The withdrawal of nonprofit executive Jessica Reinmann from the Democratic primary in New York’s 17th Congressional District — a top-targeted swing seat currently held by Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) — is bringing the top contenders in the wide field into focus.

Reinmann, who endorsed military veteran Cait Conley upon her exit from the race, was one of eight — now seven — challengers aiming to take on Lawler in next year’s midterms.

A Democratic strategist in the district said he believes Conley, along with Rockland County Legislator Beth Davidson and potentially former Briarcliff Manor Mayor Peter Chatzky, comprise the top rung of candidates in the crowded race.

Those three candidates also led the field by a wide margin in fundraising as of the end of September. Conley had raised $1.3 million, Davidson $1.2 million and Chatzky $1 million. However, the vast majority of Chatzky’s war chest — $750,000 — comprises a personal loan to his campaign.

Davidson and Conley were invited to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s Candidate Week event in Washington earlier this month, where they received additional training and media preparation — a sign the national party sees the two women as the strongest contenders to take on Lawler. 

Conley’s campaign has taken on a distinct national dimension, as she has touted her military background alongside a series of other female national security alumni in swing races. The so-called Hell Cats, a group that formally launched this week, is explicitly modeling itself after Virginia Gov.-elect Abigail Spanberger, New Jersey Gov.-elect Mikie Sherrill and Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI), each of whom flipped House seats in the 2018 midterms.

In her endorsement, Reinmann said she believes Conley is “by far the strongest candidate in this race” and that she has “seen her commitment to our nation and our shared values.”

Jake Dilemani, a New York political consultant, said that Conley’s profile — a woman with a national security and military background — is “unique and compelling” and one that voters seem receptive to at the moment. But he also cautioned against drawing too many one-to-one conclusions about Conley’s candidacy based on Spanberger and Sherrill’s victories in their recent off-year gubernatorial elections alone.

Davidson, meanwhile, has been racking up local Democratic endorsements, particularly in Rockland County, and she is the only Democratic candidate who hails from that part of the district, where Democrats have struggled against Lawler in previous cycles. Rockland Democrats’ backing for Davidson has not been without some internal controversy, however.

The strategist said that Davidson’s Jewish faith and family could give her a boost in a district where Jewish voters make up a significant and highly engaged portion of the voting population, and have been a strong base of support for Lawler. The Republican congressman has seen particularly strong support in Rockland County’s ultra-Orthodox community.

Dilemani also noted that Tarrytown Trustee Effie Phillips-Staley, who is running as the “de facto lefty” in the field, could rally a base of support with that approach and “pick up some of the enthusiasm that the left has from [Mayor-elect] Zohran [Mamdani]’s win,” but also emphasized that the Democratic voting base in NY-17 is much less progressive than that of New York City.

He said that the field will likely consolidate further in the coming months after the next fundraising deadline at the end of the quarter.

“Whoever is the nominee is going to have a tough challenge going up against Mike Lawler because he has proven himself to be a savvy politician, a good retail campaigner, a good fundraiser, and he has a pretty responsive constituent services team, so the party is going to have to produce a very, very solid candidate to run against him,” Dilemani said.

Hank Sheinkopf, a longtime New York Democratic consultant, also emphasized that Lawler has been popular and has a strong reputation for constituent services, which will make him a formidable incumbent. But he also said that Lawler and Republicans are likely to face backlash over the lengthy government shutdown, and that both Davidson and Conley could give him a strong challenge.

On Israel policy, both Davidson and Conley have expressed support for the U.S.-Israel relationship.

Davidson has highlighted that her daughter stayed in some of the kibbutzim that were attacked on Oct. 7, 2023, and said in a position paper that, “For me and for my family, championing the sanctity and safety of Israel is not an abstract political stance or foreign policy issue. It is deeply personal — woven into the fabric of our identity and survival as Jews.” She has expressed support for continued U.S. aid to Israel.

Conley, an Army veteran who spent time in the Middle East and North Africa in counterterrorism operations, said that, “As someone who has spent my career fighting for democracy, I deeply value Israel as America’s strongest ally in the region, the only democracy in the Middle East and a safe haven for the Jewish people” and that the U.S. should be “firmly committed to the safety and security of Israel.”

During the war between Israel and Iran, Conley expressed hope for a negotiated nuclear agreement but said that “Iran’s unwillingness to abandon the pursuit of nuclear weapons has left the world with few choices” and said that she knows firsthand the necessity of preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. But she also warned about “being drawn into another Middle East conflict.”

Davidson told JI on Thursday that last week’s election results show that voters are looking for change from the Trump administration, but distanced herself from Mamdani.

“What was clear across the country on election day was that voters were motivated to the polls by a strong disagreement with the Trump agenda and a desire for more affordability,” Davidson said. “I bring a very different record than Mayor-Elect Mamdani does, having cut taxes, fully funded our police force, and vocally stood up against antisemitism as a well-known Jewish leader in my community. That’s a record I’m ready to take to Mike Lawler from now through next November.”

Conley told Jewish Insider earlier this year, after Mamdani’s primary win, that she did not agree with his approach. “We need to address affordability but not by raising already exorbitant taxes on New Yorkers that will just drive more people out of the state. We need to stand up for the NY Jewish community and stand against anti-semitism in all forms,” Conley told JI.

But she said that Mamdani’s victory showed that voters are looking for alternatives to career politicians — like herself.

Chatzky has distinguished himself from many in the field with a significantly more critical stance toward Israel — he has accused Israel of violating U.S. arms sales laws, requiring the suspension of arms transfers, and said he did not believe that Mamdani is antisemitic.

Ireland is set to elect a new president tomorrow. Like in Israel, the role of president is largely ceremonial, but unlike in Israel, where the Knesset elects the president and the choice is mostly the result of backroom political deals, the Irish president is directly elected by the people.

That means the choice reflects the mood of the Irish public — and after the news coming out of the Emerald Isle over the past two years, it may come as no surprise that the country appears to be on the verge of choosing a candidate with anti-Israel, antisemitic and even anti-Western views.

The current president, Michael D. Higgins, is no friend of Israel or the Jews, having called antisemitism accusations an Israeli “PR exercise.” When the Jewish community asked him not to attend a Holocaust remembrance ceremony out of a concern that he would politicize it, he went anyway and gave a speech comparing Israel’s actions in the war in Gaza to the Holocaust.

The country’s former justice minister, Alan Shatter, told Jewish Insider that the leading candidate for the presidency, Catherine Connolly, “if elected, will present as Michael D. Higgins on steroids.”

Connolly, a legislator representing Galway West since 2016, is a hard-left candidate running as an independent, and led a recent Irish Times poll by 18 points. 

The front-runner’s anti-Israel history goes back to before the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel and the ensuing war in Gaza, and includes remarks that crossed the line into antisemitism. In 2021, Connolly wrote in a parliamentary question that Israel is “attempt[ing] to accomplish Jewish supremacy,” using language associated with centuries-old antisemitic conspiracy theories.

Since then, she has brought up Israel, which she calls a “terrorist state” or “an apartheid state,” in parliament over 200 times. One of those times was questioning the Irish Embassy in Tel Aviv joining an EU member embassies’ statement marking Holocaust Remembrance Day last year. 

Last month, she criticized calls to keep Hamas out of a future government for Gaza, saying that the terrorist organization is “part of the fabric of the Palestinian people.”

Her views have earned her the endorsement of the notorious Hezbollah-supporting Irish rapper duo Kneecap. 

Connolly has also said that the U.S. and EU cannot be trusted, and called President Donald Trump a bully. She has parroted Russian President Vladimir Putin’s line on his invasion of Ukraine, claiming that “NATO has played a despicable role in moving forward to the border and engaging in warmongering.” She also said that Russia’s attempt to assassinate Sergei and Yulia Skripal, a former Russian military intelligence officer and double agent for the British intelligence agencies and his daughter, should be viewed in the “context” of an EU and NATO missile buildup. 

Shatter said that Connolly “personifies the Irish left’s and Sinn Fein’s anti-Israel hostility … counting amongst her political supporters those who advocate Israel’s replacement by a Palestinian state. On social media she is supported by the entirety of the obsessive Israel-hating Irish social media community. … She regards the Irish government’s hostility towards Israel and anti-Israel action to date as insufficient.”

Connolly “is a product of the Irish government pandering to and adopting the narrative of Israel’s most extreme critics, and the government parties failing to nominate credible, articulate candidates,” Shatter argued. 

Shatter also pointed out that, while there are other issues on the national agenda, Connolly’s “hostility to Israel has [put her in] center stage.” In addition, he said that at many of her events, supporters have been “waving Palestinian flags as if the Irish flag has gone out of fashion.”

Perhaps the front-runner’s obsession with a conflict thousands of miles from Dublin and disconnected from key issues in Irish society is a reason why turnout is expected to hit a record low on Friday. “Of the big-ticket items in Irish society – for instance housing, race, climate change, unification – [the candidates] have had very little interesting things to say,” and the campaign “hasn’t inspired voters,” professor Kevin Rafter, a political scientist and the co-author of The Irish Presidency: Power, Ceremony and Politics, told The Guardian. 

Rep. Nellie Pou (D-NJ) starts out her first re-election campaign at a crossroads: Running in a historically deep-blue district that President Trump surprisingly carried, she’s caught between her background as a liberal leader and the pressures of a purple district that could pull her toward the political middle to preempt Republican opposition. 

Pou — who has never faced such a competitive general election in her political career — has generally leaned left while keeping a relatively low profile on the Hill. She joined the Congressional Progressive Caucus and stuck with the majority of her party on many key votes, including some pertaining to antisemitism and Israel that divided the Democratic caucus. She now faces a well-credentialed GOP challenger — Clifton, N.J., councilmember Rose Pino — as the Republican Party hopes to keep her urban north New Jersey district on its target list.

Despite representing a district with a sizable Jewish population, she didn’t join many of the moderates in her party in voting for a Republican-led resolution last month condemning the antisemitic attack in Boulder, Colo., urging stronger enforcement of immigration laws and supporting Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The Boulder resolution split the Democratic caucus, with 75 lawmakers voting for the resolution and 113 voting against it. Some Democrats objected to the immigration-related language. 

Pou, and nearly all other Democrats, voted in favor of a second resolution condemning a series of recent antisemitic attacks without that language.

“Congresswoman Pou believes that the rise of antisemitism in the United States and across the world is alarming and unacceptable. That’s why Congresswoman Pou voted in favor of a resolution on the House floor fully condemning antisemitism,” Pou spokesperson Mark Greenbaum told Jewish Insider. “And it’s why she is using her position on the Homeland Security Counterterrorism and Intelligence Subcommittee to demand increased funding for law enforcement to keep our Jewish communities safe and greater federal grants for synagogues and schools to upgrade their security.”

Pou also voted earlier this year against sanctioning the International Criminal Court, another vote that split House Democrats. Forty-five Democrats supported the sanctions.

But she has joined other efforts to support Israel and the Jewish community during her tenure, including signing a letter urging prompt federal approval of additional flights by Israeli airlines between the U.S. and Israel and calling for $500 million in funding for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program in 2025.

Pou’s district, New Jersey’s 9th, has both significant Jewish and Palestinian constituencies. Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-NJ), Pou’s predecessor who died in August 2024, faced a primary challenge from Prospect Park, N.J., Mayor Mohamed Khairullah, who focused his campaign squarely on criticizing Pascrell’s support for Israel. 

Pou was tapped by New Jersey Democratic leaders to replace Pascrell on the ballot after the congressman died during the election cycle — and they assumed she would face little opposition in future elections.

Pou’s district was considered a safe Democratic seat before the election, and Trump’s performance came as a surprise to Democrats, leaving Pou, the former majority leader in the state Senate, on guard as she prepares to defend her seat next year. 

Pou told the New Jersey Globe she takes political pressures into consideration on divisive votes, “But I also think it’s [about] doing the right thing.”

“Politics is very important, and I would love to make sure I have the opportunity to return back to Congress,” Pou said. “But I also think that we are here to do a job, and that we should be doing it with the right reasons in mind.”

Pino, a leading GOP recruit, announced her campaign on Thursday. Pino is a longtime local official and the child of Ecuadorian immigrants. Pou herself is the first Latina woman from New Jersey to serve in Congress. The district has a sizable Hispanic population.

Republican Billy Prempeh, whom Pou beat by five percentage points in the 2024 election, is also running again. Prempeh was endorsed by the New Jersey chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations last year and supported cutting off U.S. aid to Israel to stop the war in Gaza; opposed Israeli strikes on Gaza, saying in part, “I’m not dying for Israel”; and opposed the Antisemitism Awareness Act.

Andre Sayegh, the mayor of Paterson, N.J., who called his city “the capital of Palestine in the United States of America” and has been critical of Israel, is a potential primary challenger to Pou.

Pou’s re-election campaign raised $500,000 in the second quarter, reporting $780,000 on hand.

Trump won the district by a point, after President Joe Biden won it by nearly 20 points in 2020. Pou’s margin of victory was also substantially smaller than Pascrell’s in previous races, and Republicans see her as a top target in 2026.

“Nellie Pou went to Congress pledging to be a friend of Israel and the Jewish community, but that was a pledge she never intended to keep,” National Republican Campaign Committee spokesperson Maureen O’Toole said. “The truth is, Pou is backed and bankrolled by rabid antisemites, and her vote … makes it clear that she stands with them. Nellie Pou won’t be sitting in her Trump-won district much longer.”

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee pushed back, noting her vote in favor of the second antisemitism resolution that passed the House nearly unanimously.

“Congresswoman Nellie Pou has been outspoken on combatting antisemitism and joined Republicans and Democrats in voting for a bipartisan resolution to condemn the horrific attack in Boulder, Colorado,” a DCCC spokesperson told JI. “Nellie is working hard to lower costs and deliver for New Jersey’s 9th District, which is exactly what her constituents elected her to do.” 

The DCCC spokesperson also highlighted Pou’s work in supporting police funding and opposing the GOP reconciliation bill.

Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Ron Dermer suggested on Wednesday that Israeli political and defense leaders are now united in opposing the terms of the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal.

In a conversation with Ambassador Dennis Ross at the United Against Nuclear Iran annual summit in New York, Dermer stressed that while some former high-level government and security officials expressed support for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), “today you cannot find security and intelligence officials in Israel — I’m not aware of any of them — that would go back to the exact same deal.” 

“The United States has got enormous leverage, and I think the idea of going back into the same deal with Iran, it gives them a clear path to nuclear weapons,” he explained.

Asked if Israel’s position on Iran would change if a national unity government is formed following last week’s redo election, Dermer said that “any new government” would continue to support Israel’s longstanding opposition to the JCPOA and be in favor of economic pressure on Iran “to ensure that: A, that Iran never gets nuclear weapons, and B, that everything is done to roll back Iran’s aggression.” 

Dermer also noted that Blue and White leader Benny Gantz said earlier this year at the Munich security conference that there was no difference between him and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the topic of Iran. 

During the election, Netanyahu slammed his chief rival for “supporting the Iran nuclear deal” in 2015. 

Dermer said that Israel “could live with” a new nuclear deal negotiated by the U.S. — but only if it addressed the sunset clause. “The one problem that you have to address is you have to prevent Iran from ever being a military nuclear power,” he stated. “And if you have a sunset clause, that’s a date certain for when you want to would be a military nuclear power, and that has enormous consequences for our region.”