I’ve covered Congress for 20 years. No one wields power like AIPAC.

Last November, shortly after Israel began its savage bombardment of Gaza, newly elevated House Speaker Mike Johnson led a fast-track approval of $14 billion in military aid for Israel’s war.

In the weeks that followed, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee delivered $95,000 in campaign contributions to Johnson.

As The Intercept’s D.C. bureau chief and a veteran of Capitol Hill reporting, this is far from the first time I’ve seen AIPAC wield its financial might.

In fact, The Intercept team and I have been tracking AIPAC’s spending and lobbying activity for years, and with one in every 25 Palestinians in Gaza now killed or wounded and 90 percent of the entire Gaza population facing starvation, it’s absolutely critical that the American people understand the influence of AIPAC in Congress.

Will you make a donation to power our continued investigation into the influence of the pro-Israel lobby on Congress?

Last year, I reported about how AIPAC offered $100,000 to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in 2018 shortly after she defeated incumbent Joe Crowley in the Democratic primary. This massive, unsolicited campaign donation was offered, in the words of the AIPAC representative, to “start the conversation” between the pro-Israel lobbying group and the representative-to-be.

“This was basically a bag filled with cash,” one of her aides told me later.

Ocasio-Cortez turned down the money, and in the years since, she has seen the other side of AIPAC’s powerful “carrot-and-stick” approach to politics. In 2022, AIPAC spent $30 million targeting progressive Democrats and members of “the Squad,” the group of lawmakers aligned with Ocasio-Cortez, making AIPAC the No. 1 biggest outside spender in Democratic primaries that year.

In the 2024 cycle, AIPAC is going even bigger. The group has already emerged as by far the biggest donor to the campaign of George Latimer, the AIPAC-recruited candidate challenging Squad member Jamaal Bowman. In fact, fully 42 percent of Latimer’s entire campaign budget so far has come from AIPAC. Summer Lee, Cori Bush, and Ilhan Omar are all facing strong challenges backed by “pro-Israel” groups.

Sadly, it’s by no means obvious that AIPAC’s success in steering American policy toward Israel has been good for Israel or for Israelis. Instead, the hawkishness has further locked the country into an endless conflict.

With bombs still falling in Gaza and the International Court of Justice warning of possible genocide and mass starvation, it’s critical for Americans to understand AIPAC’s role in U.S. politics.

The Intercept’s hard-hitting investigative journalism relies on your support. Will you make a donation today?

STAND WITH THE INTERCEPT →

Thank you,