Today, Explained - Defunding Israel

Episode Date: July 21, 2026

Democrats in Congress voted in shocking numbers to cut aid to Israel. This episode was produced by Dustin DeSoto with help from Miles Bryan, edited by Miranda Kennedy, fact-checked by Gabriel Dunatov, engineered by Patrick Boyd, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Pro-Israel protesters demonstrate during the Democratic National Convention in 2024 in Chicago. Photo by Jim Vondruska/Getty Images. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. New Vox members get $20 off their membership right now. Transcript at ⁠vox.com/today-explained-podcast.⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The president has a new favorite word, maybe you've heard. Communism. Communisms, easy to sell. I would be the greatest communist in history. I'd be right up there with Lenin. And it's contagious. He's got Marco Rubio using it. Communism does not sound good in theory.

He's got Speaker Johnson using it. Communism, and this philosophy has led to the murder of tens of millions of innocent people. Easy buddy. The president and his pals are intentionally conflating communism with democratic socialism. And they're doing it because the Democratic socialists are winning, and they're winning on Israel. Israel is a country that has been accused of apartheid and occupation for decades now. Prime Minister Netanyahu belongs in the Hague.

This genocide happens with our tax dollars, and we must stand up and say, not on our dime. Democrats in Congress just had to draw lines on Israel with a big funding vote, so we're going to talk about defunding Israel on today, Explain from Box. Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here for MintMobil. Now, I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month is back. So I thought it would be fun if we made $15 bills. But it turns out that's very illegal.

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really far in this environment. I'm Preet Bharara, and this week, the Atlantic staff writer Mark Leavovich joins me to discuss the latest chaos out of Washington and what to expect from the upcoming elections. The episode is out now. Search and follow. Stay tuned with Preet wherever you get your podcasts. The House will be in order. The clerk may call the roll. Today, yay.

Explained, yay. I'm Riley Rodgerson. I'm a House leadership reporter for Politico. And Riley, last week there was a big vote in the House to defund Israel. Was it ever going to pass? I don't think it was ever going to pass. There is still very strong support for Israel among many, many House Democrats. But what was shocking about this vote is that over 100 House Democrats voted to block aid to Israel.

This was a seismic shift in the party's support for Israel and was pretty crazy to watch as a reporter. Tell me what the expectations were going in. What was the prologue of this vote? Going into this vote, we knew as reporters that House Democrats were going to be split on this issue. The amendment was a discussion among House Democrats for about two or three weeks. It was introduced by a Republican Congressman Thomas Massey, you know, an isolationist renegade. He's usually pretty out of step with his party. But he put this forward.

They knew it was going to come up eventually. Madam Chair, my amendment is simple. It strikes $3.3 billion of foreign aid to the country of Israel from the State Department funding bill. So there were two pretty lengthy closed-door meetings where House Democrats were like, We need to find a way to hash out this issue. We know that it's divisive. We have to talk about it. The situation relative to the United States' relationship with Israel, the Palestinian people,

and policy in the Middle East has to change because the current status quo was unsustainable. So there was an opportunity behind closed doors for Democrats to pretty openly debate and disagree what they were going to do. And as reporters standing outside, you know, one of those meetings, people were coming out on both sides of the issue. So we knew this was going to be a big split. We didn't know that 100 members were going to vote to cut Israel aid. That was pretty shocking because in 2024, there was a similar vote to cut Israel aid and just 37 House Democrats voted for that measure.

So this was a pretty market shift. So, yeah, what accounts for the uptick for what you're calling a seismic shift now? There's a couple of theories of the case here. So one is that. that this is political and House Democrats are looking at what's happening on the campaign trail. Incumbent after incumbent has lost to pretty hard left candidates. I'm thinking in New York City. I do believe that what's happening is a genocide and I believe that it's a moral injury to the American people that our tax dollars are being used to enact this genocide. I'm thinking in Denver. I believe that

our selling of arms to Israel, defensive or offensive, gives them the cover to continue the genocide that's taking place in Palestine and now the ethnic cleansing that's taking place in Lebanon. And these hard left candidates are running on a pretty Israel skeptical or even anti-Israel message compared to the incumbents where taking a more moderate stance. So plenty of Democrats are looking around and saying, this is not politically viable. I need to be on the record as providing some sort of a check on Israel. Also, House Democrats are saying they're fed up at this point with what's going on. They are not satisfied with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's leadership in Israel.

U.S. taxpayers have spent many, many billions of dollars in support of the racist, extremist Netanyahu government. Enough is enough. How did this split in the Democratic Party on defunding Israel break down ideologically? What were the more notable votes here? As you can imagine, more progressive members tended to vote to, you know, defund the Israel aid. And more moderate members tended to vote to maintain that aid. But there were a number of very interesting people to watch that us reporters were pretty surprised by. One of them being former Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Tick, tack, toe, a winner. She has received money from A PAC before a pro-Israel PAC. So people were surprised to see that break. The other name that was a real. a big deal was the number two House Democrat, Catherine Clark, voted to break with the rest of leader or other members of leadership, including minority leader Hawking Jeffries, to vote to cut off the aid. So that was also a very big deal. Does it say something about his leadership that he couldn't unite his party on this vote?

Or is that just like nobody could? So it's not really an indictment of his power? I think you're right that nobody could. I think that this is. issue is just that divisive among House Democrats. What was interesting about the whole endeavor is I talked to, you know, pretty far-left progressives and very moderate Democrats leaving this vote. And both had positive things to say about Jeffries, which, you know, was somewhat surprising. The moderates were pleased that Jeffries voted, you know, to preserve this aid. They thought that that was important. And Congressman, for example, Josh Gaheimer, a very pro-Israel Democrat. I spoke to him. He said he was.

was happy because Jeffrey's voting to preserve the aid, he thinks swayed more Democrats to do the same. So he was satisfied. The progressives say, hey, he said, vote your conscience. That's a big step. That's not him whipping all these members to support Israel, as Democrats have done in the past. So they see that as a step in the right direction. And they were enthused about his strategy to have these two closed-door meetings where he did encourage open dialogue and progress.

of say that, too, is a step in the right direction. Will he be able to get away with this, you know, as speaker potentially next term when these hard, hard left Democrats come in? They've been very, very vocal about Israel. That remains to be seen. But for now, members of both sides were satisfied. Okay. Let's talk about the other side, because there was actually much more unity amongst

Republicans. Yes. That was also very surprising to watch. marks a big shift in the Republican Party. So back in that vote in 2024, which was another vote to restrain Israel aid, I think it was 21 or 22 House Republicans voted in favor of that measure. On last week, when the vote to cut off Israel aid came up, just one Republican voted to cut off that aid.

And that was Thomas Massey, who we know is sort of on his own journey in Congress as it is. So, yeah, I mean, it's, I think, a sign of President Trump's shifting approach to foreign policy compared to where he was out on the campaign trail when he was talking about a much more isolationist approach to foreign policy. Now, President Trump has shifted his strategy. He's been much more engaged abroad than I think many people anticipated, whether it be, you know, Israel, Gaza, Ukraine and Russia, in Venezuela. And his party is willing to have his back on this and voted near unanimously to back this funding. And to bring this back to Democrats, there were Democrats who also basically agree with that line of thinking. Yes, that's part of it.

The other reason that many House Democrats voted in support of keeping this funding is because they said they were worried about some of the aid. I think it's about $3.3 billion total is what we were talking. talking about. So it was complicated, but there are plenty of pro-Israel Democrats who were just really wanted to have Israel's back in this moment. And that's a lot of what we saw. What does what we saw say about what we might see if Democrats do indeed win back control of the House this November, which the betting money seems to suggest they will? I mean, this is the question that anyone observing. the situation is asking themselves, what are we going to see from a potential speaker,

Hakeem Jeffries, when it comes to Israel, and how firm are both sides of his caucus going to push and pull the speaker in their direction? We frankly don't know. Something to consider is that if Democrats do take the majority, they will have significantly more control over the floor agenda. He'll have control or be able to stop, say, these Republican-led amendments from coming to the floor. At the same time, if you have these, you know, very ultra-progressive members coming in and demanding votes in, say, exchange for voting for his speakership, then you're going to have a, this issue is going to be very, very alive. Part of the question is just how big of a majority do Democrats win if they do get a majority. If it's coming down to one or two votes like we've

seen Republicans have this term, who knows? Who's to say which direction people are going to pull Jeffries? If it's coming down to one or two votes, like we've seen Republicans have this term, If it's a big majority, say, you know, 15 or 20, Jeffreys is going to have a lot of room to work with. What I will say was a consistent trend, no matter who I talked to leaving the vote, or every Democrat I talk to leaving the vote. There is consistent frustration with Benjamin Netanyahu.

I think perhaps if there was a different government, more House Democrats would be willing to support aid to Israel and have a different conversation. So that's another factor here that's, It's going to influence, I think, the direction that Congress heads. When today explains back, we're going to hear from a Democrat who voted to continue funding Israel. Support for the show comes from Upwork. There comes a point in every business owner's journey where you realize you can't do it alone

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So go make it one. Start your free trial at Shopify.com.com slash explain. That shopify.com slash explain. Shopify.com slash explained. Support for the show today comes from Built. There's no way around it. Housing is expensive. Rent, mortgage.

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You can download the built app and join the built membership for where you live at joinbilt.com slash explained. Don't spell it with a you because it's J-O-I-N-B-I-T dot com slash explained. Use our link so they know we sent you. Today, Explain is back. I'm joined by Representative Brad Schneider, who's representing the 10th District of Illinois in the United States House of Representatives. Could you walk us through the vote last week? You voted against the measure to cut aid to Israel,

and a lot of your colleagues obviously did not. How did that play out for you? How did that feel? I'm going to take you a step back further and just I'll give you my personal perspective first and talk more broadly, but I was born with two names. The first is Brad and also Schmuel bin Ephraim, which is Samuel, son of Ephraim, my father, Frank. And two identities, both as an American and as a Jew and is how he's raised and consequently raised is very much a strong Zionist. growing up in the 60s 70s and for the last 65 years, I fundamentally believe that the U.S.-Israel relationship is an important relationship. Growing up, I also believe that the aspiration for peace in the Middle East, not just between Israelis and Palestinians, but probably throughout the region, is something that is in the United States' interests and the interest for the people in the region.

So this is not a new issue to me and something I thought long and hard about. Now, Israel from its founding in 1948, has faced enemies in the region. Initially in 1948, it was five Arab armies. Today, the enemies are going to be more non-state actors, Hamas, Isbalah, etc. And so I'm committed as an American, but also as a Jew, to a secure and safe Jewish. Democratic State of Israel. I'm also committed to the aspirations of the Palestinians to their rights and to their aspirations to self-determination and ultimately sovereignty. Got it. Tom Massey doesn't believe any of that. You know, first let's start with Tom Massey

is his intentions with this amendment were anything but pure. It was hastily crafted, poorly written, and one of the biggest issues with it is not only does it address this 10-year memorandum of understanding something negotiated by President Obama eight years ago. There's two years left on the MOU. It would have blocked funding for the Nita Loe-Mitties Partnership for Peace, something that I was proud to help promote, develop, and support. Working to build those bridges between Palestinians and Israelis that is going to lay the groundwork ultimately to hopefully find a path towards peace. It would have cut funding for that. It was a messaging bill and nothing more, and it was a negative message.

I voted no because I think if we're going to move towards peace, we need to move in a constructive way. A lot of my colleagues were saying we need to send a message to the Netanyahu government. I've been extremely critical of this government. Their failure to address the settler violence in the West Bank, the failure to plan for a day after in Gaza following what was a horrific war. If we're going to move towards peace, if we're going to find a path where Israelis and Palestinians can live side by side,

and the region can have the peace they deserve, because we're not just talking about Israelis and Palestinians. There's progress being made between Lebanon and Israel, and giving Lebanon the people of Lebanon, the liberty and freedom they all deserve, and Syria and Jordan, and the list goes on around the region. We need to be doing it in a thoughtful way. Okay, I think I hear your argument against Massey's amendment, but you say it sends a negative message.

People in your party, however, would like to clearly send a message that they no longer want to fund Israel's military. They'd like to see Israel out of Gaza. They'd like to see Israel ease restrictions on humanitarian aid. They'd like to see Israel stop expanding into Palestinian and Lebanese territory. What limits would you like to see placed on Israel? Well, let's also recognize that any time U.S. weapons are sold to any country in the world, including Israel, there are conditions on how they're used, what the countries can do with them, what they can do to extend them and share those technologies with other countries, et cetera. But let's also remind people that Israel used the United States weapons to kill thousands and thousands and thousands of women and children.

So are those restrictions working? Well, so you're talking about the war in Gaza. The war in Gaza was a horrific tragedy. It started when Hamas invaded on October 7th. Israel responded. Hamas was in tunnels. One civilian death is too many. No question about it.

And the way Israel conducted many aspects of the war put too many civilians in harm's way and ultimately led to those civilian deaths. We need to find a way to end the conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians. That war of October 7th, in theory, Trump's 20-point plan brought that war to an end. The conflict continues. People are still dying. Israel has to be able to defend itself. we need to work to disarm Hamas and make sure, and should say this very clearly,

Gaza has to be, must be for the people of Gaza. And Israel, I've been very clear on this. Israel should not look to occupy Gaza permanently. Sending a message that we're turning our back on the Israeli people, that their security is not important to us is the wrong message, just as sending a message to the Palestinians that their future doesn't matter to us. We have to find a way to say that we care about both people. This amendment was never going to go anywhere, but members of your party have taken more concrete action here when it comes to sort of redefining the democratic relationship with Israel and Israel aid. One of the ways is by swearing off money from the very pro-Israel lobbying group, A-PAC. Have you sworn off said money?

I don't believe you have. Can I ask you if you still take money from A-PAC and if so, how much? I appreciate the support I get from people who care about the issues that I advocate for. So people who are pro-Israel, pro-US-Israel relationship are likely to support me because I'm pro-US-Israel, pro-Israel relationship. I'm also pro-addressing gun safety and reducing gun violence in this country. So I get the support of those groups. The support I get doesn't determine my positions.

I think my positions determine who supports me. All of this change that we're talking about within your country. party comes in the wake of October 7th and the devastation people have seen in Gaza. And it sounds like this is devastation that you acknowledge in your career. Absolutely. Has your position on Israel shifted at all since October 7th or at any point in your political career? And if so, can you tell us how?

So my position hasn't changed because I've always been committed to promoting peace between Israelis and Palestinians and finding a path where both can live together, which I believe ultimately is two states, a Jewish democratic state of Israel and a Palestinian state living side by side. My frustration with the current Israeli government has grown and continues to grow. Every conversation I have with whether it's the U.S. ambassador to Israel, and I've had the privilege of working with many, or my meetings with Prime Minister Netanyahu, who I've had engagement with the Prime Minister going back now for almost 30 years. But in the last several years, every single conversation I have with them talks about the need to address civil or violence,

the need to get humanitarian aid. One of the things that I am proud and will say loudly and proudly is that immediately after October 7th, as the war began, my team, we worked hard to push for humanitarian aid into Gaza, to do everything we could to make sure that the civil millions who were always caught in the middle of any war wouldn't suffer more than they did. And the suffering was horrific. And I did challenge Israel when they made what I'll call ill-conceived, ill-advised, in some cases, illegal decisions to deprive humanitarian relief into Gaza. We pushed hard and we opened.

We worked with the Egyptians to get Rafat crossing open. We pushed the Israelis to get the Karam Shal. along crossing open, and to not just get aid to those crossings, but get aid into and across the territories within Gaza. I feel like the disconnect here, I mean, your optimism on this issue of peace in the region is overwhelming, but I don't feel that that is the general feeling in the United States right now amongst American voters or the people who really care about this issue. They look at what's happened since October 7th,

and they feel deeply pessimistic about the possibility for peace. So I am always going to be optimistic. I have to hold on to that optimism for the prospects of peace because the alternative is too dark. And let's separate the issue for folks living in the region and the folks living here. And for Israelis and Palestinians, these are two people who are totally traumatized.

Traumatized not just over the last couple of years, but for decades and the conflicts that when, there were steps forward and then the enemies of peace could take you on steps backwards. So I recognize the trauma that Israelis have and are experiencing and I recognize the trauma that the Palestinians have and are experiencing. And that's part of what I feel is my obligation to hold on to that optimism and speak to a better future and work to try to find ways to bring the parties on both sides of the issue there together to make the hard choices and take the risk to get to a path to peace. So the reason I'm holding on to optimism, and it's not 24-7,

I have my moments when I am down and where I feel like the hill we're climbing is just too steep, is you take a deep breath and you dig deep, and you say, I can't give up on hoping and working towards peace because otherwise peace is never going to happen. And I want to find people who are like-minded. And that is not just on the Israeli side of the equation. We have to find people on the Palestinian, and for those on the Palestinian have to find Israelis. And I meet and I spend time with them on a regular basis. They come to my office. When I'm in the region, I talk to them, we have to strengthen and empower those voices who believe that peace will only come when the Israelis see the Palestinians as a people worthy of engagement and shared future.

And the Palestinians see the Israelis as a people worthy of engagement and a shared future and recognize that until they get there, there's no future for either side. We've got to have a path with both our pointing in the same direction. Representative Brad Schneider from Illinois's 10th earlier in the show, you heard from Riley Rodgerson from Politico. Dustin DeSoto made the show today with help from Miles Bryan, Miranda Kennedy, Gabriel Dunditoff, Patrick Boyd and me, Sean Ramosferam, today explained.