Daily Kickoff
👋 Good Monday morning!
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we look at the upcoming GOP race in Kentucky for the gubernatorial nomination, and spotlight an initiative backed by Josh and Marjorie Harris to bring sports and leadership training to Israel’s disadvantaged communities. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Aharon Barak, Jake Sullivan and Yotam Polizer.
A bipartisan delegation to Israel last week led by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and former Democratic Majority Leader Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) was supposed to put on display bipartisan support for Israel.
But while lawmakers on both sides of the aisle emphasized their ongoing support for the Jewish state, the trip also highlighted how Israel’s judicial reform proposal is becoming a political wedge issue among supporters of Israel in the U.S, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Hoyer told JI last week that “friends ought to be candid with one another when they see things that they think are inconsistent with what we think are the proper steps to take,” drawing a parallel to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to a joint session of Congress in 2015 in which he expressed disapproval over the Iran nuclear deal, which the U.S. was at the time negotiating.
“Neither Israelis nor Americans ought to be surprised that the other from time to time expresses disagreement with some things that the other is doing. That does not mean that we don’t have an enduring bond of friendship and alliances,” Hoyer said. “It means that friends are saying, ‘I don’t think what you’re doing in this particular instance is in the best interest… of our alliance.’” Read the full story here.
A separate delegation of lawmakers — members of the House Intelligence Committee — were also in Israel last week for meetings with high-level officials. While still in Israel over the weekend, Reps. Mike Turner (R-OH) and Jim Himes (D-CT), respectively the chair and ranking member of the committee, spoke to CNN’s Jake Tapper about their meetings and the concerns they heard from Israeli officials.
“The one thing that [Netanyahu] made clear is that he does think that Iran can be deterred,” Turner said, “that if they do believe that there will be military action against them and a surgical-type strike that would diminish their ability to pursue nuclear weapons, that that could have a chilling effect and could stall their programming… He doesn’t want that opportunity to be missed, of the understanding that Israel and or the United States, together or separate, might be willing to take military action to forestall Iran making that next step to a nuclear state.”
The lawmakers are back in the U.S., where the House and Senate are both in session beginning tomorrow. But heading to Israel this week is San Francisco Mayor London Breed, whose trip with the Jewish Community Relations Council Bay Area will include time in the Golden City’s sister city, Haifa.
National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan is meeting with officials in Riyadh this week, where yesterday he met with counterparts from Saudi Arabia, India and the United Arab Emirates to discuss a potential joint infrastructure plan that would create an expansive railway system across the Middle East and connect with India, Axios’ Barak Ravid reports.
And in Paris, ELNET is holding its third annual policy conference today through Wednesday. Israeli President Isaac Herzog and former Israeli Justice Minister Gideon Sa’ar will give tonight’s opening keynotes, following a panel with Emirates Policy Center founder and President Ebtesam al-Ketbi; French Senator Roger Karoutchi; French Ambassador to Israel Éric Danon; Israel’s chargé d’affaires in Paris, Haim Waxman; Rep. Brad Schneider (D-IL) and the Hudson Institute’s Ken Weinstein.
bluegrass battle
Trump, McConnell tensions play out in Kentucky GOP gubernatorial primary

Days after the Kentucky Derby, another closely watched race in the Bluegrass State, the Republican primary for governor, is nearing the finish line, with two GOP frontrunners locked in fierce competition for the nomination, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports.
Heated battle: The crowded primary on May 16 has turned into a heated battle between Daniel Cameron, the popular attorney general of Kentucky, and Kelly Craft, who served in the Trump administration as an ambassador to the United Nations. Even as they are largely aligned on key issues, their rivalry has grown increasingly personal over the course of the campaign.
Changing GOP: Craft has spent millions on attack ads, including a recent TV spot in which Cameron is cast as an “insider” for his connection to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). It was a curious ad, not least because Craft has previously contributed to McConnell. Meanwhile, the assumption that McConnell would be unpalatable to voters in his home state underscored how the GOP has changed under former President Donald Trump, who gave his endorsement to Cameron.