A growing number of House Democrats are refusing money from AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobbying group, as the war in Gaza becomes politically toxic with the party’s base.
Over the last month, three House Democrats have sworn off contributions from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee after accepting them in prior election cycles. AIPAC was a top contributor to Reps. Morgan McGarvey (D-KY) and Deborah Ross (D-NC), supporting their campaigns with a combined $104,000 in 2024, according to OpenSecrets, while Rep. Valerie Foushee (D-NC) received some $2 million in contributions from its affiliated super PAC for her 2022 election bid.
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All three announced they would not accept further donations over the August recess, as pro-Palestinian constituents at town halls brought the issue back to the fore of political debate.
The Democratic divide over Israel has persisted since the earliest days of the war in Gaza, with the Left pressing for a ceasefire or cutoff in military assistance. But the new wave of disavowals represents the latest sign that the conflict, which has killed thousands of Palestinians, has become polarizing within the mainstream of the party.
Weeks earlier, a majority of Senate Democrats voted to restrict the sale of munitions to Israel, though the measure failed in the Republican-led chamber.
AIPAC, which spent more than $40 million in congressional races last cycle, has found some success in ousting the House’s most vocal Israel critics. Former Reps. Cori Bush and Jamaal Bowman were the only Democratic incumbents to lose their congressional primaries, and both faced a deluge of spending from pro-Israel groups.
But AIPAC has faced a widening chasm within the party in the nearly two years since Hamas launched its invasion of Israel, killing hundreds of civilians. Public sentiment seemingly reached a turning point in July as reports of famine and Israeli soldiers firing on food lines in Gaza drove even sympathetic Democrats to issue rebukes.
Rep. Wesley Bell (D-MO), the AIPAC-backed candidate who defeated Bush, said he could not “stand by” as Palestinians go hungry, while Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, endorsed using American military aid as leverage to influence how Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is conducting the war.
Netanyahu, who has described the reports as “malicious falsehoods,” came under even greater scrutiny on Tuesday, when Israel launched a strike targeting Hamas leadership in Doha, a move that drew rare criticism from President Donald Trump given Qatar’s alliance with the United States.
“We have a lot of members,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), one of 37 House Democrats to vote against $14 billion in military aid to Israel last year, said of the more diffuse criticism. “I think their clout is diminishing, and they know that.”
AIPAC maintains that Israel has a broad base of support within Congress, with the three House Democrats swearing off AIPAC money representing a small share of the hundreds who received contributions in 2024.
The divisions over Israel also do not fall neatly into two camps. Democrats like Bell continue to defend Israel from progressive attacks. At a town hall in August, he pushed back on protesters characterizing the siege of Gaza as a “genocide.”
Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-IL), who received more than $12,000 from AIPAC over the last two election cycles, told the Washington Examiner that he would still accept its contributions even as he openly criticizes the Netanyahu government.
Jackson is one of 45 Democrats who have co-sponsored a bill, the Block the Bombs Act, that would cut off some offensive military assistance to Israel.
“The overwhelming majority of Democrats and Republicans welcome the support of our 5 million members because they recognize that being pro-Israel is both good policy and good politics,” AIPAC spokesman Marshall Wittmann said in a statement. “They understand that Israel is fighting a just and moral war against Hamas terrorism, and they will not be dissuaded by extremists hostile to the Jewish state.”
The congressional support is directly tied to public polling on the war in Gaza. Criticism of Israel has been muted within the Republican Party, tracking with surveys that show broad approval of Israel’s military operation among GOP voters.
Among Democrats, criticism has grown louder as the war becomes deeply unpopular with the party base. Just 8% of Democrats approved of the conflict in a July Gallup poll, down from 36% in November 2023.
The shift has profound implications in House districts across the country, seeping into Democratic primaries as a possible liability for more centrist members.
Ross, one of the Democrats to decline AIPAC money, is a relative centrist, according to a GovTrack scorecard, while Foushee and McGarvey, Kentucky’s only House Democrat, are in the middle of the pack ideologically.
In Republican politics, criticism of Israel has largely been limited to the noninterventionist wing of the party, as represented by lawmakers like Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Thomas Massie (R-KY) in the House.
Last year, 21 Republicans voted against the $14 billion in military aid to Israel.
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AIPAC supports members of both parties, and despite its heavy involvement in Democratic primaries last cycle, it spent more than $16 million on Republican congressional candidates in 2024. That figure stood at $25 million for Democrats.
“Our activists will be deeply engaged in the 2026 elections to elect candidates who stand with Israel,” said Wittmann, the AIPAC spokesman.