etc., Graham is committed to getting money out of politics.”

Amid the mounting scandals, Platner met with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer last week to shore up support for his candidacy among Democratic leaders. Speaking with reporters afterward, Schumer — who is Jewish, considers himself a leader on fighting antisemitism and had said he would support Platner’s campaign after Mills dropped out — repeatedly dodged questions about his confidence in Platner.

Some anti-Israel voices claim that the criticism reflects a conspiracy by Israel to prevent Platner from taking office.

“If you want a handy list of people who work for Israel, look at everyone criticizing Graham Platner now, especially Democrats,” the progressive influencer Cenk Uygur tweeted on Friday. “I get why Republicans want to tear him down. But Democrats attacking their own candidate only happens when they are ordered to do so by their handlers.”

His supporters, meanwhile, went on the offensive after a report in The New York Times cited multiple ex-girlfriends who said he had engaged in abusive and bullying behavior during their relationships.

The story featured as its most prominent voice Lyndsey Fifield, a Republican operative and former staffer at the conservative Heritage Foundation. In the article, Fifield claimed that Platner had known about his Totenkopf tattoo when he was dating her despite the candidate’s public insistence that he hadn’t recognized its Nazi origins. Platner had called his tattoo “my Totenkopf” while with her, Fifield told the Times, sharing a text in which she referred to the tattoo as a Nazi symbol before Platner said he was aware of what the tattoo represented.

Platner “has a Nazi tattoo on his chest,” Fifield texted her friends last summer, according to the Times. “It’s a Totenkopf … I will personally go campaign for Collins.”

Speaking to Maine’s public radio after the Times story ran, Platner denied Fifield’s claim. In another interview with MS NOW, Platner struggled to sort out the timeline of Fifield’s text to her friends about his tattoo, which occurred before he said he knew about the tattoo’s origins. Reached for comment, a Platner campaign spokesperson pointed to a previous interview the candidate held with JTA, in which he noted his “direct family connection to Judaism” and positive associations with Jewish religious tradition. Platner has also cast doubt on Fifield’s account, alleging that she is the sole source for reports about his knowledge of his own tattoo.

Reached for comment, Fifield told JTA by email, “I’ve been a vocal Zionist since college. I’ve been a proud conservative since then as well. Both of those things were true when I dated Graham.”  Fifield is also close with the Jewish conservative commentator Bethany Mandel, with whom she formerly co-hosted a podcast.

To JTA, Fifield added, “If not being an antisemite is enough to fuel a mob of conspiracy theorists, it says something very dark about our culture.”

Some of Platner’s defenders have suggested the Times article was fueled by pro-Israel adversaries. Online, pro-Palestinian commentator Mehdi Hasan called Fifield “an anti-Palestinian racist and bigot,” sharing a tweet of hers in which she mocked the concept of “a Palestinian museum” and wrote, “What are their accomplishments, inventions, or other notable figures apart from terrorists and bombs made from the water pipes Israel gave them to pipe in free water for their people?”

Others have pointed out that the reporter who wrote the article, Katie Glueck, was co-president of Students for Israel at Northwestern University when the chapter won an “Activist of the Year” award from pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC in 2009.

“The most shocking part of this story is that the NYT had a former AIPAC Activist of the Year (Katie Glueck) write a piece devoted to detailing unsubstantiated claims from a professional Republican activist (Lyndsey Fifield) on how a left Democratic Senate candidate who has promised to take on Israel (Platner) was a lousy boyfriend and sold it as a legit journalistic scoop,” tweeted Marcus Stanley, the director of studies at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, an anti-interventionist think tank.

In a statement to JTA, a New York Times spokesperson defended Glueck’s participation in the article.

“Katie Glueck has covered politics for over a decade and is one of the best journalists in media at producing incisive coverage of candidates and campaigns,” the Times’ Charlie Stadtlander wrote in an email. “She approached this article about Graham Platner’s past personal conduct with the same independence she brings to all of her reporting.”

Stadtlander added that the Times stands behind its reporting “of the accounts from Ms. Fifield and the other women, who provided a revealing look at the behavior of a major candidate for the U.S. Senate.”

The drumbeat of criticism has tempered excitement among some Democrats about Platner and his potential to flip a Senate seat. Even California Rep. Ro Khanna, a leading critic of Israel in Congress, offered indirect criticism of Platner and his defenders on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” over the weekend, where he said Platner’s supporters shouldn’t go after his accusers and “should not attack the New York Times reporters who wrote this story.”

“I know those reporters. They’ve written things critical of me. That’s what journalists do,” Khanna said. “Our party doesn’t attack the press. Our party believes that you treat women with equality and respect in all aspects of their lives.”

Still, he continued to signal support for Platner, saying that “he’s taken accountability for that period of his life.” Khanna also spoke at a rally for Platner in Maine over the weekend.

While Platner does not have many prominent Jewish supporters in Maine, and has seen the Jewish Democratic Council of America pointedly withhold its own support of his bid, one of his most visible Jewish allies in the state says he will stand by him.

“I’m still very much in Camp Platner,” Steven Koltai, the chair of J Street Maine who helped organize a Passover seder with the Platner campaign, told JTA following the latest revelations.

Koltai suggested that Platner’s past behavior paled in comparison to the president’s: “Thanks to President Trump, the bar for public office in America has been set at a level that even a subterranean earth worm could overcome.”

Asked about Platner’s comments regarding Collins and AIPAC specifically, he signaled a degree of difference with his candidature: “Of all Senator Collins’s votes, her votes on aid to Israel are very low on my list of complaints about her voting record.”

Platner is expected to sail through the primary. Most recent polls suggest that he and Collins are running neck and neck heading into November.

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At the RJC’s “America 250” gala six months later, the mood was cheerier, and the cautionary words gave way to declarations that emerging antisemitism on the right was being dealt with properly. 

Fine reminded the audience at the RJC event held in Manhattan on Sunday that in his speech to the RJC in November, he’d called Carlson “the most dangerous antisemite in America.” Now, he said, “I don’t know that that’s true anymore.” 

Fine and other Republicans at the RJC gala told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that enough Republicans had spoken out against Carlson – most significantly, President Donald Trump – and his ilk to damage their image and dampen the threat they might pose. They also pointed to major GOP critics of Israel who had lost their seats in recent months.

But others have warned that it’s a mistake to celebrate too soon, or think Carlson’s star has really faded, especially amid speculation that he might launch a presidential run as a Republican. 

Fine told JTA in a text that he now believes the country’s “most dangerous antisemite” is Zohran Mamdani, New York City’s anti-Zionist mayor. In contrast, he said, Carlson’s impact had only plummeted in the past half-year.

“I think that brand has been destroyed [in] the last six months,” he wrote, attributing the change to politicians like himself calling Carlson out, as well as “the damage he has done to himself.”  

A number of speakers at the RJC who lauded Republicans’ response to antisemitism in the party also pointed to the recent primary defeat of outspoken Israel critic Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie. Brooks said to loud applause that the group spent $5 million in that race, and called the effort “a fight worth having and a victory worth celebrating.” 

Speakers also recounted the resignation from Congress of Marjorie Taylor Greene in January, maintaining that the Republican Party is squashing its anti-Israel voices, while the Democratic Party is electing them. 

“Being anti-Israel in today’s Republican Party is not — unlike the Democratic Party — a path to success,” said RJC CEO Matt Brooks during his remarks. Brooks later told JTA that Carlson, Owens and Fuentes’ “influence and credibility is less than it’s ever been” and that “they don’t represent” the mainstream of the MAGA movement.

But the Anti-Defamation League warned that it would be a mistake not to see the audience and impact of Carlson in particular as worthy of continued concern. 

Oren Segal, the ADL’s vice president of counterextremism and intelligence, said in an interview with JTA that his organization’s biggest worry regarding Carlson is “not merely his relationship with any conservative or elected officials” but also the “normalization” of his views.

Randy Fine addresses the audience at the RJC’s “America 250” gala in Manhattan. (Joseph Strauss)

Segal pointed to the accusation that an Israeli attack on an American spy ship during the 1967 Six-Day War was intentional — used by conspiracy theorists as proof that the Jewish state cannot be trusted — despite U.S. investigations determining that it was a mistake. 

“No one’s been a bigger boon to the USS Liberty Conspiracy of late than Tucker Carlson,” he said.

Segal added that it would be “absurd” to count out anyone as a potential presidential contender, while several political observers have speculated that Carlson may be weighing a run. 

New York University professor Scott Galloway recently said on his New York Magazine podcast “Pivot” that the former Fox News host could be a serious contender. There is an “enormous lane,” he assessed, for a candidate who, like Carlson, has “very conservative values, an enormous media platform, an enormous army of acolytes that he could weaponize right away, and is anti-Trump and anti-the war on Iran.”

Some of Carlson’s allies are gunning for a campaign. Speaking Thursday on Russian state television during a trip to St. Petersburg, Owens said she personally did not plan to run for office but said Carlson would be a great candidate for president.

“I would love for him to run,” she said, adding, “I would gratefully get behind someone like Tucker Carlson.”

Back in March, TV host Piers Morgan asked Carlson whether he has White House ambitions. Carlson said that politics is “not what I do,” adding, “The whole idea of, ‘I’ve been a successful cable news host, I should be president!’ — that whole way of thinking is disgusting to me.”

Asked about the possibility of Carlson running for president, Brooks told JTA in a statement that the RJC would continue to push back against Carlson and similar anti-Israel figures.

“There is only one party where American Jews can be proudly Jewish and loudly pro-Israel, and it is the Republican Party — and those who imperil that will have to come through the RJC first,” Brooks said.

Others who attended Sunday’s RJC gathering felt the possibility of a Carlson candidacy was overblown. Shabbos Kestenbaum, a prominent Jewish conservative activist who sued Harvard University over alleged antisemitism, dismissed concerns that Carlson could be a serious presidential candidate. 

In an interview, he pointed out that Carlson’s support of Massie and Ohio gubernatorial candidate Casey Putsch did not yield electoral success. Putsch, who has a history of dog whistling to neo-Nazis, received 17.5% of the vote in Ohio’s Republican gubernatorial primary. Unlike Massie, Carlson did not issue an endorsement for Putsch, but he did host Putsch on his podcast last year.

“His endorsements mean absolutely nothing, and outside of the ‘Podcastistan’ universe, his words carry very little weight,” Kestenbaum said of Carlson.

Brooks said in an interview with JTA  that he feels “very pleased” with how the party has responded to voices like Carlson’s. President Donald Trump has publicly cast Carlson aside since his former ally sharpened his objections to the administration’s war in Iran.

“It’s been marginalized,” Brooks said of the party’s anti-Israel wing. “They tried to hijack the term MAGA. Groups like ours, but equally important, the president, has made it clear they are not MAGA.”

Asked about Vice President JD Vance, who has not offered a condemnation of Carlson to some Jewish Republicans’ chagrin, Brooks said, “When you have the president speaking, that’s the voice that matters right now.”

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Rep. Rashida Tlaib, a Michigan Democrat and fierce critic of Israel, forced a vote on the House floor Thursday. It was defeated 324 to 92, with 91 Democrats voting in favor. The sole Republican vote came from Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie, who will be departing Congress next year after losing his primary.

The resolution, which would have ordered President Donald Trump to remove U.S. troops from Lebanon within seven days, was defeated after Democratic Party leaders noted in a joint statement that there are “no U.S. servicemembers involved in combat operations or hostilities in Lebanon.”

The statement issued by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Minority Whip Katherine Clark and Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar continued: “We stand with the Lebanese people, the government of Lebanon and the Lebanese Armed Forces in their efforts to live peacefully and defeat Hezbollah, a violent terrorist organization that is a sworn enemy of the United States.”

Jewish Democratic Reps. Jerrold Nadler and Dan Goldman of New York also voted “no” on the resolution, writing in a joint press release that their opposition “should not be taken as an approval of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s prosecution of Israel’s military action in Lebanon.”

“To the extent that American armed forces are present in Lebanon, it is to support the current Lebanese government, which deserves our assistance,” the statement continued.

But Tlaib defended her resolution in a post on X Thursday ahead of the vote. “The people of Lebanon can’t wait another month for Congress to act,” Tlaib wrote. “Every day that we do nothing, 11 more Lebanese children are killed or injured by the Israeli military in this U.S.-supported invasion. Congress must pass today’s Lebanon War Powers Resolution.”

Tlaib was citing a UNICEF report of data from Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health last month that found 77 children in Lebanon had been killed over the course of a week as Israeli strikes continued to pummel the country.

Some of those who opposed Tlaib’s resolution, including Nadler and Goldman, said they would vote for an alternative version of the resolution that would preserve cooperation with the Lebanese Armed Forces in their fight against Hezbollah.

The defeat of the resolution came the same day that Hezbollah rejected the latest ceasefire agreement brokered between Israel and Lebanon, as fighting between the Iranian proxy and Israel has intensified in recent weeks.

On Wednesday, the House narrowly passed a resolution for the first time that would limit President Donald Trump’s power to continue the war in Iran. While the development was largely symbolic, it marked a rebuke of the president’s increasingly unpopular strategy in Iran.

On Friday, 85 members of Congress also signed onto a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio calling on the Trump administration to “use every available diplomatic tool to halt imminent settlement construction in the E-1 area of the West Bank,” a corridor east of Jerusalem.

Citing Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s orders to demolish a Palestinian Bedouin village in the West Bank last month, the letter, which was led by Democratic Reps. Mark Pocan and Jan Schakowsky, who is Jewish, argued that the issue of settlements in the area had reached a “critical and final inflection point.”

“The window for meaningful diplomatic intervention is closing rapidly, and we believe it is not too late for the United States to act,” read the letter, which was also signed by Nadler and Jewish Tennessee Rep. Steve Cohen.

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On Saturday, they narrowly prevailed.

The measure, titled the “Genocide Accountability Resolution,” was struck down by members of the North Carolina Democratic Party’s State Executive Committee with a vote of 163-130.

For Amy DeLoach, the first vice chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party Jewish Caucus, the victory marked a sign that Jewish Democrats still have a place in the party, even as debates over Israel have roiled Democratic politics across the country.

“Most Jews vote Democratically, and we were feeling abandoned, and now we feel like we have a home again,” said DeLoach, who also sits on the party’s international subcommittee.

The defeat of the resolution comes as support for Israel has dropped dramatically among Democrats, and the U.S.-Israel alliance has increasingly emerged as a third rail within the party.

While resolutions condemning the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC and calling to halt arms sales to Israel have been blocked by the Democratic National Committee over the past year, last June, the North Carolina Democratic Party passed a resolution calling for an immediate arms embargo on Israel.

Joel Wanger, the chief political officer of the Democratic Majority for Israel, welcomed the outcome of the genocide resolution in a statement to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency Tuesday.

“This resolution would have divided Democrats at a time when we should be united in opposing Donald Trump, while doing nothing to advance peace between Israelis and Palestinians,” he said.

The resolution was introduced earlier this year by a member of the progressive, Arab and Muslim caucuses of the North Carolina Democratic Party. It advanced from the precinct level through county, district and state bodies before reaching the State Executive Committee for a final vote Saturday.

The resolution would have added language to the state party platform calling for the “prosecution” and “vetting” of individuals and entities in the United States who “may have participated in or enabled genocide.” The resolution also cited a United Nations Commission of Inquiry that concluded for the first time in September that Israel had committed a genocide in Gaza.

The resolution’s defeat Saturday followed an extensive campaign by the party’s Jewish Caucus to block its adoption.

In a May 27 letter to members of the executive committee, leaders of the Jewish Caucus urged them to reject the resolution, arguing that state parties “should not adopt contested international policy positions” and that its timing would hurt 2026 Democratic candidates and divide voters.

“Jewish, Muslim, Palestinian, Christian, and secular Democrats are united on affordability, public education, healthcare, voting rights, and reproductive freedom,” the letter said. “This resolution forces them to take sides on something most did not join the party to fight about.”

The letter cited “serious factual and legal problems” with the resolution and said Jewish Democrats would support a substitute “affirming NC Democrats’ commitment to ending civilian suffering in Gaza, supporting humanitarian aid, and opposing antisemitism, Islamophobia, and political violence in all forms.”

But the Jewish Caucus was not the only group within the party invested in the outcome of the vote.

Last month, the leaders of the Muslim, Arab, interfaith and progressive caucuses of the North Carolina Democratic Party issued its own a letter calling on members of the State Executive Committee to support the resolution in order to “affirm our party’s commitment to human rights and the protection of civilian life.”

“All too frequently, the burdensome narrative of genocide denial has been heard from those persons and organizations who have 1) either acquiesced to genocide or 2) feared the worst reprisals from those who have supported it,” the letter read. “This silence compromises the faith of many voters in our party.”

The letter, which cited a recent study that found 80% of Democrats have an unfavorable view of Israel, was undersigned by the head of the state party’s Jewish Democrats, a non-Zionist Jewish subgroup within the Interfaith Caucus.

Mark Bochkis, the communications chair of the Jewish Democrats, told JTA that his group and the Jewish Caucus “fundamentally disagree about the divisiveness” of the resolution.

“We believe this is actually an issue that galvanizes the younger base of the party and other other important key voting blocks for the Democratic party,” Bochkis said. “We believe not speaking out on something like this is actually holding the party back.”

Paul McAllister, the chair of the Interfaith Caucus, told JTA that “we don’t want to see anything happen to any member of any community, Jewish or otherwise, but we do want accountability.”

While McAllister said that the language concerning “prosecution” in the resolution could have been “clarified,” he said the Jewish Caucus’ suggestion of an alternative to the resolution attracted little support because he felt it “waters down the need to hold a nation accountable for what it is doing to another people.”

“My major concern is that we have a faction within the party that wants justice for all people equally, Jews and Palestinians, and that there’s some in the party, namely members of the Jewish caucus, who do not comprehend how critical it is that we not only look after our own interest or our own group’s interest, but the interest of others, and this is the struggle,” McAllister said.

DeLoach said the scheduling of the vote last week on Shabbat had bothered members of the Jewish caucus. But she said they had “let that one go” to focus on fighting the resolution.

“We talk about that amongst ourselves, but we’re in a war right now,” she said. “We’re going to pick and choose the battles we fight.”

DeLoach said her group viewed the resolution as a political liability that could potentially force Democratic candidates in the state to either distance themselves from the party or embrace a “difficult divisive issue” on the campaign trail.

“No politician is going to want to run on a platform that includes this,” DeLoach said. “Platforms don’t win elections, and this is going to risk us losing an outrageously important election.”

DeLoach pointed to the campaigns of Roy Cooper, the state’s former governor who’s running for a Senate seat, and Anita Earls, who is running for reelection to the North Carolina Supreme Court.

“Most Democrats in North Carolina really are more concerned about their electric bill right now, and the cost of food,” DeLoach said. “As the vote shows, you know, nobody likes what’s going on in the Middle East. We don’t like what’s going on in the Middle East, but we know that’s not where our focus should be right now.”

Looking ahead, DeLoach said she hoped that the resolution’s defeat would serve as a warning against rhetoric she saw as “adding to a drumbeat of antisemitism that is so prevalent in the country.”

“There’s war crimes on both sides here, but it’s not a genocide, and y’all pounding this drum is making it more and more dangerous for Jews to live in this country,” DeLoach said. “We see the defeat of this resolution not only as a chance for us to start just electing Democrats, but as a hopeful pause, at least, if not a stop to this horrible rhetoric.”

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He will face San Francisco Supervisor Connie Chan, who placed second with Pelosi’s endorsement, in November’s general election, which under state law will be held between the top two vote-getters regardless of party.

Saikat Chakrabarti, a progressive who ran to Wiener’s left on Israel and who campaigned with the anti-Israel influencer Hasan Piker, failed to make the ballot.

With 50% of votes tallied as of Wednesday morning, the Associated Press called the race for Wiener and Chan. Wiener took 41% of the vote, with Chan at 28% and Chakrabarti a distant third at 15%.

“Tonight, the voters sent a clear message: they’re ready for a new vision on housing affordability, ICE accountability, smart guardrails on AI, single payer healthcare, and affordable clean energy,” Wiener wrote on X in a victory statement that did not mention Israel. The senator said he would tackle “rising authoritarianism” and “defend immigrants and trans people” if elected to Congress. In his victory speech, Wiener decried President Donald Trump’s “disastrous wars.”

Over the course of the campaign, Wiener, like his two top rivals, concluded that he believed Israel had committed genocide in Gaza. His remarks upset his local Jewish constituents and cost him the leadership role with the statehouse’s Jewish caucus, but some local Jews still urged their community to back him.

“It is a hard year to be a lefty Jew running for Congress,” Wiener told news outlets during the campaign.

The race was roiled in its final day by disputed reports that pro-Israel PACs, including AIPAC and Democratic Majority For Israel, were secretly funneling money to Chan via an elaborate shell game. A person familiar with DMFI’s thinking denied the reports to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency and said the group’s PAC wasn’t spending for Chan. A representative for AIPAC did not return a request for comment.

Candidates backed by Jewish and pro-Israel groups had a mixed record in other House primary races in the state.

• A pro-Israel challenger to progressive Rep. Ro Khanna, entrepreneur Ethan Agarwal, was lagging far behind two GOP challengers in the 17th District as of Wednesday morning. The AP has yet to call a second-place finisher, but Khanna’s lead positions him to potentially avoid a runoff.

• In the 14th District to replace disgraced Rep. Eric Swalwell, entrepreneur Rakhi Israni (who had the backing of Bay Area Jewish Coalition-Action) was similarly trailing far behind other candidates. State Sen. Aisha Wahab, the daughter of Afghan refugees who has worked with Jewish groups on refugee issues while also taking a tough line on Israel, clinched the top spot with more than 34% of the vote.

• DMFI-backed San Diego council member Marni von Wilpert bested her Democratic rival Ammar Campa-Najjar — the grandson of a Palestine Liberation Organization founder — in the 48th District primary, and will go on to face Republican Jim Desmond, the top vote-getter, in the general.

• The 22nd District primary race in the Central Valley, in which DMFI had spent heavily in favor of moderate state assembly member Jasmeet Bains, remained too close to call Wednesday morning between Bains and progressive school board member Randy Villegas. The race, seen as a bellwether for Democrats nationally in a district they hope to flip, turned ugly as DMFI-backed attack ads drew on Villegas’s alleged role in a school district sexual assault settlement. Bains had walked back her stance that Israel committed genocide after DMFI got involved in the race. Villegas was ahead at press time.

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The political novice held a 12-point margin ahead of second-place candidate Brad Cohen with 86% of the vote in, even as he faced questions over his past ties to Omar Abdel-Rahman, the “Blind Sheikh” convicted on terrorism charges in 1995. Hamawy’s camp had called the questions “gross and bigoted” and said the attacks against him were “getting more desperate than ever.”

At a time when Israel is becoming increasingly unpopular among Democratic voters, Hamawy’s victory makes him the latest in a string of vocally pro-Palestinian progressives to win Democratic elections in blue districts in this year’s midterms, following fellow New Jersey candidate Analilia Mejia and Chris Rabb in Pennsylvania.

“The Democratic establishment just got a wake-up call!” wrote PAL PAC, a pro-Palestinian group that had endorsed Hamawy, on X. “This victory proves what we have known all along: Standing firmly and unapologetically for Palestinian freedom is a WINNING platform.”

Hamawy, who is credited with having saved Sen. Tammy Duckworth’s life during the Iraq War, was also boosted by $2 million in spending by American Priorities, a super PAC that aims to counterweight the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC by installing pro-Palestinian progressives in Congress. He was endorsed by a slew of left-wing politicians and campaigned alongside the streamer Hasan Piker, who’s been accused of antisemitic rhetoric. He is set to succeed Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, who is retiring at the end of her term.

As an opponent of Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system and a supporter of a complete arms embargo and the right of return for Palestinian refugees, Hamawy will become one of Congress’ sharpest Israel critics if he wins November’s general election, which he is expected to do in the deep-blue district.

Hamawy said that he finds antisemitism “abhorrent” and that he is “deeply worried about its continued rise” in a statement to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last week.

“As a Muslim, I understand what it feels like to face bigotry, to feel unsafe in your community and to have your loyalty to this country questioned,” Hamawy said. “In this country, we have seen recent attacks at both synagogues and mosques. I see our safety as intertwined.”

Asked about Jewish constituents who disagree with his stance on Israel, Hamawy told JTA, “I hope we can still connect on shared values and goals, including peace, justice, safety and dignity.” He added that his door “will always be open.”

Ken Martin, chair of the Democratic National Committee, did not mention Hamawy’s pro-Palestinian advocacy in a statement congratulating him on his win.

“As a veteran, combat surgeon, and small business owner, Adam Hamawy has continually served his community and our country. He is a proven fighter for working families,” Martin said. “We look forward to welcoming him to Congress, where he will continue the fight to lower costs, expand access to healthcare, and make life more affordable for New Jersey families.”

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Can a Jewish progressive who believes Israel committed genocide still earn the support of his local Jewish community? Can an ardent critic of Israel be dethroned in Silicon Valley? And is a trollish Los Angeles mayoral candidate from reality TV preferable to a Mamdani-esque progressive?

For many of these races, the primaries won’t be the end of the story: State law mandates that the top two vote-getters, regardless of party, will move on to November’s general election. But the dynamics of several races ensure they will be seen as the latest bellwether for progressive political voters’ views on Israel, and local Jewish groups have compiled a voter guide specifically tailored to their concerns.

Here are five California races of particular interest to Jews.

Los Angeles City Councilmember and mayoral candidate Nithya Raman speaks to a crowd at the “Families for Nithya” event at Vineyard Recreation Center in Los Angeles on Saturday, May 16, 2026. (Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

A tight 3-way Los Angeles mayoral race

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is facing a tough bid for her reelection, and one of her challengers — L.A. City Council member Nithya Raman — has appeared with left-wing anti-Israel streamer Hasan Piker and drawn comparisons to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Raman made a last-minute filing to challenge Bass not long after endorsing her for reelection.

For some Jewish Angelenos, the prospect of a mayor who has vocally criticized Israel is enough of a concern to instead back Spencer Pratt — a reality-TV star with links to conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. While Pratt has distanced himself from some of his past beliefs, including that the 9/11 attacks were an inside job, he has dodged questions about his friendship with Jones. (The mayoralty is officially a nonpartisan position.)

“A Raman mayorship would make every Jewish Angeleno less safe,” Sam Yebri, a local political activist with the centrist group Thrive LA who is also involved with pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC, told JTA. The candidate’s Piker appearance was central to Yebri’s objections, and has also been a target from Pratt: “I would never sit next to somebody who has no problems with Jews getting attacked,” he told a local TV station.

Other Jews pointed to Raman’s absence at a recent City Council meeting marking Jewish American Heritage Month as a reason for their negative feelings toward her.

There are some key differences between Raman and her East Coast counterpart when it comes to Israel and Jews. 

While Mamdani is an anti-Zionist aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America, Raman says she supports Israel’s right to exist and opposes the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. 

The local DSA chapter, after endorsing Raman for council in 2024, has since condemned her for her more moderate stances on Israel. Her constituents include large Jewish and Israeli neighborhoods; and Jewish leaders in the area have told the Forward they trust her and have had good conversations with her. She has attended services at local synagogues. (A local pro-Israel group also endorsed Raman in 2024.)

LA Mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt hosts a campaign “block party” event on 10th Ave. in Los Angeles, CA on Wednesday, May 20, 2026.
(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)

Yebri is instead encouraging voters to vote either for Bass or Pratt. Both of them, he said, “have made significant efforts to listen to the concerns of the Jewish community and have committed to protecting houses of worship and supporting LAPD funding.”

Pratt, a former star of “The Hills,” has focused much of his campaign on the city’s response to the 2025 Pacific Palisades fire (he lost his own house in the blaze). He has not made Jewish issues a centerpiece of his campaign, though he told CNBC last week that “all of my best friends since kindergarten are Jewish” and that he opposes antisemitism. “I want Jewish moms to feel safe for their kids to go to the temple or … to class at UCLA,” he said.

Yebri is not the only Jew backing Pratt. According to a report in the Jewish magazine Tablet, Ashley Underwood, a producer for Jewish comedian Sacha Baron Cohen and wife of Jewish comedian Larry David, hosted a fundraiser for the candidate that was attended by producer Hilary Shor and philanthropist Irene Medavoy. Shor then wrote on social media that she and others were “transfixed by the power of his message, which hopefully will help save our town.”

In the event no candidate secures above 50% of the vote (a likely outcome), the election will head to a November runoff.

California state senator and U.S. congressional candidate Scott Wiener speaks at BART Colma Maintenance Yard south of San Francisco, California, on February 19, 2026. (Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Will Pelosi’s replacement be a ‘lefty Jew,’ or a Piker-backed leftist?

Perhaps no congressional race is being watched more closely than the bid in San Francisco to succeed retiring former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. 

California state Sen. Scott Wiener, a Jewish progressive with a growing national profile, is mounting a spirited bid for the 11th District seat and leading in the polls. But Wiener, who did not return a JTA request for comment, alienated many in the local Jewish community when he said he believed Israel had committed genocide in Gaza. 

San Francisco Jewish groups condemned his comments, and the blowback caused him to step down from his role as the head of the state’s Jewish Democratic caucus. 

“It is a hard year to be a lefty Jew running for Congress,” he told Politico, suggesting he believes, on the one hand, that “Israel’s existence is critically important, it is home to half of the Jews on Earth,” and on the other hand that “the Israeli government is an abomination, the Israeli government is engaged in an effort to destroy Palestinian communities.”

Saikat Chakrabarti debates Scott Wiener and Connie Chan for San Francisco’s Congressional District 11 seat, at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, on Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (Carlos Avila Gonzalez/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)

Complicating matters further for Wiener is the fact that one of his opponents, Saikat Chakrabarti, is running further to his left on Israel. A former chief of staff for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who also worked on one of Jewish progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaigns, Chakrabarti backs a full stop of weapons sales to Israel and has campaigned with Piker. 

Chakrabarti has also opposed a local measure intended to combat antisemitism in public schools, which Wiener spearheaded. The law creates new enforcement mechanisms to address antisemitism in schools, which critics have argued would amount to surveilling teachers. Wiener spearheaded the bill; Chakrabarti has called it “a censorship bill,” while a top aide of his has called it “harmful.”

Yet Ocasio-Cortez herself has not endorsed Chakrabarti, which has become a sore spot in his campaign. Meanwhile, Pelosi’s endorsement went to a third candidate, San Francisco supervisor Connie Chan — who also said she believes Israel committed genocide, and has proposed pairing U.S. funding for Israeli defensive systems with aid packages for Gaza.

U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) claps as San Francisco Supervisor and congressional candidate Connie Chan speaks at a “Get Out the Vote” rally on May 29, 2026 in San Francisco, California. (Benjamin Fanjoy/Getty Images)

In a last-minute shakeup to the race, some pro-Palestinian sites and accounts claimed over the weekend that AIPAC-aligned donors had funneled money to Chan’s campaign via a series of other PACs. The allegations, which JTA has not verified, prompted Chan’s campaign to issue a statement urging “any organization supporting Connie to respect the very clear values she has laid out not to accept donations from AIPAC.”

A spokesperson for AIPAC did not immediately respond to a JTA request for comment on the claims, which if true would mark an almost unheard-of instance of AIPAC funding a candidate who has accused Israel of genocide. Chakrabarti, a centimillionaire who has self-funded much of his campaign, mused that  “AIPAC wants to keep me out of the top two.”

Local Jewish voters, who have contended many times with area activism targeting Israel on a range of fronts, have agonized over whether to back Wiener. Some communal leaders are now arguing that they should — even if they disagree with his “genocide” comments.

“There is a version of Jewish political engagement that seeks to punish anyone who uses the word genocide, regardless of their record, regardless of their opponents,” Jewish organizers Arthur Slepian and Jan Reicher wrote in the Jewish News of Northern California. This position, they argued, is “self-defeating.”

“Wiener made a statement that many in the community found painful,” they continued. “But he did not abandon his commitment to Jewish security, Jewish education or the physical safety of Jewish institutions. He did not endorse the groups that chant for the elimination of the Jewish state. He did not cast Israel’s existence as a ‘colonial project’ that needs dismantling.”

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) speaks at a town hall event on February 20, 2026 in Stanford, California. (Benjamin Fanjoy/Getty Images)

Some Silicon Valley Jews hope to take down Ro Khanna

If Jews in San Francisco are largely conflicted on Wiener, their counterparts in Silicon Valley are much more unified — against their district’s outspoken pro-Palestinian incumbent.

Rep. Ro Khanna is one of Israel’s fiercest critics in Congress and has even made common cause with far-right Republicans, including Rep. Thomas Massie, over the issue. Khanna has also made no secret of his 2028 ambitions for higher office. Disaffected Jews and Israeli Americans in the 17th District are hoping to use this primary to send a message to Khanna by backing tech entrepreneur Ethan Agarwal, who has positioned himself as the congressman’s pro-Israel challenger.

“We have lost trust in his ability to represent us, and will not accept empty condemnations of antisemitism while he amplifies radical antisemitic messages at every possible turn,” Tali Klima of Bay Area Jewish Coalition-Action recently said about Khanna.

Of particular concern was Khanna’s appearance in a documentary about Israel also featuring YouTuber Ian Carroll, who has claimed that a “modern Jewish mafia” controls the United States. (Khanna distanced himself from Carroll after criticism.) The congressman has also appeared multiple times on Hasan Piker’s stream.

Ammar Campa-Najjar attends Protect Our Care’s “Stop The GOP War On Health Care” Mobile Billboard Tour on November 19, 2025 in Escondido, California. (Jerod Harris/Getty Images for Protect Our Care)

A PLO member’s grandson runs for Congress, again

Democrats are hoping to flip a San Diego-area district held by retiring Republican Rep. Darrell Issa. But to do that, they may have to back a candidate with an unusual pedigree.

Ammar Campa-Najjar, a former Obama staffer and U.S. Navy Reserve officer of Mexican and Palestinian descent, is putting his Palestinian identity front and center in his pitch for the seat. Campa-Najjar spent part of his childhood in Gaza, where his family moved after the Oslo Accords “to help build a secular Palestinian government and foster economic cooperation with Israel,” his campaign biography says.

Another part of his family story: His grandfather, Muhammad Yusuf al-Najjar, was a top figure in the Palestine Liberation Organization who was targeted by the Mossad for what they alleged was his role in the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre of Israeli athletes. 

This became a sticking point for Campa-Najjar during a failed 2018 congressional run in a different district, when his Republican opponent said his background made him “a national security risk.” At the time, local Jewish leaders came to Campa-Najjar’s defense. 

Also at the time, Campa-Najjar had condemned what he believed to be his grandfather’s role in planning Munich. But after an Israeli investigative journalist in 2019 questioned al-Najjar’s role, his grandson said he had “renewed skepticism” about the allegations that he was descended from a terrorist. 

Last month, in response to a claim from far-right Jewish activist Laura Loomer that he was “Palestinian terrorist spawn,” Campa-Najjar wrote, “My grandmother was a Palestinian mother raising children, she was unjustly killed in her home. I never met my grandfather, I knew him as much as you do. What happened is a matter of disputed history.”

Campa-Najjar has also met with former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, who was part of the commando unit that killed his grandfather.

This is Campa-Najjar’s third congressional run, but the aftermath of Oct. 7 and the Gaza war puts his background in a new context — as does the recent mass shooting at a San Diego mosque (the candidate himself is a Christian convert from Islam). At the same time, some progressives have cooled on him, accusing him of having moderated his stances on a range of issues across his different campaigns. 

One Jew in his corner: Democratic Rep. Sara Jacobs, who represents a neighboring district and is Campa-Najjar’s longtime girlfriend. A super PAC backed by Jacobs’ grandfather Irwin Jacobs, a billionaire and business entrepreneur, has spent heavily for Campa-Najjar. (Neither Campa-Najjar nor Jacobs returned JTA requests for comment.) 

J Street is also backing his candidacy, as well as that of his primary opponent, San Diego city council member Marni von Wilpert. Democratic Majority for Israel, meanwhile, is spending heavily on von Wilpert. A Republican also running in the district means that only one Democrat is likely to advance to the general election.

California state senator Aisha Wahab (C) attends a press conference as Governor Gavin Newsom criticizes U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to strike Iran in Hayward, California, United States, on March 2, 2026. (Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Will Swalwell’s replacement make noise about Israel?

Rep. Eric Swalwell was among the most resolutely pro-Israel Democrats in Congress. He was also accused of sexual misconduct by multiple former staffers. Swalwell has called the allegations “false,” but resigned from his seat — and bowed out of the governors’ race — opening a vacancy in the state’s 14th District.

Hoping to step into his shoes is state Sen. Aisha Wahab, who is leading in a poll commissioned by the left-wing Working Families Party PAC. A child of Afghan refugees, Wahab has collaborated with local Jewish leaders before on refugee-related issues, including on a 2021 fundraiser for Afghan refugee resettlement in the aftermath of the U.S. pullout from the country. That fundraiser was held at Manny’s, a San Francisco deli owned by an Afghani Jew that has been targeted multiple times — both before and after Oct. 7 — by anti-Zionist vandals.

But East Bay Jews hoping that Swalwell’s replacement might match his pro-Israel record will likely be disappointed. Wahab, like most of her Democratic opponents in the primary, has said that Israel committed genocide in Gaza after the Oct. 7 attacks. 

At the same time, she has shown a willingness to work with Jews on Israel-related matters. In the California state Senate in fall 2025, Wahab coauthored a resolution to “call for the end to the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza and the immediate release of all hostages.” Notably, her coauthor was Wiener, the self-proclaimed “lefty Jew” state senator who is also running for Congress in the nearby 11th District.

Prominent local Jewish groups have endorsed a different Democrat. Both the Bay Area Jewish Coalition and Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen, whose court-ordered removal from a case involving Stanford pro-Palestinian protesters has triggered allegations of antisemitism, is backing entrepreneur Rakhi Israni. 

In 2024, Israni also appeared alongside local Jewish leaders on a panel discussing links between antisemitism and “Hinduphobia.” Some of Israni’s associations with more conservative Jewish and pro-Israel causes, including reported past personal donations to political campaigns for far-right Jewish pundit Laura Loomer and Christians United For Israel director David Brog, have further raised eyebrows among progressives. Israni is so far the leader in fundraising among the candidates.

In an email to JTA after this article was published, Israni did not address her donations but pushed her relationship with the Jewish community, including her work organizing the Bay Area Hindu Jewish Roundtable. “These relationships have deepened my understanding of the community’s priorities, such as combating antisemitism and supporting inclusive civic engagement,” she said. 

“In a few instances, I financially contributed to candidates who later took positions that I strongly oppose, including one whose views I find abhorrent and incompatible with my own,” Israni said in a statement last month in response to a report on her spending by the San Jose Mercury News. “But highlighting a handful of past donations without acknowledging years of overwhelmingly supporting Democratic candidates creates a misleading picture.” Israni did not name specific candidates in her statement.

Due to the circumstances of Swalwell’s resignation, the district is facing several different rounds of voting. Tuesday’s primary is for November’s general election, while a subsequent primary on June 16 will determine the top two contenders to fill the remainder of the current term, which will be voted on in August.

Santa Clara District Attorney Jeff Rosen speaks during a charge announcement to the participants of the 2024 Anti-Israel-Palestine war break-in and vandalism at Stanford University, in San Jose, Calif., Thursday, April 10, 2025. (Stephen Lam/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)

Other Jewish stories to watch on the ballot

• In the crowded 16-person field for lieutenant governor, two of the candidates are Jewish, and both have been endorsed by a range of leading state Jewish groups. Whoever wins will sit on the boards of the state’s public university systems, including the University of California, whose campuses have been wracked by tensions over Israel and antisemitism since Oct. 7.
• Campus Israel politics have also rocked a district attorney race. Santa Clara County DA Jeff Rosen, who is Jewish, has sought to prosecute a group of pro-Palestinian vandals at Stanford University who destroyed campus property, and had used the case in his campaign literature to claim that he was fighting antisemitism. That led a judge to recently remove Rosen from his effort to retry the case. Another Jewish DA in the state has since accused the judge of antisemitism. All this could upend Rosen’s bid for reelection as he faces a challenger, Daniel Chung, who used to be his subordinate. Chung has led protests against Rosen tied to the Stanford case.
• In a repeat of primary dynamics in other states, a pro-Israel group is spending heavily in a U.S. House race in a district without a large Jewish constituency. Democratic Majority For Israel is pouring $500,000 into TV ads in the Bakersfield-area 22nd District, which is conservative-leaning and majority Latino. The ads target progressive school board member Randy Villegas, who is backed by Bernie Sanders and other left-wing figureheads. Villegas has opposed continued U.S. military aid to Israel — though his opponent, moderate state Assemblymember Jasmeet Bains, also previously said Israel had committed genocide in Gaza (she has since walked it back). National Democratic groups are also backing Bains as the party hopes to flip the district.

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Outside the Palo Alto JCC in April, as hundreds of people entered the campus to celebrate Yom Haatzmaut, Israel’s 78th birthday, a group of Jewish and Israeli-American activists from the advocacy group Bay Area Jewish Coalition-Action stood at the entrance, holding yard signs for political candidates on the ballot this June.

One name that stood out among those signs: Ethan Agarwal, a tech entrepreneur and political newcomer vying to unseat Rep. Ro Khanna in Congress.

A growing number of Jewish and Israeli-American voters are putting their campaign donations and votes behind Agarwal, who has positioned himself as the pro-Israel candidate in the six-person race. Under California’s primary system, the top two vote-getters, regardless of party, will advance to face each other in the general election in November.

No public polling has been conducted in California’s 17th Congressional District, but at least one prediction market and two prominent California political analysts favor Khanna to lead the field with Agarwal in second.

“Ro is the frontrunner,” said Sam Lauter, a principal at BMWL Public Affairs who has been following the race closely. “There is zero question that Ethan has the ability to give him a run for his money, and that Ro has to — has to — engage [his constituents], something he hasn’t had to do in a long time.”

Khanna has served California’s 17th district, which includes parts of Alameda and Santa Clara counties, since 2017 and won re-election comfortably in 2024. But he is also among Congress’ most vocal critics of the Israeli government and has backed legislation that would penalize Israel over what he characterizes as genocide in Gaza — a charge Israel and most pro-Israel Jews reject.

For many Israeli Americans in Silicon Valley, that posture has fueled a frustration that boiled over throughout the Gaza war — the kind of tension that surfaces in WhatsApp group chats, Facebook threads and dinner table conversations.

Tali Klima, a spokesperson for Bay Area Jewish Coalition-Action, is one of those trying to turn the frustration into votes.

“We have lost trust in his ability to represent us, and will not accept empty condemnations of antisemitism while he amplifies radical antisemitic messages at every possible turn,” Klima said in an email.

Klima was referring to Khanna’s association with social media influencers accused of promoting antisemitism. In October, Khanna shared a video clip about refusing to accept money from AIPAC that featured the antisemitic YouTuber Ian Carroll, sparking outrage from Jewish groups. Khanna has also been a repeat guest on a show hosted by Hasan Piker, a left-wing commentator who has drawn allegations of antisemitism from major Jewish organizations. (Khanna has said he would go on Piker’s show again, but that he didn’t know who Carroll was when he shared the video.)

Despite the tensions, Khanna has continued to engage with the Jewish community. Late last year, he visited local synagogues to defend his decision to say Israel had committed “genocide” in Gaza. A group of teens from Congregation Beth Am in Los Altos Hills visited Khanna at his Washington office in March. And in April, he convened a roundtable of more than a dozen Bay Area Jewish leaders to envision “how we can build a new coalition for a just peace and a new way forward,” he said at the time.

The son of Indian immigrants, Agarwal was born in Montreal and raised in the Bay Area. Most recently a tech entrepreneur, he founded and later sold Aaptiv, a popular fitness app, and Coterie, a consumer finance technology company. But before entering tech, he interned for Sen. Dianne Feinstein while he was an undergraduate at Johns Hopkins University.

Agarwal attended the annual conventions in Washington in 2005 and 2006 of AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby that has lately become a bogeyman in Democratic politics. In 2010, while at Wharton Business School, Agarwal spent 10 days traveling through Israel on a trip organized by Israeli students that he credits with increasing his commitment to a strong U.S.-Israel relationship. He has said he has criticisms of the Israeli government but does not agree with Khanna’s characterizations.

“What Israel has done in Gaza, I don’t agree with all of it. I will not call it a genocide, though, because it’s not a genocide,” he said in April. “That specific word has very specific implications and has historical precedent, and it’s not a word that should be casually thrown around. I think [Khanna] uses it again as a bit of a dog whistle, because he wants to come across as being strongly anti-Israel.”

Khanna has an advantage because primary elections tend to bring out the most ideologically motivated voters, according to Larry Gerston, professor emeritus of political science at San Jose State University.

“For Democrats, that would be progressives who are least supportive of Trump/Israel. That would probably help Khanna,” Gerston said.

Encompassing a large swath of Silicon Valley, Khanna’s district is home to one of the largest concentrations of Israeli Americans in California, though they make up only a fraction of the overall voting population.

“Generally speaking, it’s difficult to oust an incumbent without any scandal or outrageous behavior,” Gerston added. “I haven’t seen any of those with Khanna.”

Lauter expects Khanna and Agarwal, both Democrats, to be the top vote-getters in the June 2 primary and face off on the ballot in November.

Khanna has made little secret of his national ambitions. He served as Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign co-chair in 2020 and has since built a profile far beyond his district — traveling to swing states, feuding with Vice President JD Vance and declining to rule out a 2028 presidential run as recently as this spring.

Lauter believes the focus on national politics has helped Khanna with campaign fundraising but cost him on the ground.

“There’s a very passionate community of people who are frankly just tired of the way Ro has conducted himself,” Lauter said. “They’re interested in having their congressperson pay attention to their district and not have an eye on other positions.”

Over Memorial Day Weekend, while Khanna was in New York City appearing on Fox News and “Meet the Press” to discuss national issues, Agarwal met with voters at the Santa Clara County farmers market and a nearby park in downtown Santa Clara.

“Ethan is an opponent he has to pay attention to,” Lauter said. Come November, “if he ignores this, if he thinks that he doesn’t have a problem, he could lose.”

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Khanna, a progressive California Democrat, and Massie, a Kentucky Republican, both said over the weekend that they would seek to remove a provision from the House’s annual defense bill that would expand U.S.-Israeli defense technology cooperation.

“If the provision in the NDAA to integrate/synchronize the U.S. and Israeli militaries (section 224) makes it out of committee, I’ll offer an amendment to strip it from the bill on the floor,” Massie, who lost his bid for reelection last month against a President Donald Trump-endorsed primary opponent, wrote in a post on X. “We are a sovereign country…”

The section of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2027 that Khanna and Massie have taken aim at would require the Secretary of Defense to designate an “executive agent responsible for synchronizing cooperative efforts between the United States and Israel, including bilateral defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, integration, and industrial cooperation.”

The cross-ideological alliance marked the latest instance of the progressive Democrat and libertarian Republican finding common cause on Israel-related foreign policy, after the pair previously teamed up to oppose U.S. involvement in Israel’s war in Iran last year.

The pledge by Massie, a leading anti-Israel Republican in Congress, was quickly joined by Khanna, who has been staunchly critical of Israel’s conduct during the war in Gaza and recently opposed American funding for Israel’s Iron Dome defense system.

“And I will be offering an amendment in the committee itself to strip section 224 out, @RepThomasMassie,” Khanna wrote in a post on X. “Trump can’t kill the Massie/Khanna partnership no matter how much he posts on Truth Social.”

Khanna lamented Massie’s primary loss on NBC’s “Meet the Press” last month, telling the outlet that he had been “taken out” because of the pair’s collaboration on opposing the war in Iran and the Epstein Transparency Act.

“Thomas is a real friend. He’s a good man, and he was taken out for two reasons,” Khanna said. “One, he had the courage to go after some very powerful people in working with me to get the Epstein Transparency Act passed. As he mentioned, that’s historic bipartisan legislation that finally got justice for the survivors, and he had people spend millions of dollars, and had the President of the United States after him. And second, he worked with me to stop this war in Iran.”

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“As a Muslim, I understand what it feels like to face bigotry, to feel unsafe in your community and to have your loyalty to this country questioned,” Hamawy said in a statement he sent to JTA on Wednesday. “In this country, we have seen recent attacks at both synagogues and mosques. I see our safety as intertwined.”

Hamawy, a plastic surgeon who served as a trauma surgeon in Gaza, is running in a crowded primary in Central New Jersey to succeed Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, who is retiring. Hamawy has distinguished himself from his competitors with his harsh anti-Israel stance, and surged to the top of the latest poll, conducted by Hamawy’s campaign, following a spending blitz on his behalf by pro-Palestinian super PAC American Priorities. 

The political novice has also faced questions about his connections back in the early 1990s to Omar Abdel-Rahman, the “Blind Sheikh” convicted on terrorism charges in 1995 linked to the World Trade Center bombing two years earlier and other plotted attacks. 

A Hamawy spokesperson on Friday called the questions “gross and bigoted,” and said the attacks against him “are getting more desperate than ever.”

In his statement to JTA on Wednesday, Hamawy said that he finds antisemitism “abhorrent” and that he is “deeply worried about its continued rise.”

Hamawy’s comments to JTA were his most extensive on antisemitism since he’s hit the campaign trail. Earlier in the race, amid an investigation into threatening letters that were sent to Jewish organizations in his deep-blue 12th district, Hamawy said he was “disgusted” by the messages. NJ-12 covers the state capital of Trenton, a number of suburban areas and the college town of Princeton.

“We are seeing an epidemic of hatred in this country against religious and ethnic minorities, and it must stop,” he wrote on X earlier in May about the threats. 

If Hamawy wins the primary on Tuesday and the general election in November, he will be one of Congress’ sharpest Israel critics. He has called for an end to military aid to Israel, a complete arms embargo against the Jewish State and the right of return for Palestinian refugees. 

Asked about Jewish constituents who disagree with his stance on Israel, Hamawy told JTA, “I hope we can still connect on shared values and goals, including peace, justice, safety and dignity.” He added that his door “will always be open.”

Hamawy also said that his Jewish staff, volunteers and supporters across the district “have made invaluable contributions to our campaign and Jewish voters are an important part of our coalition.”

However, he has drawn heat for his anti-Israel views. In an appearance last month on Hasan Piker’s show, he told Piker — a far-left streamer who’s been accused of antisemitic rhetoric — that he doesn’t support Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system because it is “insulating Israel” from “having to deal with the consequences of war.” 

In response, Sue Altman, one of Hamawy’s challengers in the primary, told Jewish Insider, “We absolutely cannot and should not ever be cheerleading and wishing for the deaths of Israeli children.” 

Piker is set to rally alongside Hamawy in Trenton, New Jersey, on Saturday.

Altman trails Hamawy, according to the race’s latest polling data, which was commissioned by Hamawy’s camp and collected in early May. According to the survey, Hamawy at 19% leads Altman, a former state director for Sen. Andy Kim, with 12% of the vote, and East Brunswick Mayor Brad Cohen, a vocal supporter of Israel, is in third with 11%. 

The recent poll was conducted after American Priorities rallied behind him. The super PAC pledged to spend $10 million throughout this year’s midterm elections in hopes of installing pro-Palestinian candidates in Congress. To date, American Priorities has spent around $1.5 million of a promised $2 million promoting Hamawy. (As a super PAC, American Priorities makes independent expenditures, meaning it does not coordinate with the campaigns it is backing.)

Data collected from March 30 through April 4, before American Priorities’ ad blitz, had Hamawy in fourth place behind State Rep. Verlina Reynolds-Jackson, Altman and Cohen with just 5% of the vote. 

Hamawy has recently come under fire from some of his opponents for his association in the early 1990s with Abdel-Rahman, who was later convicted for terrorism following an investigation that grew out of his ties to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. 

Hamawy’s yearslong association with Abdel-Rahman included a visit to his home and a 13-hour drive together in 1991 to an Islamic economy conference in Detroit, according to the transcript of the Sheikh’s 1995 trial, for which Hamawy served as a witness for Abdel-Rahman. Hamawy told the New Jersey Monitor this week that he testified out of a sense of “a civic duty,” and said he was “called as a witness, and I gave my testimony under oath, and then I walked out.”

New Jersey Rep. Josh Gottheimer told Jewish Insider that he has “serious questions and deep concerns about [Hamawy’s] associations with terrorist organizations and leaders who have attacked America,” and that Hamawy “needs to answer these questions and explain himself to New Jersey voters.”

A Hamawy spokesperson told JTA that Abdel-Rahman had been “one of very few religious figures in what was then a very small Muslim community in New Jersey,” and that the candidate condemns Abdel-Rahman’s “violent rhetoric and actions” and had no contact with him after his arrest.

Hamawy is a former combat trauma surgeon and is credited with saving the life of Illinois Rep. and veteran Tammy Duckworth during the Iraq War. He has spoken at length about his experiences in Gaza in 2024 and 2025. 

“This was not my first time in a combat zone,” Hamawy said on Piker’s show. “I’ve seen war. I was in Iraq, I was in Bosnia, which was another genocide. That was 20, 30 years ago.” 

He added that what he saw in Gaza “was at another level altogether. You know, this was a genocide.”

Hamawy has received support from a slew of staunchly pro-Palestinian Democrats in Congress, including Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Ro Khanna, Delia Ramirez – who introduced the Block the Bombs to Israel Act – and Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders.

On Tuesday, Chris Rabb, who recently won a congressional Democratic primary in Philadelphia, backed Hamawy. Hamawy has also been endorsed by former Rep. Jamaal Bowman, who lost his New York seat in a 2024 election where AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobbying group, spent $14.5 million opposing him.

Hamawy is also backed by anti-AIPAC groups PAL PAC and Track AIPAC, and other progressive organizations including the Council on American-Islamic Relations and Sanders’ group Our Revolution. On Tuesday, the anti-Zionist group Jewish Voice for Peace also endorsed Hamawy.

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The runoff in the San Antonio race drew national attention after Galindo, a local housing activist and therapist, came under scrutiny for comments that included vows to turn a local immigrant detention center “into a prison for American Zionists” and claims that it was her “perception that Zionist billionaires run the world.”

Following Galindo’s surprise first-place finish in the march primary, national Democratic leaders and Jewish organizations condemned her rhetoric and urged voters to reject her candidacy, including Texas Senate candidate James Talarico, who revealed to JTA earlier this month that he would not back or campaign with Galindo.

The district, which stretches between San Antonio and Austin, was heavily affected by Republican redistricting this year, one of several factors that local political observers and Democratic Party leaders said contributed to Galindo’s earlier win.

The race also attracted outside spending, with Lead Left PAC, a newly launched super PAC apparently tied to a Republican donation platform, pouring over $900,000 on ads and mailers promoting Galindo. Last week, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee launched a $35,000 ad buy against Galindo, an unusual step for the DCCC to take against a Democratic candidate.

“Republicans just spent weeks and almost a million dollars propping up an antisemite, and they should be ashamed and embarrassed — it was a disgrace,” the president of the Democratic Majority For Israel PAC, Brian Romick, told JTA in a statement. “Tonight is a victory for the voters of TX-35, for the Democratic Party, and for every Democrat who believes that antisemitism has no home in our coalition.”

Romick told JTA Tuesday night that he believed the results of the runoff signaled that Democratic primary voters “aren’t going to elect antisemitic candidates, and in the districts that we need to win, pro-Israel candidates are our best bet.”

Garcia will now face Republican nominee Carlos De La Cruz, who defeated opponent John Lujan, in the Nov. 3 general election.

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With voters set to decide the Democratic nomination Tuesday, as Galindo faces off with sheriff’s deputy Johnny Garcia, local officials and political observers are grappling with how a little-known candidate with a history of inflammatory remarks about Israel and Jews has come within striking distance of a seat in Congress.

The local housing activist went into the race with little political profile, having received less than 3% of the vote in a San Antonio City Council race last year. Local officials familiar with the contest chalked up Galindo’s success to a litany of factors, including low voter awareness of the candidates and a newly drawn Republican-leaning district that attracted few high-profile Democratic contenders.

What they did not credit for her success was her antisemitic rhetoric. While the race heading into Tuesday’s runoff has been defined by scrutiny and criticism of Galindo’s views toward Zionists, local political analysts and activists told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that her controversial positions were not widely known ahead of her March win and, if anything, are hurting her chances against Garcia.

Israel is a growing flashpoint in a number of Democratic primaries across the country, and several candidates have drawn allegations of antisemitism as they employ harsh criticism of Zionism. Galindo’s rhetoric has been even more extreme – including vows to turn a local immigrant detention center “into a prison for American Zionists” – but San Antonio political observers caution against lumping her early success in with the recent wins of progressive candidates in urban districts.

Jon Taylor, a political science professor at University of Texas San Antonio, told JTA that Galindo’s antisemitic rhetoric had been largely unknown at the time of the primary.

“What I can tell from previous candidate forums, she talked about the 1%, she talked about going after Trump and ICE,” Taylor said. “None of the stuff on Zionism, from what I could tell, was ever mentioned.”

Now that her antisemitic tirades have received so much attention, Taylor predicted they would turn off voters in the socially conservative district, where elections are usually driven by pocketbook issues.

“To be honest, talking about Israel, talking about some sort of Zionist conspiracy, is not what voters are looking for,” Taylor said.

Galindo has previously told local outlets that it was her “perception that Zionist billionaires run the world” and posted on social media that “ZIOS=GENOCIDAL EUROPEAN COLONIZER FREAKS.” After Texas Senate candidate James Talarico revealed to JTA that he would not back or campaign with Galindo, she told JTA that “coordinated media attacks declaring my anti-Zionist rhetoric as anti-Semitic” were “causing MORE harm to the Jews of San Antonio by playing into all the stigmas that they own the media.”

Galindo, who has raised almost no direct funding for her campaign, has benefitted from an opaque, newly formed Political Action Committee, which Democrats are charging is Republican-backed.

For some Jewish Democrats, the purported GOP-backed funding is evidence that Galindo’s anti-Israel rhetoric is a political liability rather than a strength.

“Republican dark money groups are spending big to elevate anti-Israel Democratic candidates who are out of touch with voters — because they’d rather face a weaker opponent in races that will decide the House majority in November. It’s cynical and it’s disturbing,” the president and CEO of the Democratic Majority for Israel, Brian Romick, said in a statement to JTA.

Taylor noted that the GOP would only be promoting Galindo because the party wants Democrats “to nominate the worst candidate possible,” backing up the notion that her views are not appealing to voters.

The newly launched Lead Left PAC, which has not disclosed its donors, has spent more than $900,000 on ads and mailers promoting Galindo. Campaign finance watchdogs accuse the group of structuring its activity in a way that allowed it to bypass donor disclosures before voters cast their ballots.

Last week, the Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission accusing the PAC of having “strategically gamed federal reporting deadlines” in order to not disclose the sources of its funds ahead of the primaries.

The alleged GOP interference in the Texas race also spurred a row between the Republican Jewish Coalition and the Democratic Majority for Israel.

In a tweet, the RJC criticized Galindo’s “vile rhetoric” and called for every Democratic candidate to be asked if they agreed with Galindo.

DMFI, after noting Democratic leaders had condemned her, asked the RJC if it would “condemn the Republican Super PACs promoting her?”

The RJC, Texas GOP and Winred – a Republican donation platform that reportedly was at one point linked in the metadata for the website of Lead Left PAC – did not respond to a request for comment from JTA.

Last week, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee launched a $35,000 ad buy against Galindo that took aim at her “conspiracies” and “hateful words.” The last-minute ad campaign, which was first reported by Axios, comes as ActBlue, a Democratic Party fundraising platform, has also stopped processing donations for her campaign on its platform.

A local Democratic Party official familiar with the race told JTA in an emailed statement that it was likely voters did not know much about Galindo ahead of the race, but that with “more knowledge and media attention, voters are now much better equipped about their choices.”

The race has unfolded against the backdrop of a major Republican redistricting overhaul. Congressional District 35, where Galindo is competing, was impacted so heavily that the incumbent Rep. Greg Casar is now running for a different seat, while roughly 43% of residents of Bexar Country, which the district partially covers, were placed in a new district, according to the San Antonio Report.

On Wednesday, a host of Texas Democratic Party leaders released a joint statement decrying Galindo’s rhetoric, writing that her comments “do not reflect our values as Democrats or as Texans.”

Casar, who chairs the U.S. House Progressive Caucus and currently represents much of the district, made the unusual move last week of endorsing Garcia, Galindo’s moderate runoff opponent, telling the San Antonio Express-News that Galindo’s “very inappropriate remarks” sealed the deal.

“I’m a progressive Democrat. Johnny has been endorsed by the more conservative Blue Dogs. But we can all agree that he’s the candidate who can win this race,” Casar told the outlet.

Rabbi Mara Nathan, the senior rabbi of Temple Beth El, a Reform congregation in San Antonio, told JTA that she did not think Galindo had drummed up support heading into her campaign from voters over her antisemitic rhetoric, adding that “if that had been the case, we would have heard about it much earlier on.”

She explained, “An alarm would have been sounded pretty early, and not necessarily from Jewish people, but from other people in the San Antonio community who are our friends and allies.”

Looking to Tuesday’s primary, Taylor said he believed the public spotlight on Galindo’s remarks had changed the race by making voters more aware of her record.

“With this animus now out there and highly visible, people are really alerted to the danger of this woman and what her rhetoric could mean,” Taylor said.

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Critics of the Biden administration’s support for Israel during the war in Gaza that began on Oct. 7, 2023, have alleged that the party was suppressing its internal findings about the election, which returned President Donald Trump to office, because it would show that Biden’s stance was deeply unpopular.

Axios reported in February that the top Democrats who worked on the report concluded that Harris “lost significant support because of the Biden administration’s approach to the war in Gaza.”

If that’s the case, it’s not reflected in the document that CNN published on Thursday morning. Portions of the document were not included, however, with notes saying that the executive summary and conclusion had not been shared by the authors.

The report points to 10 different “strategic implications” for Democrats, including that “anti-Trump sentiment has limits,” male voters “require direct engagement,” and that voter demographics are not enough to determine which candidate they’ll prefer.

CNN reported that the document was written by Democratic strategist Paul Rivera and annotated by the DNC. The DNC released the document following questions raised by CNN, the network reported.

DNC Chairman Ken Martin told CNN that the report was not yet ready to be publicly released, but concluded that withholding it would create a larger distraction than releasing an incomplete version. “I sincerely apologize,” he said.

“For full transparency, I am releasing the report as we received it, in its entirety, unedited and unabridged,” Martin said. “It does not meet my standards, and it won’t meet your standards, but I am doing this because people need to be able to trust the Democratic Party and trust our word.”

Halie Soifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, said she’d expected to see analysis related to Gaza and Israel in the report.

“As soon as it arrived in my inbox I immediately searched for the word ‘Gaza’ expecting there to be an entire section focused on this issue,” Soifer said in an interview. “So I was surprised that, in fact, there was nothing — on Gaza, Israel, Jewish voters, non-Jewish voters, it was just nothing.”

Though rumors had swirled about the role that Gaza played in the autopsy, Soifer said she heard from a DNC official that there was “never” a section focusing on the issue, “at least not in writing in this report.”

Meanwhile, the Institute for Middle East Understanding, a pro-Palestinian nonprofit, called on Martin to release “the information that the author of the autopsy told us clearly and unambiguously, which is that DNC officials’ review of their own data found Biden’s support to be a net-negative for Democrats in 2024.”

Rivera, the report’s author, met with the IMEU and told them that the war in Gaza hurt Democrats in the 2024 election, according to reporting by Axios.

Soifer said the JDCA was not contacted by Rivera, and did not meet with him. 

The pro-Israel lobbying group Democratic Majority for Israel also said it had not met with Rivera. “Our current leadership has not met with the author and hasn’t been contacted,” communications chair Rachel Rosen told JTA.

DMFI rejected the idea that Gaza caused Democrats to lose the presidency in 2024.

“We need to learn the lessons of 2024 so we can be successful in 2026, 2028 and beyond,” said Brian Romick, DMFI’s president. 

“What is clear — autopsy or not — is a majority of Americans, including Democrats, support the U.S.-Israel relationship, and that support was not the reason Vice President Harris lost the election,” he said.

A DMFI staffer pointed to polling from last fall showing that a majority of Democrats support the U.S.-Israel relationship.

And Soifer pointed to a poll published Friday by the Jewish Voters Resource Center, a nonpartisan firm, that found that more than two-thirds of Jewish voters plan to vote for Democrats this November — suggesting that Israel was not significantly moving votes in one of the demographics most likely to be invested in the issue.

“The poll also demonstrated that the top issue driving the Jewish vote in 2026 – just as it was in 2024 – is the future of democracy, followed by the cost of living. While 70% of Jewish voters have an emotional attachment to Israel, 55% opposed Israel’s conduct of the war in Gaza,” she said. “There is little evidence that the war in Gaza has impacted the Jewish American vote.”

A spokesperson for the Republican Jewish Coalition pointed to the episode as an example of infighting among Democrats.

“The Democrats are tearing themselves apart as they appease the ascendant far-left extremists in their party, from Maine to Pennsylvania,” wrote Sam Markstein, alluding to candidates Graham Platner and Chris Rabb.

“It’s bad policy and it’s bad politics. The GOP is the only party where it’s safe to be proudly Jewish and pro-Israel,” Markstein wrote. “Republicans are righteously taking on the tough fights and winning, while Democrats continue to whistle past the political graveyard.”

This story has been updated to clarify DMFI’s views.

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Nathan lives and works in San Antonio, where Maureen Galindo, a local activist who has vowed to turn a local immigrant detention center “into a prison for American Zionists,” was the top vote-getter in a Democratic primary in March and now faces a runoff on Tuesday.

“It seems shocking that someone who is so virulently antisemitic and anti-Zionist has not only been given a voice, but is even now in this primary runoff,” Nathan, the senior rabbi of Temple Beth El, a 150-year-old Reform congregation, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Galindo’s extreme rhetoric has drawn national attention as the runoff in Texas’ 35th Congressional District nears — and increasingly has also drawn condemnation from other Democrats, including some who are themselves critical of Israel and its supporters in the United States. Some are alleging that her candidacy has been boosted by Republican operatives.

The far-left PAC Track AIPAC, founded to oppose the influence of the pro-Israel lobby in politics, rescinded its endorsement of Galindo on Tuesday, saying that her call to “jail Americans who identify as Zionists” clashed with its support for free speech rights.

“Just as we oppose efforts to criminalize the Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement and efforts to codify expressions of support for Palestinian liberation as antisemitism, so do we oppose any effort to suppress or punish the free speech of self-identified Zionists,” the group said.

And several Jewish Democrats, including Sen. Jacky Rosen of Nevada and Reps. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey and Jared Moskowitz of Florida, also decried Galindo’s rhetoric. In a joint statement Wednesday, Gottheimer and Moskowitz said that, if Galindo wins the election, they would force votes to expel her from Congress “every single day we are here.”

Last week, the Texas Senate candidate James Talarico revealed to JTA that he would not back or campaign with Galindo if she wins the runoff against sheriff’s deputy Johnny Garcia — even as securing her district would make it more likely for the Democrats to take control of Congress.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive leader who has been strongly critical of Israel, threw her support behind Garcia in a post on X Tuesday, calling Galindo’s rhetoric “absolutely disgusting.”

“This bigoted garbage and antisemitism should be nowhere near our politics. If you’re in TX-35, vote for @johnnygarciatx,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote.

Also on Tuesday, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Washington Democratic Rep. Suzan DelBene issued a joint statement condemning Galindo’s rhetoric, writing that the “vile language by her is disqualifying and has no place in American politics, and certainly not in the Democratic Party.”

The two Democratic leaders also accused Republican leadership of propping up Galindo in the race through the newly launched Lead Left PAC, which has spent nearly $600,000 on ads and mailers bashing Garcia and boosting Galindo.

While the PAC has not had to disclose its donors, the metadata on its website previously linked it to WinRed, a Republican donation platform, according to a Punchbowl News report. Ocasio-Cortez made the connection in her statement, saying, “The donors behind the Republican super PAC funding her should be exposed.”

Jeffries and DelBene called on Republican leadership to “immediately cease propping up this antisemitic candidacy, pull spending in the race and forcefully condemn these comments,” adding that “MAGA extremists should be ashamed of themselves.”

In a statement to The New York Times regarding funding for a mailer supporting her candidacy, Galindo suggested that the funds had come from “a billionaire zionist who made the pac to sabotage candidates.”

“Dems and Republicans uniting against me in the same week with the same message is evidence that theyre working together for the zionist billionaires that control our government and tax money,” Galindo told The Times.

Galindo, WinRed and the National Republican Congressional Committee did not immediately respond to JTA requests for comment, and attempts to reach Lead Left PAC and the Republican National Committee were not successful.

The head of Democratic Majority For Israel, Brian Romick, whose organization has launched a new six-figure ad campaign backing Garcia, also took aim at Lead Left PAC’s spending on Galindo in a statement, calling on Republicans to “explain why they’re paying to keep her viable.”

“Republicans aren’t doing this by accident,” Romick said. “They are deliberately elevating one of the most grotesque antisemites in American politics this cycle because they think it helps them win.”

The Jewish Federation of San Antonio did not immediately respond to a request for comment from JTA. But the federation appeared to weigh in on Galindo’s remarks in a post on Facebook last week, calling on “candidates and elected officials” to “refrain from bigoted and offensive attacks.”

The widespread condemnation has reassured Nathan that opposition to Galindo’s rhetoric extends across the Democratic party.

“It is heartening that those folks who are clearly no fan of Israel understand that you can be critical of a government without saying you’re going to put Jewish people in internment camps,” Nathan said.

Nathan said she hoped the growing attention surrounding the race would help Texans “wake up and step up for a more sane perspective in how one is going to lead our community.”

“On both sides of the aisle, what we need is for both our elected officials and people who are running to speak out against that kind of antisemitic rhetoric,” Nathan said. “Beyond the political position, the idea that you want to attack any faith or any religion, any race is really abhorrent and goes against American values and certainly Texan values.”

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The matchup comes as no surprise, as the two candidates won their respective primaries uncontested on Tuesday.

Shapiro is seen as the strong favorite to win. But Garrity, who is popular among Republicans and endorsed by President Donald Trump, could mount a competitive challenge. She became the only person to earn more votes than Shapiro in Pennsylvania history when she was reelected as state treasurer in 2024.

The matchup could pose a hurdle for Shapiro’s potential 2028 presidential ambitions even if Garrity loses in November. A hard-fought race in a purple state will allow Republicans to test attack strategies against Shapiro.

Shapiro is a pro-Israel Democrat in a party where supporting Israel is an increasing liability. Garrity, too, has gone to bat for Israel. As state treasurer, she has more than tripled Pennsylvania’s investment in Israel bonds. She invested $20 million following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, and another $25 million in July 2025.

“Israel is our greatest ally in the Middle East, and I will continue to stand by them in their fight to achieve peace,” Garrity said when announcing the $25 million investment last year.

“Israel bonds are a smart, dependable investment with a proven track record — and it’s especially important to show our support at a time when Israelis and Jews — both abroad and here in the United States — continue to face horrific acts of antisemitism,” she wrote. “I’m proud to announce this significant new investment, continuing the strong relationship between Pennsylvania, Israel, and the Jewish Community.”

Garrity is embracing her endorsement from Trump, whom she has said she believes won in her state and nationally in 2020, when President Joe Biden prevailed.

Garrity’s early attacks on Shapiro have implicated his record on Jewish issues. Last year, she took a shot at Shapiro in response to an article by politically conservative website the Washington Free Beacon. In the story, a group of Philadelphia parents said Shapiro had “completely ignored” their pleas for help addressing antisemitism in public schools during the war in Gaza.

“I know Josh Shapiro understands the evils of antisemitism — he’s lived it,” Garrity wrote on X. “That’s why it’s painful to see him turn away from Jewish parents begging for help as their kids face N*zi salutes and teachers praising Hamas.”

Shapiro’s team denied that the governor had neglected parental concerns. He is widely regarded as being outspoken against antisemitism, and has maintained a pro-Israel outlook that includes support for U.S. military aid to Israel. The man who confessed to committing an arson attack on Shapiro’s residence in 2025 said he thought Shapiro was contributing to violence against the Palestinian people.

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