Today, Explained - The AIPAC backlash

Episode Date: August 11, 2026

AIPAC is one of the biggest spenders in American politics. This year, it could backfire. This episode was produced by Denise Guerra and Peter Balonon-Rosen, edited by Amina Al-Sadi, fact-checked by Gabriel Dunatov, engineered by Patrick Boyd and David Tatasciore, and hosted by Noel King. Pro-Palestinian Jewish American demonstrators rally outside the Manhattan headquarters of pro-Israel lobbying group American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and the offices of Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, who accept donations from the group, in 2024. Photo by Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via 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

Concerns about dark money in U.S. politics date back years, at least to Citizens United, the 2010 Supreme Court decision that removed barriers on corporate spending in elections. During midterm cycles and presidential races, there's always grumbling about dark money. And this year in Michigan, it sometimes seemed like the whole race. The pro-Israel lobbying group A-PAC spent about $30 million boosting the campaign of Haley Stevens. Her opponent, Abdullah Al-Sai, drew attention to this again and again, and she lost. APEC is in a difficult position. Its support can now be a liability, and some people are questioning the way the organization disperses money.

I'm going to sound crazy when I say this, but Crush MAGAPAC is affiliated with a different pack called Save Democracy, and Save Democracy has received $100,000 from United Democracy Project, which is APEC super PAC. So sometimes the layers here are two or three or even four packs deep. Coming up on today explained, the backlash against APEC. I'm Seth Matlins, and this week on my podcast, Creator Destroy, which is a business show, a marketing show, and a show that argues they've always been the same thing. I sit down with J.P. Morton-Chay's CMO, Carla Hassan, to talk about how she builds trust in 84 million customers, when amongst other things, her product is in many ways intangible. Turns out it requires real human connection of physical branches, enterprise-wide alignment, and the discipline to admit when you've broken it. Check out create or destroy reimagining marketing on YouTube and your favorite podcast app.

Support for show today comes from Apple News Plus. Apple News Plus has everything you're into all in one place. Over 500 top publications covering local and national news, food, sports, plus daily puzzles, audio, and more. News subscribers try it free for one month at news.com Apple slash learn terms apply. This is today explained. I'm David Dayan. I am the executive editor of the American prospect. magazine about ideas, politics, and power. What is APEC? APEC started out as a lobbying organization.

It was inaugurated in the 1950s. It's seen and has historically been seen as one of the more powerful lobbying organizations in Washington. And its goal is to strengthen and maintain the relationship between U.S. and Israel. I said, it seems to me that we should really be going to Washington. And that instead of sitting here in New York and talking about these things, why don't we make a determined effort? All of us go to Washington, and that was in 1960. They have annual conventions where pretty much everybody across the political spectrum attends and gives speeches.

One of the many things that I admire about APEC is that you fight for this common cause from the bottom up. The lifeblood of APEC is here in this room. When the United States stands with Israel, the chances of peace really rise and rises exponentially. But something changed about five years ago, and APEC was not content to just lobby members of Congress. They wanted to influence who actually got to Washington. And they began to engage in the use of super PACs to run advertising and other forms of political engagement. in campaigns, and particularly in primary campaigns that determined who actually gets to a general election.

Why did they want to influence who got to Washington? Maybe that sounds like an obvious question, but it wasn't happening before, so why did it start happening? One thing that happened is in 2018, we saw the rise of what is known as the squad. And that included Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. If you want to know what an unfolding genocide looks like, open your eyes. Ilhan Omar. I believe A-PAC is toxic. Rashid Tzelebe.

The American people are tired of watching their tax dollars fuel death, destruction, and endless war. People who had very strident views, particularly about the U.S. Israel relationship. Those progressive Democrats were very successful in winning safe seat races. And I'm not in their head, but it could be that APEC wanted to try to provide a counterweight and stop that from happening and use their resources, very prodigious resources, to spend money in these campaigns and to make sure that didn't happen again. All right. So once upon a time, an endorsement from APEC was a powerful thing. It could be a huge benefit to a candidate. What exactly did it get you when APEC said, this is our guy, this is our gal? I mean, in practical terms, it probably got you $5,000 because that's the limit on a corporate pack. But because APEC was powerful and also a bipartisan organization, getting your name on the list of APEC and Dorsey's was something that you could tout in your election.

It was something that showed that you had a commitment to what, you know, has historically been an important bond between the U.S. and Israel. And it was, I think it certainly wasn't as controversial in the years before 2023 than it is today. So what changed exactly? Well, I think what happened is the war in Gaza is what happened. And, you know, after October 7th, and we saw what, you know, a lot of people have termed a genocide against the Palestinian people, I think that because of the changing attitudes around the U.S. Israel relationship more broadly, where large numbers of Americans now view that relationship negatively, I think that has changed what the meaning of an APAC endorsement really is. What do we know about how much money APAC is specifically spending this midterm cycle? Well, it's a hard question to answer. If you go by the Federal Election Commission disclosures,

APAC has raised about $100 million this election cycle and has spent in independent expenditures, and that's TV ads and mailers and these kinds of things, has spent about $28 million. But that is an undercount. When I say those numbers, I am going, by the specific super PAC that APAC has created. It's called United Democracy Project.

However, United Democracy Project has sent money to other packs, about $9 million worth. I think the real innovation here is the transfer of money from, in this case, pro-Israel packs, to these pop-up packs, these shell packs that are created specifically for a particular election and then funded through APEC and, you know, in some cases, other pro-Israel packs, they are sort of laundering in some ways this money through to other packs. So those other packs run the ads and it doesn't look like it's coming from APEC. A perfect example is,

was the first real major primary state of the cycle, which was Illinois. There were four open seats in the Chicago area that are pretty strongly blue. And millions of dollars went from APEC super PAC, which is called United Democracy Project, into these two pop-up packs. One called elect Chicago women. Melissa Bean for Congress, ECW is responsible for the content of this ad. And the other called Affordable Chicago Now. Our community is worth fighting for. ACN's responsible for the content of this ad.

And those two PACs then funded ads for four candidates in those four open seat races. Now, if you were watching that on television, you would say, hey, elect Chicago women. That sounds like a good idea. I'm going to watch this ad. Or Affordable Chicago Now, I like affordability. The truth is that this money was coming from APAC into these ads. and supporting candidates that were generally supportive of the U.S. Israel relationship. Now, those four races ended up APAC won two of them, and they lost two of them.

And it was really interesting, I think, where they were successful and where they weren't. In one race up in the Evanston area, it became a big issue that APAC actually was behind these ads from elect Chicago women. an affordable Chicago now. And the candidate, she was a state senator named Laura Fine, actually was harmed, I think, in the election by this fact that this got out and that this became a major issue in the campaign. And a Jewish American, who has family,

who are nearly killed in the capacity. And third, how can you take millions from them? Millions of them. And she ended up finishing, I believe, third. in that primary. A few minutes ago, I received a gracious call from Senator Fine,

conceding. Despite having millions of dollars supporting her and behind her. APEC found out the hard way. The 9th District is not for sale. There were other races where this wasn't sort of as explicit a factor

in the election itself, and those candidates were able to win. This all sounds quite sure. shady. And yet I wonder, how unusual is it for an interest group in politics to be doing something like this? I think it's pretty unusual. It's not something I've seen a whole lot of. We saw it to a smaller degree in some other election cycles two years ago, four years ago, but it has become a concerted strategy this time. And so there are these pop-up packs that are specific to a campaign, but also some established packs that have been around for a while are resists. And, you know,

money from APAC and affiliated groups and using that, deploying that in campaigns. And you can start to, like, the mind kind of boggles when you try to figure out where this money's coming from, who it's supporting, where it's intended to go to, et cetera. Last year, Senator Bernie Sanders comes out with a statement. He denounces Benjamin Netanyahu's government for what he says is the, quote, extermination of Gaza. He calls for an end to military aid to Israel. He says people are starving to death. Now, APEC attacks Sanders' statement, calling it a hate-filled rant and blood libel, and pointing out that in his statement, he didn't mention Hamas' attack on Israel. So APEC is now public in a way

that historically it has not been. And it is tying criticism of Israel to anti-Semitic sentiment. Does this help or hurt APEC's cause, do you think? Well, I mean, it's a very good question. I think it depends on the messenger. But the issue, I think, is that there's a very straight line between how this money is being used, transferred, spent, concealed, etc., and a broader critique that I think a lot of Democrats have about money in politics. And so when APEC decides, okay, we're going to respond to criticism that, you know, obviously is rooted in what APEC believes and the conditions in Israel and Gaza and the West Bank, etc., to saying, you know, any criticism of what we're doing is anti-Semitic, I think people who see this as a broader problem about money in politics see that as extremely cynically. take. I don't think that really connects to one of the big reasons why people are really objecting to this, which is that they don't want to see their politicians essentially bought. But it's additionally fraught because there are anti-Semitic tropes where, you know, a cabal of Jews is secretly controlling the governments and finance, right? Like it feels triply

complicated. Yeah. I mean, look, I'm Jewish. And, you know, in having to cover this, I have to go through, you know, try to follow money from, you know, Jewish groups from one place to another. And that can certainly be uncomfortable. And it does add some weight to this issue. But I feel like we are talking here not about somebody's religion, but about a policy. And it's a twofold policy. One is the policy of the U.S. government funding to the tune of billions of dollars, the destruction of an entire region, and also the policy of allowing Super PACs to dictate who ends up making decisions in Washington. That's David Dayan of the American prospect. Coming up four years ago, APEC spent millions of dollars to boost the opponent of a Michigan congressman, named Andy Levin. Levin lost his race. What's he think now? Support for today explained comes from Upwork. If you are a business that's trying to scale,

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I'm Noil. Four years ago, Michigan lost a seat in Congress, and Representative Andy Levin ended up running in a Democratic primary race against Representative Haley Stevens. APEC spent about $4 million to help get Stevens elected and that time she won. I talked 11 this morning and asked him how he got on Apex bad side. It was a couple things, Noel. First of all, I think it's just who I am. I'm not just Jewish. I am really like an out there joyously Jewish person.

I have Mazuzas on all my doors I had in Congress, and I was a synagogue president until I won my primary. Then I figured I'd better resign because I was, you know, when I was going to Congress. And so to have someone like me be so clear about the need to stop warring and start peacemaking in Israel and Palestine, and the strongest voice in the House with a simple proposition that there's no way to have a secure and safe future for my people, the Jewish people in the Holy Land, unless we fully realize the political and human rights of the Palestinian people, that really was difficult for a back, I guess. And then I introduced a bill called the Two-State Solution Act, which

By today's standards, when many, many members of the House in the Senate are voting to condition aid to Israel or stop a certain military aid to Israel, this bill of mine simply said, we need to do everything we can to bring the Israelis and the Palestinians together to pursue a two-state solution. And there were multiple provisions about helping democracy building in Palestine and pushing for efforts. efforts among Israelis to work together with Palestinians, those kind of things. Tell us what happened in your primary election in 2022 and the role that you think APAC played. They do a very good opinion research. And whatever boosted Haley Stevens or tore down Andy Levin, that's what they did. And they did, mostly they did ads that were very positive about Haley. And they just flooded the airwaves with these ads. I mean, and it's also important to note that it wasn't just AAPC. I believe APEC actually spent about $4.5 million. That's just dark money, though, Noel. They also raised a lot of

what's called hard money, or like what people think of as the regular contributions for my opponent. I think people listening are very curious about what it looks like when APEC decides you're not their candidate. And I think what I hear you saying is instead of there being ads saying, Andy Levin, Congressman Andy Levin is not fit for the job, or Congressman Andy Levin is, you know, bad for Israel. You're telling me instead, APEC money went to ads boosting your opponent, Haley Stevens. That's what I would have seen. Mostly, yes. Mostly they were positive ads about my opponent. To a regular viewer, it looks the same as any other TV ad that's directly for that person. You know, Noel, they decide how much they want to go negative or how much positive and in what

ways based on polling and opinion research like focus groups. So if you look at all the campaigns that they've been involved in, they go more negative sometimes, more positive sometimes. It really depends on whatever will win for them is what they do. We talked in the first half of the show with a reporter named David Dayan, who's been looking into how APEC spends its money. And we talked about how this can become fraught because APAC will say, if you criticize us, essentially it is criticizing Israel or even criticizing Jews. And yet there is also a dark history of anti-Semitism and allegations that, you know, Jews control finance, control all the money, control politics. How do you think about that tension these days?

Well, so to me, there's a few strands about this. I grew up in suburban Detroit, right, where, you know, in the district. and I faced a lot of anti-Semitism. And people said to me, you can't be Jewish, you don't have horns, or your nose, you've out a big nose, or your nose isn't big enough to be Jewish. And so I've faced anti-Semitism my whole life. This idea that APEC pushes that criticizing Israel is anti-Semitic is ludic, and it just needs to be called out. If you say, push all the Jews into the sea, that is anti-Semitic.

anti-Semitic. But if you say Israel is in a apartheid state, for example, I may agree or disagree with that, but that's not anti-Semitic. If you say Israel committed genocide in Gaza, which I think is undeniable that it did, tragically, that you can't say that that's anti-Semitic. But APEC definitely pushes that line. And it's not only is it wrong, Noelle, but it's harmful to the vital fight against anti-Semitism, which is a real problem in America and other places in the world. Let me ask you about last week's primary election in Michigan. So this was, in some ways, a similar scenario. A PAC again spent millions of dollars to back Haley Stevens. This time there was a different outcome. Why do you think Dr. Abdullah Syed won that race?

Well, there's a lot that's changed in the last four years. I mean, but the first thing I want to say is, what a fantastic candidate Abdul is. I mean, he's just a brilliant public speaker in a large setting. He's great at retail politics. He built a fantastic ground game. But we're living in very different times. I mean, we have had Israel's war in Gaza. And, you know, the attack by Hamas on October 7, 2003, Israel was so horrifying and it absolutely involved war crimes and crimes against humanity

and you can't say enough negative things about it. But then how Israel responded. And I don't know if you remember, Israel really had the moral high ground there. I mean, after that horrifying attack by Hamas and killing people at music festivals, not only did Israel not take a diplomatic approach

and it took a military approach, but it went so overboard that there's no justifying it. But there's something else that's really important about this moment in 2026 in America. And you're seeing it in elections all across the country. Basically, the American electorate is just so fed up with the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. And they feel like their life stinks. and they look at the Democratic Party, and they say, well, you're just as bought and paid for as the Republicans or as anybody else. And I'm not even sure what you stand for, right? And so here comes Abdul in this moment where the crisis of income and wealth inequality in our country has hit this fever pitch.

But I do think people are fed up with all the money in politics, all the special interests in politics. And APAC is really the kind of biggest symbol of that. in America in 26. That primary in Michigan was fiercely fought. You watched it play out. You're aware of this. Did you feel vindicated at all, when Abdullah Syed one?

You know, people texted about this and said, like, revenge and stuff. I just don't feel like that. I don't have anything against Haley Stevens. And by the way, you could say that APEC harmed Haley Stevens, but the reason the election was so close was the tens of millions of dollars

they poured into her campaign. So nobody should like bet against the interests that are pouring millions and tens of millions of dollars into American politics because in general the person with the most money wins that happens a lot. And so it's a real credit to the people of Michigan that they went for who they really believe

can change things. That was former Congressman Andy Levin in Michigan. We reached out to APEC for comment on today's show and we didn't hear back. Denise Guerra and Peter Balinan-Rosen produced. Amina El-Sadi edited, Patrick Boyden, David Tadishore engineered, and Gabriel Donatov checked the facts. I'm Noelle King. It's Today Explained. Support for Tay Explain comes from Quo.

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