Israel-Gaza and the Michigan Democratic primary

IN THIS EDITION

The Democrats’ Israel split is defining the Michigan Senate primary

California Dems’ redistricting gamble

Cornyn shows signs of closing polling gap

Tim Scott thanks crypto for toppling Brown

THE TOP

The Democrats’ Israel split is defining the Michigan Senate primary

Happy Wednesday morning.

NOVI, Mich. — Democrats are facing a moment of reckoning over how to approach long-term U.S. support for Israel amid the seemingly never-ending war in Gaza and the ongoing humanitarian crisis facing Palestinians.

Nowhere in the country are those divisions more pronounced than in the party’s messiest Senate primary in a must-win state for Democrats in 2026.

The open Senate seat in Michigan, a state President Donald Trump won in 2024, has triggered an intense battle that’s morphed into a proxy fight over the future of the Democratic Party.

Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.), seen as the favorite of Democratic leadership, is doubling down on her pro-Israel record. State Sen. Mallory McMorrow and former Michigan health official Abdul El-Sayed — to varying degrees — say Democratic voters want their leaders to reconsider what’s been a reflexively pro-Israel stance by both parties in Washington for decades.

El-Sayed, a 40-year-old physician who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2018, was a prominent booster of the “uncommitted” movement during the Democratic presidential primary last year. El-Sayed saw it as a way to pressure then-President Joe Biden to change his support for Israel’s war in Gaza following the Oct. 7 terror attacks by Hamas, although he backed Democrats in the general election. But the move reflected the anger at Democratic Party leaders among Michigan’s prominent Arab-American community.

El-Sayed insists his position isn’t only smart politics in a Democratic primary but also in a general election.

“There’s an opportunity to take back the voters we lost in 2024 — who, by the way, happen to be Arab voters and young men,” El-Sayed told a crowd here, describing himself.

“[Trump] is, for whatever reason, someone who comes off as being authentic,” El-Sayed added in an interview. “People are going to look at me and be like, that man believes what he says.”

The bigger picture. Back in Washington, Democratic support for Israel is slowly slipping as the war in Gaza grinds on. House Minority Whip Katherine Clark recently referred to Israel’s actions in Gaza as a “genocide,” although she later walked back those comments and didn’t lose her AIPAC endorsement.

The Senate Democratic Caucus is bitterly divided over Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza and the tidal wave of Palestinian civilian casualties. This is evidenced by recent Senate votes on resolutions to block offensive weapons sales to Israel. Both El-Sayed and McMorrow told us they would’ve backed the resolutions, which have steadily picked up additional Democratic support over the past year as the conflict continues.

Despite the shift, Stevens says she’s staying consistent. In an interview in Warren, Mich., on Tuesday, Stevens told us she would have opposed the Senate’s Israel resolutions.

“I have a record that I stand by,” Stevens said. “I would not have voted for that legislation in part because I don’t think that that was the solution to getting this war to end, getting the hostages to come home, building toward lasting peace and getting Hamas to surrender. I believe consistency and transparency is really important here.”

Stevens was first elected to the House in 2018, flipping a Trump district by focusing on bipartisanship and revitalizing the state’s manufacturing industry. Redistricting forced Stevens to run in 2022 against a fellow incumbent, then-Rep. Andy Levin (D-Mich.), who was more critical of Israel.

AIPAC poured tons of cash into the race on Stevens’ behalf. Since then, the pro-Israel group has also helped topple progressive “Squad” members.

This is news: McMorrow is publicly urging AIPAC to stay out of the Michigan primary, adding that she’s been in touch with the organization directly, as well as other pro-Israel groups.

McMorrow said the groups have been “receptive,” later clarifying that she was referring to her positions on Israel more broadly.

“I think they understand the shifting dynamics not only in Michigan but around the country and the world,” McMorrow added. “People are very attuned to the deep influence PACs have that outweighs the influence of people and voters.”

Yet it remains to be seen how the burgeoning Democratic messaging on Israel will play in a general election, especially one that’s still 15 months away in a state Trump won in 2016 and 2024. Former Rep. Mike Rogers, the presumptive GOP nominee who has Trump’s endorsement, is happy to sit back and watch things play out.

“It is very short-sighted and politically naive to walk in and say we’re not going to allow Israel to defend itself. This has been a fairly easy conversation for me to have,” Rogers said in an interview.

A long, bruising primary. The Democratic candidates have mostly refrained from directly attacking each other at this early stage, choosing instead to draw contrasts from their opponents.

McMorrow, for example, says Hill Democratic leaders aren’t fighting Trump enough or effectively — and she’s implicitly tying Stevens to them.

“There’s a real disconnect between what Michigan voters are looking for and what Democrats in D.C. are currently offering,” McMorrow said. “As angry as people are at Donald Trump and at Republicans, they seem to be angrier at Democrats.”

But there’s a concern among Democrats back in Washington that a divisive primary — which doesn’t take place until a year from now — will weaken the eventual nominee.

On top of that, Michigan lawmakers have taken steps in recent years to expand ballot access, which means some voters will have ballots in-hand as soon as five weeks after the primary. That leaves precious little time for Democrats to rally behind their nominee, while Republicans already have their candidate in Rogers.

“I’d rather be us than them,” Rogers quipped, accusing Democrats of “trying to out-left each other, which just does not represent Michigan.”

— Andrew Desiderio

REDISTRICTING WARS

California Dems’ redistricting gamble

Democrats did something a little unexpected in their proposed remap of California — they created several competitive districts, if you go by the 2024 presidential election results.

There are many ways to assess how “swingy” a district might be in any given year, such as voter registration and past election results. But for the upcoming midterms, the 2024 presidential race gives the most recent snapshot of where voters stand. The smaller the margin of the presidential race in a district, the more potential it has to be competitive in the 2026 midterms.

California Democrats’ new redistricting plan features seven districts that former Vice President Kamala Harris carried by single digits in 2024, including three she carried by fewer than five points. Those districts are held by: Republican Rep. Darrell Issa (Harris +3) and Democratic Reps. Adam Gray (Harris +1), Derek Tran (Harris +4), Raul Ruiz (Harris +6), Jim Costa (Harris +6), Norma Torres (Harris +8) and Ami Bera (Harris +9).

There is one district, held by Rep. David Valadao (R-Calif.), that Trump won by single digits — in this case by just two points.

Many of those members represent districts with a high population of Latino voters who surged to the right at the presidential level in 2024. This includes the districts held by Gray, Ruiz, Costa and Valadao.

Democrats believe they’re favored to hold or flip these seats because the party that holds the White House traditionally suffers in a midterm election. And President Donald Trump’s numbers have fallen in some recent polling, especially on the economy.

“If you look at where he’s losing support, Trump’s support is completely collapsing among younger men,” said Paul Mitchell, a Democratic data expert who drew the California map. “And if Republicans are counting on 2024 general numbers in those districts, they’re really screwing themselves because those numbers are an artificial high.”

Texas Hold’em. Of course, Latino voters in Texas are not the same as Latino voters in California.

Texas Republicans made the opposite bet. Trump carried all of their newly drawn red districts by 10 points or more. The new map has more majority-Hispanic seats than the current one and GOP strategists believe they will only become more red.

Yet from Democrats’ perspective, a Texas seat Trump won by 10 points could be competitive. And a seat Harris won by one point, such as Gray’s, isn’t as purple as it looks.

California Democrats are constrained by the fact that they have to submit their maps to the voters for approval. That limits the number of cities they can split and places a premium on the compactness of districts. Voters are less likely to approve something that divides communities.

Texas Republicans didn’t have these limitations.

The GOP argument is that Latinos have been trending right for longer than just the 2024 cycle, and they expect that pattern to continue. Republicans also drew districts won not only by Trump but also by GOP Gov. Greg Abbott and Republican Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz in their reelection campaigns.

— Ally Mutnick

THE LONE STAR STATE

Cornyn shows signs of closing polling gap

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) trails Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton by just five points in a new poll of the Senate race from Texas Southern University — an indication he may be winnowing down a huge polling gap.

Paxton led Cornyn 44% to 39% in a survey of 1,500 likely GOP primary voters conducted Aug. 6-12. Another 17% were unsure. The poll was conducted via SMS by TSU’s Barbara Jordan Policy Research and Survey Center.

This is a significant improvement for Cornyn, who has trailed by much larger margins for much of the year in public and private polling. The senator’s allies have been spending millions on TV over the summer to boost his numbers. And this survey could be a sign that effort is working.

It’s not the only recent poll that has brought good news for Cornyn. The senator led Paxton by 1 point, 30% to 29% with 37% undecided in a mid-August survey from Emerson College. But that poll had a small sample size of 491 GOP voters.

A couple other notable results from the TSU survey: Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-Texas), who is considering a Senate run, pulled 22% in a three-way of the race. Cornyn got 30% and Paxton 35% in that scenario.

Cornyn’s allies make the point that the pair of surveys are the first since news broke about Paxton’s divorce. Paxton led by an average of 17 points in more than a dozen polls dating back a few months. Several entities are in the field this month with new polls.

TSU also tested the Democratic primary for the Senate race. Former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas), who isn’t a declared candidate, led former Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas), who is in the race, 58% to 38%. Allred led Texas state Rep. James Talarico, who has been inching toward a run, 50% to 43%.

– Ally Mutnick

THE CAMPAIGN

Tim Scott thanks crypto for toppling Brown

This week, the chair of the Senate Banking Committee traveled to Jackson Hole, Wyo., to pay it forward.

Speaking to an audience gathered for a crypto conference on Tuesday, Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) thanked the sector for “getting rid” of former Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio).

“I gotta tell you — I mean, thank you to all of y’all for getting rid of Sherrod Brown,” Scott said. “He’s running again, by the way.” Remember that Scott is also the chair of the NRSC.

Brown chaired the Banking Committee before losing to Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) in 2024. The crypto sector’s Fairshake super PAC network spent more than $40 million backing Moreno.

Nine months later, Scott was frank about the role that crypto’s unprecedented campaign spending played in that race.

“Literally, the industry put Bernie Moreno in the Senate, and he’s on the Banking Committee,” the South Carolina Republican said.

Usually, lawmakers thank voters for their electoral victories. Case in point: Moreno spokesperson Reagan McCarthy said in a statement that Republicans defeated Brown “thanks to overwhelming grassroots support in all 88 counties and an incredible team of supporters and allies.”

But things have changed in the years since the Supreme Court uncorked campaign spending limits for super PACs.

Policy corner: Scott projected confidence on the Senate’s next crypto bill, which — like the GENIUS Act — will require a hearty number of Democrats to clear the chamber.

“I believe that we’ll have between 12 and 18 Democrats, at least, open to voting for market structure, a far more complicated piece of legislation,” Scott said.

– Brendan Pedersen

… AND THERE’S MORE

The Campaign. We don’t typically cover local politics. But hey, let’s dip into the Boston mayoral race. Josh Kraft, the son of billionaire New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, is running for mayor against Democratic incumbent Michelle Wu.

In a campaign ad, Kraft — a Democrat — stated that he and Wu agree that “Trump is unhinged.” Remember, Robert Kraft donated $1 million to Donald Trump’s first inauguration and has been an acquaintance of the president for years.

The ad continues: “But Trump isn’t why Boston is the most expensive city in America to raise a family. It’s Mayor Wu who raised our taxes. She spent over 100 million on a soccer stadium for billionaires instead of housing for the middle class. I’m Josh Kraft. As mayor, I’ll fight Trump and make Boston more affordable.”

See the ad here.

NJ-7: Healthcare for Action PAC, a Boston-based group that seeks to elect health-care professionals to Congress, is endorsing Dr. Tina Shah in the crowded Democratic primary for New Jersey’s 7th District. GOP Rep. Tom Kean, Jr., holds this critical swing seat.

Shah, a former Obama and Biden administration official, is an ICU doctor. She says Kean — first elected to the House in 2022 — is wrong to support Trump and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who she accuses of undermining federal health-care programs.

NJ-7 is a key battleground district in the fight for the House. Joe Biden carried it in 2020, but Trump won it in 2024.

Downtown Download. The ​District of Columbia Fire Fighters Association, IAFF Local 36 has hired Stryk Global Diplomacy to help facilitate “District of Columbia interactions with U.S. Congress.”

The crypto sector has a new letter out today that pushes back on recent calls for amendments to the GENIUS Act from banks, consumer advocates and state regulators.

The joint letter from the Blockchain Association and Crypto Council for Innovation argues that those changes would “create an uncompetitive payment stablecoin environment, protecting banks at the expense of broader industry growth.”

Nvidia, the chip giant, has hired the Vogel Group to lobby on “[i]ssues related to international trade in the semiconductor industry” and issues “related to artificial intelligence.”

– Jake Sherman, John Bresnahan and Brendan Pedersen

MOMENTS

CLIPS