By Jonathan D. Salant, JNS
The Michigan and Missouri races offered contrasting outcomes for Jewish Democrats as they grapple with the Democratic Party’s evolving stance toward Israel.
For Jewish Democrats, Tuesday’s primaries could have been worse. But not much.
Former public health official Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, who has accused “bloodthirsty” Israel of “genocide” and called it an “illegal apartheid regime,” defeated Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) in the Senate Democratic primary in Michigan, a state that could determine which party controls the Senate next January.
And Michigan state representative Donavan McKinney unseated pro-Israel Rep. Shri Thanedar (D-Mich.) in the Democratic primary.
But state senator Jeremy Moss, who is Jewish, won the Michigan Democratic primary over two anti-Israel candidates to succeed Stevens.
And in Missouri, Rep. Wesley Bell (D-Mo.) repelled a comeback attempt from former congresswoman Cori Bush, a harsh critic of Israel whom he ousted two years earlier.
That provides some comfort for Jewish Democrats, Guy Ziv, associate professor of foreign policy and global security at American University and associate director of its Israel studies center, told JNS.
“They have every reason to be hopeful that the party has not become this kind of monolithic anti-Jewish or anti-Israel or anti-Zionist party but rather that there are deep divisions,” Ziv said.
“Hopefully, these divisions will be addressed in the coming months as we approach the midterm election,” he told JNS. “I don’t see any reason for the Jewish community to panic in light of the better-than-expected results for Haley and the certainly positive outcome in the Missouri race.”
While Jewish Democrats can sit out a House race where the Democratic candidate is anti-Israel without affecting the outcome of the election, Maryland Democratic activist Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi told JNS that they can’t do that in Michigan, where the race between El-Sayed and former Republican congressman Mike Rogers could determine which party controls the Senate in January.
“The difference is that Michigan is so important to the control of the Senate that it gives people a moral hazard, where both of your decisions are bad decisions,” she told JNS.
On the campaign trail, El-Sayed accused Israel of “genocide” and welcomed the support of far-left streamer Hasan Piker, who has called Orthodox Jews “inbred.”
“I don’t feel better when you have a bigoted hater,” Laszlo Mizrahi told JNS, “at a time when Democrats need to have a Senate victory because of the need to be able to impact who sits on the Supreme Court in the future and whether there is rule of law in this nation.”
The Michigan Democratic Jewish Caucus stated on Wednesday that it congratulates El-Sayed. “Winning the primary is step one and earning the full Democratic coalition in November will take deliberate, meaningful work,” it said. “To build the broad coalition needed to win the general election, Dr. El-Sayed must address the harm caused during this campaign.”
“While debating campaign finance and political spending is a standard part of Democratic primaries, repeatedly singling out organized Jewish political participation as a proxy for special interest corruption crossed an alarming line,” the caucus leaders stated. “For many in our community, this framing functioned as a dog whistle that demonized mainstream Jewish civic engagement.”
“If Dr. El-Sayed seeks to represent our entire state in the U.S. Senate, his campaign must commit to engaging directly with Michigan’s Jewish community, demonstrating a genuine commitment to engage with our community on its own terms, respecting the deep connection many Michigan Jews have to Israel, rejecting rhetoric that demonizes the Jewish civic identity and seeking common ground on life issues that concern all Michiganders,” it said.
Laszlo Mizrahi said that Jewish Democrats will have to look at other states, such as Nebraska, where independents are taking on Republican Senate nominees.
“I think we have to take a look as Democrats at what are the other paths that we can take if we don’t have Michigan,” she said.
'Politically homeless'
The results still leave Jewish Democrats wondering about their future in the party and how to resolve the split between the far-left wing and the more moderate establishment, Ziv told JNS.
“It’s clear that there are deep divides within the Democratic Party and a struggle over the future of its leadership and future direction,” he said. “For the Jewish community, of course, many are feeling politically homeless—how I would phrase it—given a lot of the anti-Israel discourse.”
“The word ‘AIPAC’ has come to mean a lot more than just that specific organization but, some might say, Jewish influence,” Ziv told JNS.
“A lot of the rhetoric has made many Jews who are traditionally kind of Yellow Dog Democrats, to use the old phrase, question their own party loyalty and whether or not there is a future for them in the party,” he said.
Veteran Democratic consultant Julie Roginsky told JNS that most of the Democrats who will be in Congress next year “are not leftists.”
“They’re not Hasan Piker acolytes, and in that sense, I hope that cooler heads will prevail,” she said. “As somebody who is deeply frustrated about the failures of Democratic leadership to both advance a robust agenda and to communicate a robust agenda, I understand where that anger is coming from among the grassroots.”
But the answer is not to embrace people who want to take over the party, she said.
“I don’t think it’s healthy for the party to have to elevate voices that sound very similar to what Nick Fuentes and Tucker Carlson say, particularly when it comes to Jews,” Roginsky told JNS.
In the end, Ziv said, he expects animus towards U.S. President Donald Trump to be the unifying factor.
“At the end of the day, the party is going to be able to exploit Trump’s unpopularity and figure out a way to work with all of these different factions,” he told JNS. “I don’t expect it to be smooth sailing. I do expect there to be fights down the road on policy and approach.”
