With progressive activist Analilia Mejia’s expected victory in the special election Democratic primary in New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District, attention is now turning to the upcoming April special general election and the June regular election primary as the last chances for moderates and pro-Israel groups to defeat her.

AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project, which spent $2.3 million attacking former Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-NJ), said in a statement that its “focus remains on who will serve the next full term in Congress” and that it will be “closely monitoring … the June NJ-11 primary, to help ensure pro-Israel candidates are elected to Congress.”

Mejia is on track to receive less than 30% of the primary vote in a relatively moderate suburban district, creating an opportunity for a moderate candidate to challenge her. But several Jewish leaders, as well as a local analyst, said that that will be difficult to achieve.

“June is potentially irresistible for the other candidates who ran … if any of these candidates could get a one-on-one shot at making it in June,” Micah Rasmussen, the director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University, said. But unless the field can consolidate, Rasmussen said, it’s hard to see how the result would be any different in June.

Rasmussen said he doesn’t share the view of some Democrats that voters would be frustrated with a Democratic candidate who decides to challenge Mejia.

Though they haven’t formally endorsed her yet, other members of New Jersey’s congressional delegation appear to be coalescing around Mejia — Reps. LaMonica McIver (D-NJ), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ) and Rob Menendez (D-NJ) participated in a town hall focused on Immigration and Customs Enforcement organized by Mejia on Saturday, and Menendez — a relative moderate aligned with the state’s party machine — posted a photo with her on Sunday.

Malinowski has not yet conceded the race, but said during the primary that he would not run again in June if he lost. Essex County Commissioner Brendan Gill also does not plan to run again. That leaves the most likely moderate challenger as former Lt. Gov. Tahesha Way, who was endorsed by Democratic Majority for Israel and is believed to be AIPAC’s choice in the race.

Way is holding in third with 17% of the vote. Her campaign did not respond to a request for comment on whether she plans to run again.

Local Jewish leaders on Friday were generally pessimistic about the chances of taking Mejia down in the June primary — for the full term in Congress — but there could be a path to defeating the ascendant progressive.

“I sat on a debate stage with Analilia Mejia when she said that Israel has a right to exist, but not as a Jewish state,” Jeff Grayzel, a local Jewish leader who ran for the seat with ambitions of uniting the Jewish community behind his campaign, said. “It is said that Jews will be blessed when they stand together and will experience misfortune when they are divided. My pleas for Jewish unity in this race went unheeded. In my messaging to the Jewish community, I warned of a repeat of New York City in NJ-11, and this result is a consequence of a house divided. I pray our people can unify to find a path forward.”

Rasmussen said that Malinowski, who came closest to beating Mejia, would be the strongest candidate in a head-to-head race against Mejia in June, and Rasmussen said he could envision a scenario in which Malinowski ultimately took another shot at the seat despite his previous pledge not to.

“I think it’s a little bit tougher for Tahesha Way to do that,” Rasmussen said. “She would very clearly have outside spending with her. She’d very clearly have fundraising with her. But it’s a little tough to go from a 17% result to a majority result. We’ll see what happens. It doesn’t mean she shouldn’t think about it, she shouldn’t consider it, but it’s probably a stretch.”

Jeff Grayzel, a local Jewish leader who ran for the seat with ambitions of uniting the Jewish community behind his campaign, lamented Mejia’s victory as a disappointing development for supporters of Israel, and said the Jewish community needs to come together.

“I sat on a debate stage with Analilia Mejia when she said that Israel has a right to exist, but not as a Jewish state,” Grayzel said. “It is said that Jews will be blessed when they stand together and will experience misfortune when they are divided. My pleas for Jewish unity in this race went unheeded. In my messaging to the Jewish community, I warned of a repeat of New York City in NJ-11, and this result is a consequence of a house divided. I pray our people can unify to find a path forward.”

Though Mejia is well to the left of candidates that the district typically picks, Rasumussen said that it’s “hard to come up with a situation” where the district — drawn to favor Democrats with a highly motivated Democratic voter base in a midterm year — would become competitive for Republicans in the April 16 special general election to fill out the remainder of Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s House term.

“However, that’s not to say that Republicans won’t try,” Rasmussen said. “If I were a Republican who had the ability to invest resources, I would certainly be taking a very close look at this race on these next three elections that are going to be happening this year in this district, and trying to see if I can take advantage of the very particular circumstances.”

“I think it’s pretty clear why voters went to Mejia, and it’s not because she is a socialist or because she is the most left of any candidate in the race,” Micah Rasmussen, the director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University, said. “Voters were driven away from Malinowski because of that advertising. They did not view a machine candidate as a viable alternative. They saw Mejia as the candidate in the race who could most stand up to Trump … the candidate who had the clearest position on ICE.”

Rasmussen said that UDP’s advertising against Malinowski “very clearly … worked,” citing the significant drop in Malinowski’s share of the vote from the first early votes to be submitted — where he was receiving 60-70% of the vote — and votes submitted later in the cycle, as well as votes on election day.

“It’s pretty clear that the reason they went in [Mejia’s] direction is because she carved out a different position on ICE, which is very clearly on voters minds, and just convinced voters that she was the person who could best stand up to Trump, and that, it seems is what Democratic voters are looking for,” Rasmussen said.

He was skeptical of the narrative that the result was a sign of a broader voter appetite for socialist or socialist-adjacent policies in moderate suburban districts.

“I think it’s pretty clear why voters went to Mejia, and it’s not because she is a socialist or because she is the most left of any candidate in the race,” Rasmussen said. “Voters were driven away from Malinowski because of that advertising. They did not view a machine candidate as a viable alternative. They saw Mejia as the candidate in the race who could most stand up to Trump … the candidate who had the clearest position on ICE.”

The race also saw substantially higher turnout than most anticipated — surpassing 2024 primary turnout levels in not just the 11th District but every congressional district in New Jersey, according to Rasmussen — a sign of strong Democratic motivation to vote, likely spurred by President Donald Trump.

Gill’s fourth-place finish — despite entering the race as the favorite given the backing he received from New Jersey Democratic institutions — is a clear signal that the state’s Democratic machine has largely lost its ability to shape elections to its will, Rasmussen added.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani selected Phylisa Wisdom, executive director of the progressive Zionist group New York Jewish Agenda and a critic of yeshiva education, to helm the city’s Office to Combat Antisemitism.

Jewish Insider first reported in January that the administration was considering Wisdom for the job. But a source also told JI earlier this week that her past work as director of development and government affairs at Young Advocates for Fair Education (Yaffed) — which criticizes the quality of secular education in Hasidic schools — had initially given the mayor’s team some pause. Mamdani had sought the support of the Satmar Hasidic community during his campaign.

In her conversation with JI last month, Wisdom sketched what she described as a “comprehensive strategy” that the office, which former Mayor Eric Adams established in May 2025, could pursue.

The antisemitism office could be “coordinating between long-standing offices and agencies tasked with combating hate, and input from the diversity of New York’s Jewish community,” she said, outlining broad steps.

In her public commentary, Wisdom has criticized some extremist rhetoric and actions — such as the anti-Israel protest in Times Square the day following the Oct. 7 attacks, the slogan “from the river to the sea” and boycotts of people labeled “Zionists” — but also defended critics of Israel and opponents of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism.

A range of Jewish Democratic politicians and advocates, including top staffers from Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office and the City Council, lauded Wisdom’s selection.

“Her Jewish values, tireless commitment to justice, and strong relationships & credibility across the community are precisely what we need in this role. Jewish safety is inextricable from everyone’s safety and our democracy,” said Amy Spitalnick, CEO of the progressive Jewish Council for Public Affairs and a New York Jewish Agenda board member.

However, some leaders in the Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish communities privately bristled at Wisdom’s history at Yaffed, though several hesitated to speak publicly out of a reluctance to pick what they described as an unnecessary fight with the mayor’s office.

“Orthodox Jews are among those most frequently targeted by antisemitism and discrimination. Choosing a figure known for antagonizing the Orthodox community — someone who has publicly battled yeshivas — reflects a troubling disconnect from that reality, and from the promises Mayor Mamdani has repeatedly made to protect our community,” said one leader. . “At best, it is a deeply misguided decision. At worst, it is counterproductive and offensive.”

Some leaders based outside the five boroughs were more outspoken, particularly about Wisdom’s willingness to countenance anti-Zionist rhetoric and questioning of the IHRA definition of antisemitism.

“Saying anti-Zionism is not antisemitism does not reflect the reality of the overwhelming majority of Jewish New Yorkers,” said Rabbi Marc Schneier, founder of the Hampton Synagogue. “Eighty-one years after the liberation of Auschwitz, honoring the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust demands vigilance, moral clarity and the courage to speak out against those who choose to define and reformulate the definition of antisemitism in our day.”

Wisdom, whose official appointment was first reported in the Forward, will replace Adams’ executive director of the office, Moshe Davis. 

Brian Varela, a businessman running in New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District, picked up an endorsement on Monday from Newark, N.J., Mayor Ras Baraka, a sign of Varela’s increasing outreach to progressive voters.

Baraka’s progressive candidacy in last year’s New Jersey gubernatorial race raised concerns in the Jewish community, in part because Baraka, in the early 2000s, appeared alongside Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, who has a long record of antisemitism, and applauded violent rhetoric by the controversial preacher. Baraka also faced scrutiny over his record on Israel and antisemitism.

“Brian is proud to have Mayor Baraka’s endorsement and grateful for his support,” Emmett Shell, a spokesperson for Varela’s campaign, said. “Mayor Baraka has joined north of 50 people across the ideological spectrum that point to Brian’s ability to build a wide-tent coalition.”

“That said, Brian wants to be unequivocal on the underlying issue: He entirely condemns Louis Farrakhan and the violent rhetoric Farrakhan has promoted,” Shell continued. “There is no place for that kind of rhetoric in this country, full stop. Brian has consistently denounced antisemitism in all its forms throughout his campaign and throughout his life, and that position will never waver. Antisemitism is a poison, and Brian will always stand firmly against it, regardless of who is in the room.”

The Baraka endorsement is an additional sign that Varela, who told Jewish Insider last summer, “I consider myself more of a moderate,” has pivoted in a more progressive direction as he faces off against candidates including military veteran Rebecca Bennett, who is running a campaign focused on more moderate messages.

The New Jersey Globe on Monday highlighted the Baraka endorsement as part of “Varela’s quest to claim the progressive mantle in the Democratic primary,” pointing to a series of progressive stances that Varela is taking and his other progressive endorsements.

He’s also staking out a progressive stance on immigration issues, describing himself as the “most vocal ICE critic” in the Garden State and one of the first candidates in the country to call for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s impeachment.

Asked whether he now considers himself a moderate or progressive, the Varela spokesperson said, “Brian would push back a little on the framing, because at the end of the day, voters in NJ-07 aren’t asking whether their representative is a moderate or a progressive.”

“They’re asking who is going to deliver on the issues that matter to their families. Brian looks at each policy on its own merits, whether that policy is going to strengthen the economy and raise the standard of living for people in this district,” he continued. “Sometimes that puts him in a more progressive lane, sometimes a more moderate one. The label doesn’t drive the policy. It’s the ability to change people’s lives for the better that moves Brian towards solutions.”

Varela has gone through a unique political evolution over the years, starting as a press intern for Republican Gov. Chris Christie in 2010, later running as an anti-machine candidate against now-Rep. Rob Menendez (D-NJ) and later leading the New Jersey chapter of the Forward Party, former presidential candidate Andrew Yang’s centrist third party.

The National Republican Congressional Committee is also seeking to paint Varela as far left, describing him in recent press releases as “dangerously radical” and the “pick of the radical left.”

Baraka also endorsed progressive Analilia Mejia in the special election in New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District, and is set to endorse Michael Blake, one of the progressive challengers to Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY). Mejia has the backing of various prominent progressive leaders, including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT).

“Analilia has dedicated her career to fighting for the rights of all people and will continue to do so,” Mejia campaign spokesperson Elon Glickman said. “As an Afro-Latina, whose own family has faced bigotry and hate, she understands that Antisemitism, racism and anti-Blackness are cut from the same cloth and we must stand together in fighting it.”

Blake’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

Democrat Crystal Rhoades, the district court clerk of Douglas County, Neb., is running for Congress in the state’s 2nd District on an unapologetically pro-Israel platform, with the explicit goal of blocking a progressive, whose record on Israel has attracted scrutiny in the pro-Israel community, from becoming the party’s nominee in the critical swing district.

Asked by Jewish Insider in an interview last week why she’s running for Congress, Rhoades answered simply, “to stop John Cavanaugh,” referring to the Democratic state senator seen as the front-runner in the race.

Rhoades, who said she’s been involved in Democratic politics in the area for two decades, during which she has held three elective offices and served as the county Democratic chair, said that “it was just not a good idea to allow him to emerge as the nominee” in the swing district. “What’s best for this district is for someone other than John Cavanaugh to represent it.”

“With everything that is happening right now, with the Trump administration, there’s too much risk in his candidacy,” she continued, noting that if Cavanaugh wins, the state’s Republican governor would appoint his replacement in the state Senate, potentially giving Nebraska Republicans enough votes to redraw the district and move to a winner-take-all system in the presidential election, rather the current arrangement in which the state’s two congressional districts are allocated separate electoral votes.

The Omaha-area 2nd district has, in recent presidential elections, voted with Democrats.

“That, combined with his position on Israel — which I find to be abhorrent, and frankly, very inconsistent with American values and national security — were strong motivators for me to get into the race, because I do have a long history of service here. I’m well known to these voters, and the only one that can compete with his family legacy,” Rhoades said.

Cavanaugh is a progressive state senator who hails from a Nebraska political dynasty. He was one of only a handful of lawmakers who declined to sign on to a letter in the state Senate expressing support for Israel on the first anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, and at a recent candidate forum swore off accepting any support from AIPAC or Democratic Majority for Israel.

“I support Israel and believe Israel has a right to exist. And I also believe a two-state solution is the only way to secure lasting peace,” Cavanaugh said in a statement to JI in response to Rhoades. “Democrats in NE-02 want a candidate who will fight the Trump agenda and bring positive ideas to fix our economy, lower health care costs, and end the corruption we see from Trump and Washington. That’s why I’m running for Congress.”

In her interview with JI and a position paper she authored on Israel, Rhoades expressed a deep commitment to the Jewish state, its security and the U.S.-Israel relationship, and offered significant criticism for fellow Democrats who are critical of Israel.

She traced her support for the Jewish state to her time as a teenager working in a nursing home, where she helped take care of a Holocaust survivor and first learned about his story, antisemitism and the Holocaust.

“For me, this is very cut and dry and not at all controversial or confusing,” Rhoades said. “I just fundamentally disagree with the position that some of the members of the party have taken [against Israel]. … It’s really sad and it makes me quite angry.”

“I knew someone who described unspeakable evil and horror. This was a man who, in the ‘90s, was still hiding [extra] food,” a practice he took up in the concentration camps, Rhoades said. “It’s really difficult for me to express how much of an impression it actually made, but it was an incredibly powerful experience, knowing a survivor and having the opportunity to talk with them about what had happened.”

She saved her money from that job and used it for a trip to Europe, during which she visited a concentration camp. She went on to study terrorism in college in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, which she said further enhanced her understanding of the threat of global terrorism and Israel’s stabilizing presence in the Middle East.

“For me, this is very cut and dry and not at all controversial or confusing,” Rhoades said. “I just fundamentally disagree with the position that some of the members of the party have taken [against Israel]. … It’s really sad and it makes me quite angry.”

She said that she believes fellow Democrats are falling for misleading or false narratives pushed by online algorithms. She added that those who would support divestment from Israel, cutting off U.S. support or anti-Israel slogans like “from the river to the sea” have a fundamental lack of understanding of Israel’s role in the world and in combating terrorism.

“It is, quite frankly, shocking to me that so many people are taking this position,” she continued. “I really can’t make sense of it. I just do not understand it.”

In her position paper, Rhoades argued that Democrats who aren’t standing with Israel are betraying Democratic values and vowed not to cave to anti-Israel pressures in the party.

“These principles: democracy, equality, and freedom from persecution, are supposed to be the foundation of our core values as Democrats,” Rhoades wrote. “So why are so many ignoring them when it comes to Israel? I won’t bend my values to appease a social media mob. I won’t apologize for standing up for our ally. And I won’t stop calling out double standards when I see them. That’s not weakness … it’s leadership.”

She said that she hopes her first trip as a member of Congress would be to Israel, a signal “to my colleagues and my constituents that these issues are of moral importance to me.”

Rhoades told JI she believes the U.S.-Israel relationship has helped prevent terrorist incidents at home and elsewhere, and benefitted the U.S. in a variety of other ways — in technology, commerce, defense and intelligence.

She also emphasized that it’s the only democracy in the Middle East and the only country in the region where women, LGBTQ people and minorities enjoy equal rights.

Rhoades said she hopes the ceasefire in Gaza holds, and that a two-state solution can eventually be reached, but that it must be negotiated between the parties and that Hamas cannot be allowed to continue to hold any authority.

She emphasized in her paper that the “eradication of Hamas” was the only reasonable response to the Oct. 7 attacks and that a two-state solution must guarantee Israel’s security, demilitarize any future Palestinian state and end support for terrorism.

“While compassion for Gazan civilians is well-intentioned, it too often misses the point that they are oppressed by the same terrorist regime that insists on harming their own civilians to try to turn public opinion globally against Israel,” she said in the position paper. “All leaders, but particularly Democratic leaders, should be calling that out as a betrayal of our core values.”

Rhoades also expressed deep skepticism of the Palestinian Authority, writing that its “weakness and corruption facilitated Hamas’s ascension.” She called for “permanent enforcement,” on an international basis, of the Taylor Force Act — which bars U.S. support for the PA until the governing body ends its payments to terrorists.

Rhoades did not attend a candidate forum in January where most candidates, including Cavanaugh, swore off pro-Israel support and several said they would have voted against a government funding package that included funding to Israel and maintained a ban on funding for UNRWA. 

She told JI that if she had been there, she would have pushed back on the premise of the questions posed by audience members, which she said provided a “fundamental misframing of the issue,” and conflated anger with Israel’s leadership with all Israeli and Jewish people.

She vowed to vote in support of any and all resources Israel needs to defend itself, and oppose any legislation imposing new conditions on aid to Israel.

Rhoades told JI she would have supported the U.S. strikes on Iran last summer, but emphasized that the Trump administration should be consulting Congress before engaging in military operations in foreign countries. If presented to her for a vote as a member of Congress, she said she would have supported the U.S. operation.

Looking ahead, she said that Congress should be involved in any decisions regarding further action against Iran, but that she is “very supportive of looking for ways to help the Iranian people, who, very clearly, are unhappy with their leadership.”

“The problem is that people conflate [Israel and Jews], and in doing so, it always kind of ends up being antisemitic. The idea that Israel does not have the right to exist, in my mind, is just inherently antisemitic,” Rhoades told JI.

In her position paper, Rhoades said that Iran cannot maintain any nuclear weapons or enrichment capacity, and additionally emphasized the need to work with other U.S. partners to “snuff out” Iran’s proxy forces.

She also argued that the debate over whether anti-Zionism is antisemitic “is the wrong debate” and that in practice, anti-Zionist rhetoric veers into antisemitism “almost immediately.” She said “it is insane” that the idea that Israel has a right to exist in safety could be considered controversial.

“The problem is that people conflate [Israel and Jews], and in doing so, it always kind of ends up being antisemitic. The idea that Israel does not have the right to exist, in my mind, is just inherently antisemitic,” she told JI.

When political leaders endorse or refuse to condemn rhetoric like “globalize the intifada” or “from the river to the sea,” Rhoades said that she sees those officials as empowering antisemitism.

She expressed strong support for the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism and for the Antisemitism Awareness Act that would codify the use of that definition in education.

“I’m not at all interested in any other definition,” Rhoades told JI, warning that spikes in antisemitism like the one currently happening in the U.S. have historically presaged authoritarian and oppressive regimes.

The 2nd District is currently represented by moderate Republican Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE), himself an outspoken supporter of Israel and prominent voice against antisemitism. Bacon, who has managed to fend off a series of Democratic challengers, is not running for reelection, and the Cook Political Report rates the district as “Lean Democratic.”

Internal polling by Rhoades’ campaign has put her in second behind Cavanaugh, 25%-17% with 53% undecided, but there are also several other candidates in the race. Polling by Cavanaugh’s campaign in mid-January had him with a commanding lead, with 43% to Rhoades’ 15%.

Rhoades said she’s the only candidate in the race from a working-class background, and understands the challenges that voters who have been disillusioned with the Democratic Party face. She said she thinks she can bring those voters back to the Democratic Party.

Outside of Israel policy, Rhoades said her top priorities include implementing mandatory retirement ages for members of Congress, eliminating gerrymandering and strengthening checks and balances; investing in infrastructure to provide economic stimulus and better-paying jobs; and helping to lower health-care costs, including by de-linking health insurance from the workplace.

Progressive operative Waleed Shahid announced on Monday morning he would assume a newly created role of deputy communications director of economic justice in New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s office.

The former spokesperson for Justice Democrats — the group that helped elevate Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), among other members of the Squad — announced on X and Substack that he would join the new administration, after serving on the mayor’s transition team. 

Shahid was a leader in the 2024 Uncommitted movement, which sought to deny support to former President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris over the Biden administration’s support for Israel following the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, and served as an advisor to former Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY).

In a post on X following Mamdani’s triumph in the New York City Democratic primary in June, Shahid asserted the Democratic Socialists of America-backed candidate’s victory was owed to his positioning against Israel.

“One of the biggest mistakes the Democratic Party establishment made was trying to smother their base’s outrage over US support for Israel’s assault on Gaza,” Shahid wrote the day after the primary. “Mamdani gave it a voice. Without that, there’s no campaign.”

It was a triumphant note after a string of losses for Shahid, who spent the days following President Donald Trump’s 2024 victory deflecting criticisms that far-left activists had divided and undermined the Democratic Party. Rather, Shahid pointed the finger at AIPAC, which had supported successful primary challenges to Bowman and former Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO).

“Many other issues dwarf ‘woke groups,’” Shahid argued. “My god, if we’re talking about ‘The Groups’ without mentioning AIPAC — the #1 spender in Democratic primaries, unseating a Black nurse and a principal while undermining youth turnout — then I can’t take you seriously. Let’s be for real.”

In a Substack post later republished in The Nation reflecting on Bowman’s loss to Rep. George Latimer (D-NY), Shahid asserted that the U.S.’ relationship with Israel was a defining issue and an essential litmus test for left-of-center candidates.

“Progressives who have avoided taking a strong stance on shaping the Palestinian rights movement must recognize the deep threat AIPAC poses to all our movements and collective interests,” he wrote. “The stance a politician takes on Palestine often indicates their willingness to challenge entrenched power and stand up for genuine justice and equality. It is imperative that progressives understand the centrality of this issue and rally together to counteract AIPAC’s influence, for the sake of not just Palestinian rights but the integrity and future of all progressive causes.”

Shahid’s role in the mayor’s office is a newly created one, though he signaled his portfolio would emphasize local economic issues. 

“My focus will be on listening to New Yorkers and connecting their lived experience to how this administration is using governing power — across economic policy, consumer and worker protections, and a more serious approach to building and development — to bring down the cost of living and ensure dignity,” he wrote.

In the same post, Shahid said not only would he exit his role at The Bloc — a nonprofit established to provide organizational and communications support to left-wing groups — but the organization as a whole would “wind down.”

According to a New York Times notice of his 2022 wedding, Shahid is married to Emily Mayer, a co-founder of the group IfNotNow, which calls itself “a movement of U.S. Jews organizing our community to end U.S. support for Israel’s apartheid.” Tax returns indicate Mayer left the organization in November 2023. 

Mayer, also a veteran of the Uncommitted campaign and the New York City Council, began working as an aide to then-New York City Comptroller Brad Lander — now challenging Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) — in 2025. She told Jewish Insider on Monday that she will exit her government role at the end of the week, but would not say whether or what position she might assume next.

With Brad Lander’s announcement on Wednesday of his primary challenge to Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), allies of the progressive New York City comptroller are feeling particularly bullish about his prospects.

Lander, a former longtime city councilman, is widely known in Goldman’s left-leaning, heavily Jewish district, which covers Lower Manhattan as well as parts of Brooklyn. Polling has suggested a primary matchup will be competitive. Lander is also expected to notch a key endorsement from Zohran Mamdani, the mayor-elect of New York City and a democratic socialist who performed strongly in the deep-blue district last month.

But even as Lander now seeks to capitalize on the newfound momentum from Mamdani’s victory, some experts speculated that he could face more obstacles than his supporters have envisioned in his bid to unseat a two-term incumbent with vast personal wealth and who is nationally recognized as a top Democratic foe of President Donald Trump.

“A Democratic primary for Congress during a midterm election in which the narrative will strongly focus on rebuking President Trump and his agenda means, for candidates, a heavy reliance on credibility taking on the president,” Jake Dilemani, a Democratic consultant, told Jewish Insider on Tuesday. 

Goldman, a Jewish Democrat who served as a Trump impeachment prosecutor before he was elected, “has those credentials and the ability to show voters how he took on Trump in the past and won,” Dilemani said. “His antagonistic history with President Trump is unique compared to the rest of the field.”

While both Lander and Goldman have been forceful opponents of Trump’s deportation efforts, Hank Sheinkopf, a veteran Democratic strategist, called Goldman “the guy who took on Trump before it was fashionable,” arguing that he “has plenty to run on.”

He also predicted that Lander “is going to have problems going after Goldman” over his support for Israel “because [Lander is] a Jew who identifies as a liberal Zionist,” a term increasingly used as a pejorative on the far left. Lander, 56, has long been a vocal critic of Israel, but he is not aligned with the anti-Zionist left in refusing to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, a disagreement that could fuel some tension during his campaign.

“You can’t dislodge an incumbent without a negative campaign. What’s the negative campaign? It’s not clear yet,” Sheinkopf told JI. “Goldman has a better playbook to work with.”

In a statement to JI on Tuesday, Maddy Rosen, a spokesperson for Goldman, said the congressman “is focused on stopping the Trump administration from what they’re doing to immigrant families in his district right now.”

“He’s proud of his progressive record in Congress and will deal with Brad and other challengers in the new year,” Rosen added.

A spokesperson for Lander declined to comment. Mamdani’s team did not respond to a request for comment.

Lander, who ran an unsuccessful campaign for mayor, during which he emerged as a top ally of Mamdani, had been widely viewed as poised for a leading role in the mayor-elect’s administration. Instead of offering him a job, Mamdani reportedly encouraged him to challenge Goldman, promising an endorsement in next year’s June primary, likely to be among the most bitterly contested Democratic fights of the upcoming election cycle.

Goldman, 49, does still possess some notable vulnerabilities that have made him a target of the left. His outspoken support for Israel amid its war in Gaza irked many progressive voters, for instance, while his ties to AIPAC have fueled criticism from another potential rival, Alexa Avilés, a far-left city councilwoman who has been weighing a campaign. 

Yuh-Line Niou, a former state assemblywoman who narrowly lost to Goldman during his first House bid in 2022, was considering a rematch but decided not to run to avoid splintering the anti-Goldman vote, she said on Tuesday.

Chris Coffey, a Democratic consultant who lives in the district, posited that by entering the race earlier than his potential opponents, Lander is now “trying to box out” the Democratic Socialists of America — which has officially endorsed Avilés for the primary.

“I think Dan will be able to raise money and have folks spend on his behalf,” Coffey added. “Overall a lot of money will be spent on this race.”

A spokesperson for AIPAC, which has endorsed Goldman and supported his first House campaign, declined to comment on the brewing primary battle.

Even absent outside spending, Goldman, an heir to the Levi Strauss fortune whose estimated net worth is up to $250 million, can draw on his own personal wealth to help fund his reelection bid and mount an offensive against Lander — who is hoping to capture the enthusiasm of the party’s grassroots base and is reportedly courting endorsements from progressive leaders including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT).

During his first congressional primary three years ago, Goldman dropped nearly $5 million of his own money into the race, prevailing in a crowded field of prominent progressive opponents with a plurality of the vote. Goldman easily won reelection last year, beating a handful of lesser-known challengers.

Like many progressives now running for Congress, Graham Platner, a Democratic Senate candidate in Maine, has made opposition to Israel a central part of his messaging.

He frequently accuses Israel of genocide in Gaza, advocates for blocking U.S. aid to Israel and is an outspoken critic of AIPAC. During a campaign event last month, Platner, a 41-year-old former Marine who runs an oyster farm, also said he believes that Israel is a terrorist state.

But more so than many candidates, the political newcomer seems particularly invested in engaging on Middle East policy, even if his views have drawn scrutiny, according to audio of a recent private discussion in which he debated about Israel with some attendees at a fundraising event in Maine for nearly 20 minutes.

Speaking at the August fundraiser, Platner defended his stances on Israel and shared previously undisclosed details about his personal ties to the region, according to the audio, recently shared with Jewish Insider.

Despite his hostile criticism of Israel, Platner said he believed that the country “has the same right to exist that every nation has to exist,” though he did not confirm whether he recognizes Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. 

While he said he agreed that Hamas is a terrorist organization, Platner claimed that Netanyahu had “publicly stated that” Israel was “funding Hamas to make sure that there was going to be no non-radical leadership within Gaza in order to keep a Palestinian state from happening.”  

While members of Netanyahu’s coalition have made this argument — Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich referred to the terrorist organization as “an asset” as it serves as an obstacle to Palestinian statehood — the prime minister has never personally made such a claim. New York Times reporting from shortly after the Oct. 7 attacks alleged that the Israeli prime minister had allowed the Qatari government to send money into the Gaza Strip for several years in order to “maintain peace in Gaza.” Netanyahu called allegations that he was empowering Hamas “ridiculous.”

“It is difficult for me to lay the onus of everything only at the feet of the Palestinians,” he explained, “and not include the Netanyahu government.”

Platner also quibbled with an attendee who said that 1,200 Israeli civilians had been killed during the attacks, noting that a percentage of those who had died on Oct. 7 were soldiers in the Israeli military.

“It wasn’t 1,200 civilians. It was 600 military members,” Platner countered, using a number that far exceeded the approximately 300 soldiers who were killed in the attacks. 

“Who were taken sleeping, unarmed, out of their beds, I’ve met families,” the attendee responded, likely referring to the tatzpitaniot, unarmed female observer soldiers, and others, who were famously killed and kidnapped in their pajamas.  

“When you are wearing a uniform and carrying a gun in the service of a cause, it is difficult for me to feel that you can be called a civilian,” said Platner, who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan. “There is a one-way street on this,” he continued, “that I find to be disingenuous.”

The private comments suggest that Platner is not merely paying lip service to such issues on the trail, as he runs in a competitive primary against Maine Gov. Janet Mills for the Democratic nomination to unseat Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME). 

Platner’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

Platner’s views on Israel and Gaza have received limited attention in recent weeks as his campaign has weathered controversy over his past incendiary Reddit posts and faced questions over when he first became aware that a skull tattoo on his chest he had for nearly 20 years resembled a Nazi symbol known as a Totenkopf.

Platner, who covered the tattoo this month, has insisted he did not know what the skull signified until recently, though reporting from JI and CNN has contradicted that claim.

He has also argued that members of his family are Jewish and never objected to the skull tattoo when he took his shirt off around them. “Eighteen years,” he told The Atlantic recently. “It’s never come up.”

In the conversation about Israel at the fundraiser, which took place before controversy ensnared his campaign, Platner noted his stepbrother is Seth Frantzman, an Israeli author, journalist and security analyst who has long worked for The Jerusalem Post and lives in Jerusalem, saying they are “very close,” according to the audio.

Frantzman, who has previously written admiringly about Platner without mention of their familial ties, did not respond to an email seeking comment.

Platner also said that he had “multiple friends in B’Tselem,” the left-wing Israeli human rights group that has described Israel as an apartheid regime and accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza — as he argued that Israel is not fully a democracy.

He cited his friends from B’Tselem “who have showed me videos, who have introduced me to former soldiers, who have introduced me to Palestinians, who have laid out a very clear and, frankly, well-sourced case that Palestinians living within the borders of the occupied territories do not live in a democracy, that they do not have equal rights, that they do not have equal access to areas.”

He said that, “as an American taxpayer,” he was uncomfortable with sending continued U.S. aid to support Israel’s military.

But even as he has been deployed to the Middle East, Platner confirmed that he had never visited Israel.

Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA), who recently announced a primary challenge to Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), said this week that his break with AIPAC was “a long time coming.”

A day after entering the Senate race, Moulton announced that he would reject any further donations from AIPAC and would return more than $30,000 from the group, a move that has continued to be a major talking point and feature of his early campaign. 

Coming from an outspoken moderate like Moulton, the move has also raised strategic questions in a race against a committed Israel critic like Markey.

In an online interview with a progressive commentator published on Tuesday, Moulton reiterated comments he made in his public announcement rejecting AIPAC.

“Israel is our most important ally in the Middle East, but I have strong disagreements with the Bibi Netanyahu government, and I’ve been very public about those disagreements for a long time,” Moulton said. “The problem is that AIPAC is aligned with that government, so I’ve been pushing them privately to separate themselves, but they wouldn’t do that. And so ultimately, it was my decision to distance myself from the organization.”

AIPAC has a history of supporting Israel and the U.S.-Israel relationship regardless of who is in power.

Asked whether he thinks debates about AIPAC will play a continued role in the campaign, Moulton said it “depends a lot on what happens in Gaza and Israel.”

He didn’t address the host’s argument that the group, whose supporters and leadership are U.S. citizens, should register as a foreign lobby group. 

“There’s a long way to go to actually having a peaceful settlement where both peoples can live side by side with the same rights, the same freedoms and the same safety that everybody in the world deserves,” Moulton said. “So we’re a long way away from that goal, and I certainly hope that we continue moving towards it, and we don’t resort to more violence. And if that’s the case, I think we’ll be able to talk about other issues in this campaign. Sadly, if it’s not, then I’m sure this will keep coming up.”

Jeremy Burton, the CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Boston, said many in the community were disappointed by Moulton’s initial statement disavowing AIPAC.

“People in our community will disagree with AIPAC and about AIPAC and some of their strategic choices and that includes myself, as a supporter of AIPAC. That said, AIPAC’s commitment to the state-to-state allyship of the United States and Israel has not changed between the time that the congressman actively sought their endorsement as recently as a year ago and his decision in recent weeks,” Burton told Jewish Insider. “So I would say that from my perspective, turning his back on yesterday’s supporters in order to pursue prospective voters of tomorrow says far more about the congressman than it does about AIPAC.”

Burton added that while some in the community support AIPAC and others support different groups, Moulton’s comment in his initial statement backing only “Israel’s right to exist” failed to “meet the minimum expectations that members of our community have for the kind of support for Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic state that we hold, regardless of our views about AIPAC.”

David Frum, a columnist for The Atlantic, responding to the video of Moulton’s interview this week, accused the congressman of pandering to antisemites.

“Moulton is a moderate who is hoping that by opening the door *just a little* to anti-Jewish feeling, he can borrow some of that Mamdani energy to win his primary — then wedge the door, thus far and no farther. He hopes to control the hatred he wants to use. But it will use him,” Frum wrote on X, referring to New York City Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist who has regularly criticized Israel and for months refused to condemn the slogan “globalize the intifada.”

Moulton also defended and praised Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner after the revelation that Platner for decades had a tattoo of a Nazi symbol on his chest. Jewish Insider reported at the time, and CNN has since confirmed, that Platner indicated to acquaintances years ago that he was aware of the tattoo’s meaning, which he has more recently denied.

“He should certainly be in the race. Primaries are good, they’re healthy, and he represents a new generation of leadership that’s not just cut from the same cloth, part of the old playbook, frankly, that hasn’t been serving Democrats well,” Moulton said in a CNN interview last week. 

He said he’s “certainly considering” endorsing Platner.

“He’s made mistakes in his life — we all have — he deserves an opportunity to explain those mistakes, and he’s doing that,” Moulton continued, praising Platner for “owning this mistake, correcting it. … As someone who served in the Marines myself, he’s far from the first Marine I’ve seen who got a tattoo that he didn’t understand.”

Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA) announced on Wednesday that he plans to mount a challenge to Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), grounding his campaign in an argument for generational change.

“I just don’t believe Sen. Markey should be running for another six-year term at 80 years old,” Moulton said in his Senate race announcement. “Even more, I don’t think someone who’s been in Congress for half a century is the right person to meet this moment and win the future. Sen. Markey is a good man, but it’s time for a new generation of leadership.”

But unlike many of the younger challengers taking on older Democratic incumbents in the current election cycle, Moulton, 46, is generally more moderate, including on foreign policy issues, than Markey, an outspoken progressive. While Moulton has been strongly critical of Israeli operations in Gaza, his record as a whole leans more pro-Israel than Markey’s.

Markey faced a similar challenge from former Rep. Joe Kennedy (D-MA) in 2020 — ahead of the current anti-gerontocracy push in parts of the Democratic Party. Young progressives rallied around Markey, who won the race by 10 points. In that campaign, Kennedy sounded more supportive of Israel than the senator he was attempting to unseat. 

A recent Fiscal Alliance Foundation poll of the Senate race found that 63% of Massachusetts voters think Markey should not run for another term. In that same survey, Moulton led Markey, 38-30% among Democratic primary voters.

Markey is a prominent progressive voice in the Senate and voted seven times in the last year in favor of resolutions led by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) to block various weapons transfers to Israel. He memorably faced boos at a pro-Israel rally just days after the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks when he called for de-escalation between Israel and Hamas.

He also joined a letter accusing Israel of violating U.S. arms sales conditions imposed by the Biden administration, and pushed to incorporate those conditions into the supplemental aid package for Israel and other allies.

Markey called the U.S. strike on Iran’s nuclear program “illegal and unconstitutional” and said the attack “holds dangers for all Americans.” 

“This attack may set back but will not stop Iran’s efforts to get a nuclear bomb. The regime can rebuild its program and will now be highly motivated to do so. A diplomatic solution remains the best way to permanently and verifiably prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon,” Markey continued. “Trump’s illegal actions raise the risk of escalation into a wider regional war with grave risks for U.S. troops and personnel and civilians in the region.”

During a committee markup of the Antisemitism Awareness Act earlier this year, Markey led an amendment opposing the revocations of visas, detentions and deportations of students and faculty based on “protected conduct under the First Amendment,” one of a series of amendments that helped torpedo the bill.

Markey appeared on the streaming show of Hasan Piker, a far-left commentator who has repeatedly faced criticism for antisemitic rhetoric and support for terrorism, during last year’s Democratic National Convention. 

While Moulton, a Marine veteran, has been critical of Israel’s war operations in Gaza and called for increased humanitarian aid, he has not backed congressional efforts to condition, withhold or end U.S. aid to Israel since Oct. 7. He voted — with most House lawmakers — in favor of supplemental aid to the Jewish state last year.

After a meeting in May 2024 with then-Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Herzog, Moulton said he opposed Israel’s plans to launch a full-scale invasion of the southern Gazan city of Rafah and backed President Joe Biden’s threat to withhold weapons if Israel proceeded with that operation. In 2019, prior to the recent war in Gaza, Moulton offered support for a bill that would have placed restrictions on the use of U.S. military aid to Israel.

In July 2025, Moulton said in a statement that it is “a moral imperative for the Netanyahu government to alleviate this suffering” in Gaza and that “Hamas bears primary responsibility, but Israel has the ability and the obligation to help.”

“I want Israel to succeed in defeating Hamas and bringing the hostages home. But that won’t happen if its policies undermine its own mission, and you cannot win a war against terror by allowing civilians to starve,” Moulton continued, citing his own experience serving in Iraq. He said he told the Israeli ambassador directly that “what’s happening in Gaza is unacceptable.”

Weeks after the Oct. 7 attacks, Moulton cautioned Israel against launching an operation in Gaza without a robust plan for what would come after the war.

Moulton voted against several Republican-led measures — which split the Democratic caucus — that would have tightened U.S. sanctions on Iran and limited presidential authority to waive such sanctions, as well as against sanctions on the International Criminal Court.

At the same time, he voted in favor of redesignating the Houthis as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, having previously led a letter to the Biden administration supporting such action, and was a lead co-sponsor of a bill to expand funding for a cooperative counter-tunneling program with Israel.

Moulton stopped short of the blanket condemnation that many Democrats expressed for the U.S. strikes on Iran, saying, “One of the reasons I was reticent to just immediately condemn the strikes is because anything that gets us back to the negotiating table is helpful — that’s where we need to be at the end of the day,” though he said he would not have voted to provide congressional approval for those strikes.

He subsequently accused administration officials of “outright lying about things that we just don’t know yet” for declaring shortly after the strikes that the U.S. had completely “obliterated” Iran’s key nuclear facilities.

On antisemitism, Moulton voted in favor of the Antisemitism Awareness Act, as well as for resolutions describing anti-Zionism as antisemitic, calling for college presidents to resign over their testimony to Congress on campus antisemitism and for a GOP-led resolution condemning the firebombing of a hostage advocacy rally in Boulder, Colo., which also praised Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Shortly after the Oct. 7 attacks, when a coalition of Harvard University student groups issued a statement condemning and blaming Israel for the event, Moulton, a Harvard alumnus, said that he “cannot recall a moment when I’ve been more embarrassed by my alma mater” and later condemned then-Harvard President Claudine Gay’s comments at a House hearing on antisemitism.

Both Markey and Moulton have supported expanded funding for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program to help protect Jewish and other nonprofit institutions.

As progressives have gained traction in local races across the country, Katie Wilson, a self-described socialist now mounting a formidable bid for mayor of Seattle, has increasingly drawn comparisons to Zohran Mamdani, the far-left Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City whose primary upset in June stunned the national political establishment.

Like Mamdani, a 33-year-old democratic socialist and state assemblyman, Wilson, the co-founder and executive director of Seattle’s Transit Riders Union, took political observers by surprise when she handily led the August “jungle” primary with just over 50% of the vote — defeating the moderate incumbent mayor, Bruce Harrell, by a nearly 10-point margin.

Wilson, in her early 40s, is preparing to face Harrell once again in the Nov. 4 election, where analysts say she is now well-positioned to oust the first-term mayor. Harrell has struggled not only to land on a vision that resonates with voters but to effectively articulate an argument against his upstart challenger, who has focused on a populist message of affordability that Mamdani has also championed throughout his own campaign.

But while her record of commentary on Israel and the war in Gaza is far more limited than Mamdani, who has long been an outspoken critic of the Jewish state, many Jewish leaders in Seattle are expressing concern over Wilson’s statements about the conflict amid what they describe as a lack of outreach from her campaign with just five weeks until the election.

In a handful of recent remarks, Wilson has accused Israel of genocide in Gaza — a characterization that Jewish leaders and community activists have found troubling as voter sympathy for the Jewish state, especially in the progressive Seattle area, has sharply declined.

“I am strongly opposed to the genocide in Gaza,” Wilson said in a comment posted to social media in August. “As mayor of Seattle, my ability to end the violence is limited, but I will do everything I can to end the suffering of Palestinians and guarantee the safety of Muslims, Jews, and people of all faiths and backgrounds in Seattle.”

Meanwhile, Wilson has suggested that she is “open to divestment” if Seattle “has investments that are indirectly supporting Israel’s actions,” according to an email response to a person who asked about her stances on Israel that was posted to social media in July. 

Elsewhere in the note, Wilson said that she was “familiar with the ‘end the deadly exchange’ efforts of a few years ago and think that’s something that could be done through executive action,” referring to a movement seeking to prohibit American police officers from training with Israeli law enforcement officials. The American Jewish Committee has accused the campaign of helping to fuel an antisemitic trope suggesting Israel is responsible for American police brutality.

Regina Sassoon Friedland, regional director of the American Jewish Committee’s Seattle office, echoed a range of Jewish community leaders in taking issue with Wilson’s rhetoric on Israel.

“While AJC does not endorse or oppose candidates, it should be noted that claims of genocide against Israel lack factual or legal foundation,” Friedland told Jewish Insider on Tuesday. “Not only are such accusations baseless, but they distort realities on the ground when no mention is made of Hamas, whose announced purpose is annihilating Israel.”

In addition to her comments, some Jewish community leaders say they are discouraged by Wilson’s relationships with anti-Israel activists including Kshama Sawant, a former far-left Seattle city councilmember who has faced accusations of stoking antisemitism. Wilson also claimed an endorsement from CAIR Action, a political advocacy group affiliated with the Council on American-Islamic Relations, whose executive director has drawn condemnation for praising Hamas.

A recently established political action committee called The Kids Table, which seeks to promote “pro-Jewish candidates for state and local office” in Washington state and is led by a group of Jewish millennial activists, claimed that Wilson has “allied herself with vitriolic anti-Jewish candidates” and “talked about focusing city resources on foreign affairs issues, rather than on local ones, including the urgent problem of Jewish safety and security in Seattle.”

“Time and time again we hear deep concern about Katie Wilson’s candidacy,” the group told JI of its conversations with the Jewish community, adding she did not respond to a “candidate questionnaire about antisemitism and extremism” that had been sent to her campaign and was filled out by Harrell.

Even as Wilson has only glancingly weighed in on Israel throughout the race, where strategists say it has not been a prominent issue for many voters, the broader organized Jewish community has otherwise observed a distinct absence of engagement from her campaign. 

The Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, for one, has not heard from her, several members told JI.

Scott Prange, an at-large member of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Seattle, said he was “not personally aware that Wilson has made any outreach to the Jewish community in Seattle.”

“And at a time when, especially in Seattle, antisemitism runs rampant amongst the left in the wake of post-Oct. 7 rhetoric and propaganda,” he told JI on Tuesday, “she has only fanned the flames by echoing hollow narratives about Israeli genocide in Gaza and calling for divestment of any city funds invested in Israel.”

Jack Gottesman, president of Sephardic Bikur Holim Congregation, an Orthodox synagogue in Seattle that includes around 300 families, said he “would welcome the opportunity to meet with Katie Wilson, but to date I have not seen meaningful outreach from her or her campaign to the Jewish community.”

“Jews have been part of Seattle’s fabric for well over 100 years, and it is important that candidates engage respectfully with all communities,” he told JI this week. “Her description of the situation in Gaza as a genocide was a mischaracterization. These are complex issues that demand depth, not slogans. I hope she recognizes the weight of her words.”

Wilson’s campaign did not respond to numerous interview requests from JI over several weeks.

In contrast with Wilson, Harrell, who was elected in 2021, has maintained what Jewish leaders largely called a strong voice in support of Israel and against rising antisemitic violence. Nevet Basker, a co-chair of Washingtonians for a Brighter Future, a separate pro-Israel PAC that has endorsed Harrell, said that the local Jewish community “appreciates” his “clear opposition to antisemitism.”

“We recognize the immense challenges the mayor has faced” and “applaud his commitment to ensure that all Seattle residents and visitors are safe and welcome,” Basker told JI in a statement. 

Rob Spitzer, the president of B’nai B’rith International and a vice chair of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, said Harrell “has reached out” and “is generally supported by the community,” while recalling “meetings with him and his police and security team about protecting the Jewish community and our institutions.”

The Kids Table, for its part, countered that Harrell “has failed to meet this moment of crisis for the Jewish community,” noting that “pro-Palestinian protestors blocked the interstate for six hours and weren’t cleared or charged, and ‘kill your local colonizer’ was spraypainted on statues at the mayor’s alma mater, with zero comment from his office.”

Still, the group told JI in a statement, “Wilson’s candidacy, alliances with anti-Jewish figures and organizations, and lack of engagement have many Seattle Jews very worried about the next four years.”

Harrell’s campaign also did not respond to requests from JI for an interview.

While he has sought to connect Wilson to the movement to defund the police, which she says is not her goal, Harrell has avoided commenting on her approach to Israel, underscoring the shifting political dynamics around views that until recently would likely have been seen as too extreme for the Democratic Party but have now become acceptable to many voters.

Despite concerns from Jewish community leaders, Israel “hasn’t been front and center” in the race as a “topic of discussion or debate,” Sandeep Kaushik, a political consultant in Seattle who is not involved in either campaign, told JI. 

Kaushik attributed Wilson’s unexpected rise in part to what he called the “Mamdani effect” and said she is the “front-runner,” even as he expects “the general election war is about to start” as pro-Harrell outside spending flows into the race and attacks ramp up in the final weeks.

“I think the mayor is now fighting for his political life,” Kaushik said.

Forty-seven progressive House Democrats, led by Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), signed onto a letter to President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio calling for the U.S. to recognize a Palestinian state on the heels of similar decisions by European allies last week.

“It has long been acknowledged by much of the international community and previous U.S. administrations of both major political parties that a Palestinian state recognized as a full and equal member of the community of nations is necessary to fulfill the legitimate national rights of the Palestinian people and ensure the state of Israel’s survival as the democratic homeland of the Jewish people,” the letter, which was first reported on by Jewish Insider, reads.

The lawmakers argue that because the current Israeli government opposes a two-state solution — a position currently shared by much of Israeli society — and is “actively undermin[ing]” the prospects of an independent Palestinian state, “meaningful action is necessary to join the majority of the world in codifying Palestinian statehood and to unlock the potential for a broader regional peace and security arrangement.”

Trump vowed last week week that he would not allow Israel to annex the West Bank.

The letter also claims that recognizing Palestinian statehood would make reform of the Palestinian Authority “far more achievable and sustainable.”

Signatories to the letter include Reps. Becca Balint (D-VT), Donald Beyer (D-VA), André Carson (D-IN), Greg Casar (D-TX), Joaquin Castro (D-TX), Judy Chu (D-CA), Danny Davis (D-IL), Madeleine Dean (D-PA), Diana DeGette (D-CO), Chris Deluzio (D-PA), Mark DeSaulnier (D-CA), Maxine Dexter (D-OR), Lloyd Doggett (D-TX), Veronica Escobar (D-TX), Dwight Evans (D-PA), Bill Foster (D-MA), Maxwell Frost (D-FL), John Garamendi (D-CA), Chuy García (D-IL), Sylvia Garcia (D-TX), Robert Garcia (D-CA), Al Green (D-TX), Val Hoyle (D-OR), Jared Huffman (D-CA), Jonathan Jackson (D-IL), Sara Jacobs (D-CA), Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Hank Johnson (D-GA), Marcy Kaptur (D-OH), Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), Stephen Lynch (D-MA), Betty McCollum (D-MN), James McGovern (D-CA), Chellie Pingree (D-ME), Mark Pocan (D-WI), Mike Quigley (D-IL), Emily Randall (D-WA), Mary Gay Scanlon (D-PA), Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Bennie Thompson (D-MS), Mike Thompson (D-CA), Jill Tokuda (D-HI), Paul Tonko (D-NY), Nydia Velázquez (D-NY), Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ).

Dexter and Garcia were both beneficiaries of significant outside spending from AIPAC’s United Democracy Project super PAC in their primary races, running against farther-left anti-Israel opponents.

Balint and Schakowsky are both Jewish. Davis, Evans and Schakowsky are retiring from Congress at the end of their current terms.

Many of the furthest-left lawmakers in the House, including some of the Jewish state’s most outspoken critics, did not sign onto Khanna’s letter, nor did some of the more moderate Democrats backing a concurrent effort to place strict restrictions on U.S. aid to Israel.

The letter is backed by groups including American Muslims for Palestine, DAWN, Emgage Action, Indivisible, J Street, MoveOn, MPower, Muslim Public Affairs Council, New Jewish Narrative and the Quincy Institute.

There is a notable split on this issue within the Democratic caucus: Khanna’s letter follows a letter from 30 moderate pro-Israel Democrats condemning unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state as “performative” and saying that doing so risks “emboldening Hamas, entrenching division, and undermining the very legitimacy and peace such recognition purports to advance.”

Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), a progressive stalwart and a longtime Democratic pillar on the House Judiciary Committee, announced his retirement Sunday evening, opening up a recently redrawn Manhattan district that the congressman has held for over three decades.

Nadler, whose district has one of the largest Jewish constituencies in the country, has long positioned himself as a progressive pro-Israel advocate, even as he broke with the organized Jewish community on some issues — most notably his support for former President Obama’s Iran nuclear agreement in 2015.

But in recent months, he has emerged as being at odds with the New York Jewish community on some high-profile issues. Even as most of the leading New York state Democratic voices have held back any endorsement of far-left New York City Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani, Nadler was one of the first House Democrats to offer the anti-Israel candidate his support — and has worked to secure support from a deeply skeptical Jewish community towards Mamdani. 

Nadler has also lately become a sharp critic of the Jewish state, in contrast to his pro-Israel Jewish Democratic colleagues from his home state. In a New York Times interview announcing his departure, he accused Israel of committing mass murder and war crimes in Gaza “without question.” He told the paper that when he returns to Congress, he will support legislation withholding offensive military aid to Israel, joining a growing roster of progressive Democrats in doing so — a move that could give cover for other colleagues to follow suit. 

During Donald Trump’s presidency, Nadler saw his national profile grow when he led the first House impeachment hearings against the president as Judiciary Committee chairman, sharing the spotlight with then-Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA). He came across as a partisan fighter during the process, and played a much more low-profile role during Trump’s second impeachment.

The impeachment fights enhanced his political profile in his solidly liberal district, helping prepare him for a heated primary in 2022 against a longtime colleague, former Rep. Carolyn Maloney, after redistricting put the two Democrats in the same district. Despite the contentious campaign, Nadler comfortably prevailed by 31 points.

And while there are plenty of ambitious New York City Democrats that could run to succeed Nadler, the congressman told the New York Times that he plans to support state Assemblyman Micah Lasher, a former aide, who represents parts of the upper West Side in the state legislature. 

Former New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer, who unsuccessfully ran for mayor this year, is also from Nadler’s district and could decide to run for Nadler’s seat. 

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is slated to appear with Graham Platner, a Democrat running to unseat Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), at a rally in Portland, Maine, on Labor Day, as the progressive leader from Vermont steps up his efforts to boost left-wing candidates who have been outspoken in their criticism of Israel and its ongoing war in Gaza.

Platner, a first-time candidate and Marine veteran who launched his campaign last week, has accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza and backed Sanders’ recent resolutions to block arms sales to Israel. Platner’s rhetoric has faced criticism from Collins, a moderate Republican seeking her sixth term.

Sanders, who announced the rally on Monday, has not officially endorsed Platner, a 40-year-old oyster farmer whose past social media activity indicates he is a longtime admirer of Vermont’s democratic socialist senator. 

The Portland event on Sept. 1, the next stop on Sanders’ nationwide “Fighting Oligarchy” tour, follows a rally in Michigan on Saturday at which the senator sought to boost Abdul El-Sayed, a staunch critic of Israel who is vying to replace retiring Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI) in a crowded primary next year. 

In remarks over the weekend, Sanders, an early backer of El-Sayed’s campaign for the Democratic nomination, highlighted his efforts to restrict U.S. military aid to Israel and spoke out against the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, claiming that Washington is “way out of touch with where the American people are” on what he called “clearly a moral issue.”

“We are paying for the starvation of children in Gaza,” Sanders said to the crowd gathered at the Miller Auditorium at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo. 

El-Sayed, for his part, echoed those remarks, saying that party leadership “is still pulling its punch on the fact that we are subsidizing a genocide in Gaza.”

“Maybe we should be using our taxpayer dollars, I don’t know, to build schools for our kids, rather than sending blank checks to foreign militaries who drop bombs on other kids,” El-Sayed said in his speech last weekend.

El-Sayed, a former health director in Michigan, is facing progressive state Sen. Mallory McMorrow and Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI), a leading pro-Israel voice in the House who is favored by party leaders.

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), one of the most visible and well-known progressive Jewish lawmakers in Congress, last week became a cosponsor of the “Block the Bombs Act,” a bill led by far-left lawmakers that aims to severely restrict U.S. aid to Israel.

The bill would impose unprecedented new conditions on weapons sales or transfers to Israel, requiring specific congressional authorization for each individual transfer of various weapons systems, and would require Congress to identify specific purposes for which those weapons would be used. 

Critics say that it would effectively constitute an arms embargo for the key weapons in question.

Raskin has not issued any statement on his support for the bill, which aligns him with some of the most anti-Israel members of the House. Currently, 32 other lawmakers are cosponsoring the legislation, but Raskin, the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, is among the most recognizable sponsors.

Three other progressive Jewish House members, Reps. Sara Jacobs (D-CA), Becca Balint (D-VT) and Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) are also backing the bill.

Raskin’s suburban Maryland district has a sizable Jewish population.

Raskin’s support for the bill adds to a growing record of similar positions since the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel, including voting against supplemental aid to Israel last year and signing onto a letter calling for the U.S. to withhold offensive arms transfers to Israel after a 2024 strike that killed World Central Kitchen aid workers.

He also joined a letter accusing Israel of violating U.S. arms sales law, which would require the U.S. to cut off aid, and another one arguing that Israeli operations in Rafah would violate U.S. arms sales policy.

In addition, Raskin led an effort to restore U.S. funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency.

The Maryland Congressman called for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas on Nov. 17, 2023.

Raskin also flipped earlier this year against the Antisemitism Awareness Act, after supporting it last year, calling it part of “Trump’s transparent moves to undermine American democracy under the banner of opposing antisemitism.” The legislation predates Trump’s time in office.

He was a vocal defender of Columbia University protest leader Mahmoud Khalil, co-leading a letter which made no mention of Khalil’s alleged involvement with antisemitic and pro-Hamas activity.

At the same time, Raskin has continued to speak out against antisemitism and for the release of the hostages in Gaza.

Effie Phillips-Staley, running on a progressive platform in the crowded Democratic field looking to unseat Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) in a swing congressional district, is taking a firm stance against the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran’s nuclear program, even as she has expressed concern about Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

“For the leader of the free world to decide to strike Iran based on Fox News coverage and without deliberation or the approval of Congress is alarming and unprecedented,” she said in a statement to Jewish Insider on Monday, a position shared by many congressional Democrats. “We cannot have a nuclear armed Iran under any circumstances and Congress must hold this President accountable by upholding the War Powers Act and requiring a full diplomatic process.”

She also expressed concern in a statement following the initial Israeli strikes on Iran.

“I do not support a nuclear Iran under any circumstances and understand Israel must preserve its security as it faces near constant threat of attacks. I am also deeply troubled at the rush to war, especially as diplomacy was underway,” Phillips-Staley said. “It is not lost on me that Trump’s decision to carelessly destroy the JCPOA in his first term has now put the lives of countless people, including Israelis and Americans, at risk. Diplomacy must be given a chance. We must prioritize the safety of innocent civilians, American personnel and peace.”

Phillips-Staley, a Tarrytown, N.Y., village trustee who has made her career in the nonprofit world focused on issues including the Hispanic community, public schools and art, told JI in an interview last month that she sees an open lane in the race for an unabashed progressive.

“I looked at the field and felt strongly that there was a space for a progressive candidate in this field, and so I decided to enter,” she said.

She’s leaning on that progressive positioning to distinguish her from a field of nearly 10 Democrats, many of whom are staking out broadly moderate or center-left platforms. Despite her criticisms of the Iran strikes, Phillips-Staley has otherwise not embraced elements of the left-wing policy agenda that have alienated Jewish voters.

Phillips-Staley said she wanted to be “very clear that the U.S. has to continue to be a critical ally to Israel,” emphasizing that Israel remains under threat and “does, of course, have a right to exist and should continue to exist.” 

She indicated that she would oppose additional conditions or restrictions on U.S. aid to the Jewish state, which she emphasized is critical to keeping Israel safe from existential threats.

But Phillips-Staley criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom she said had “repeatedly undermined” a two-state solution, while adding that Hamas cannot continue to rule Gaza.

She said she wants to see Congress work to “create incentives to find a peaceful resolution,” but emphasized that the hostages must first be released. Phillips-Staley said that her family’s El Salvadorian background helps her understand the damage that a “cycle of violence can do” and how difficult it can be to interrupt.

She described the Abraham Accords as a framework that could be built upon for Israeli-Palestinian peace.

Speaking to JI in the aftermath of the antisemitic attacks in Washington and Boulder, Colo., Phillips-Staley called rising antisemitism nationwide “deeply, deeply troubling and appalling.” She suggested that brokering Israeli-Palestinian peace would help tamp down on antisemitism domestically.

“Apart from what everybody says — ‘we need more education, we need to come together more’ — I think we really have to work very hard to find a resolution to the conflict between Israel and Palestine,” Phillips-Staley said. “Peace creates peace. And the terrifying thing is … what is spilling from that unresolved conflict is now making Jews in America under threat even more, which is entirely unacceptable.”

She said the U.S. also needs to crack down on acts of violence and provide more resources to address antisemitism in the country.

Asked about the increase of domestic antisemitism predating the war in Gaza, Phillips-Staley criticized the first Trump administration, saying it had enabled and emboldened a range of unacceptable behavior, including white nationalism.

She expressed hope that a new Congress and subsequently a new presidential administration could help to reverse those trends. 

Citing her own immigrant family background, she also criticized the Trump administration for implementing immigration restrictions in the name of combating antisemitism, explaining, “anything that creates wedges, that undermines the openness of people coming together, I question as effective.”

Phillips-Staley told JI she’s running for Congress to continue what she characterized as a lifetime of service in the nonprofit sector and, later, public office. She added that as the daughter of an immigrant from El Salvador, she has close ties to the Lower Hudson Valley district’s Hispanic and immigrant communities. She said those communities had urged her to run for higher office.

She currently lags behind many of the other candidates in the 17th District race in fundraising, though she entered the race more recently than several other competitors. In the first six weeks of her campaign she only raised $52,000, loaning her campaign an additional $100,000. She ended the third quarter with $103,000 on hand.

“Effie’s campaign is people-powered and grassroots,” campaign spokesperson John Tomlin said in a statement. “She does not come to the table with a list of corporations, ultra-rich and Washington establishment figures to seed her operation. We have an active campaign and we are on target with our goals.”

Rockland County Legislator Beth Davidson said she raised $350,000 in the past quarter and $850,000 since the start of her campaign, while national security veteran Cait Conley reported raising $472,000 in the second quarter and more than $800,000 since launching her campaign,  and nonprofit leader Jessica Reinmann raised $311,000 in the first quarter, $100,000 of that self-funded.

Phillips-Staley argued that her lived experience as a Hispanic person from a working-class background, who put herself through college and worked her way up from a receptionist to executive director of a nonprofit, makes her fairly unique among political candidates and leaders. 

Her key issues as a member of Congress, she said, will be affordability, particularly in housing, and protecting government services that help Americans succeed. She said she’s proud of the work she’s done on issues like infrastructure and zoning in her role in local government.

Among the more surprising cheerleaders for President Donald Trump’s diplomacy with Iran were several progressive foreign policy analysts who had advised former President Barack Obama and former Vice President Kamala Harris. 

Now, many of those same voices — including Phil Gordon, Harris’ national security advisor who would likely have stayed in the role if she had been elected president last year — are expressing skepticism about Israel’s preemptive strikes on Iranian military and nuclear sites, and urging Trump to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cool it.

“I would have found it too risky to initiate military force with all that that could unleash,” Gordon told Jewish Insider on Friday. His approach would have been “to try to get an enduring, diplomatically-negotiated nuclear arrangement that prevented Iran from being able to get a nuclear weapon.” 

If he were advising Harris, or another Democratic president, Gordon would’ve wanted “to try to get that accomplished without having used this military action,” he said. 

Gordon also argued that Trump was manipulated into supporting Israel’s strikes by Netanyahu, even as Trump celebrated Israel’s killing of Iranian hardliners, noting that several of Trump’s senior advisors have urged restraint rather than intervention.

“His supporters did not put him in place to get involved in the conflict in the Middle East,” Gordon said. “A lot of his advisors … served in Iraq or are against U.S. military interventions in the Middle East. We know where Vance is in terms of intervention. The Tucker Carlson view, Don Jr. I think Trump really wanted to avoid military conflict and negotiate a deal and be the guy who got a better deal than Obama.” 

Ilan Goldenberg, who served as an Iran advisor at the Pentagon in the Obama administration and who advised Harris on Middle East issues during her 2024 campaign, told JI that Trump should try to encourage parties in the region to tone it down. 

“I think the appropriate position for the United States to be in now is the role of de-escalator,” said Goldenberg, now the senior vice president and chief policy officer at J Street. “The better option, the less risky option that had more good outcomes, was the diplomatic option. Unfortunately, it’s not the way it went. So now we have to see.” 

J Street released a statement on Friday calling for an end to the “cycle of retaliation and escalation,” and for a return to diplomacy between the U.S. and Iran. 

Both Gordon and Goldenberg questioned Israel’s end game in the strikes, which killed several senior Iranian military leaders and destroyed an above-ground uranium enrichment site at Natanz. 

“It definitely has set back the timetable for Iran’s nuclear capacity, but it hasn’t eliminated it, and we also don’t know what happens in terms of retaliation. We’d like to think and hope that Iran has been deterred and won’t respond in a way that we can’t handle,” Gordon said. “So far, so good, but we’re only on the first day, so there were real risks of doing it this way. And that’s why I would have sought, if at all possible, to do it a different way.” 

Goldenberg, who said the most important next step in stopping the violence is for the U.S. to help Israel defend against Iran’s retaliation, said he is unsure whether the Israeli success will turn into a long-term victory.

“The Israelis are incredibly good operationally, but they have challenges sometimes translating that into a strategic kind of sustainable victory, as opposed to just continuing to fight,” said Goldenberg. “What’s the end state here? What are you trying to do? Or is the objective to just be in constant conflict?”

Still, even as they said a return to diplomacy is the best way to move forward, both Gordon and Goldenberg acknowledged that Israel’s Friday attack on Iran had so far gone well for Israel.

“It is a remarkable display of Israeli military and intelligence capabilities,” said Gordon. 

“I think in the immediate [term], it had a lot of success. Very impressive operationally,” Goldenberg noted. 

Trump said in Truth Social posts on Friday that Iran could have a “second chance” at a deal, and that they should return to the negotiating table “before there is nothing left.” 

Goldenberg agrees — and he thinks Israel needs to hear from Trump that they can’t attack Iran forever.

“Make clear to the Iranians that there’s still a deal on the table. We’re willing to negotiate,” Goldenberg said. “And at the same time, make clear to the Israelis, there are limits to this. We can’t see this get out of control.”

Corey O’Connor prevailed in his bid to oust Mayor Ed Gainey of Pittsburgh in the Democratic primary on Tuesday, dealing a major blow to the activist left in a city where progressives had until recently been ascendant.

O’Connor, the Allegheny County controller and a centrist challenger, defeated Gainey, the first-term incumbent aligned with the far left, by a significant six-point margin, 53-47%, on Tuesday evening with most of the vote counted.

“We built this campaign with and for the people of this city, neighborhood by neighborhood,” O’Connor said in a social media post on Tuesday night. “I’m proud to be your Democratic nominee for Mayor. I’m ready to get to work, and I’m grateful to have you with me as we take the next steps forward, together.”

The primary, which drew national attention in the final weeks, grew increasingly acrimonious — featuring particularly sharp divisions over Israel as well as antisemitism that served as a prelude for the sort of intra-Democratic clashes poised to emerge in several races for federal office next year.

During his tenure, Gainey, who had likewise unseated an incumbent when he was elected as Pittsburgh’s first Black mayor four years ago, drew frequent criticism from the city’s Jewish leaders over his alleged lack of outreach and for a record of offensive commentary on Israel’s war in Gaza, among other issues.

O’Connor, for his part, touted his long-standing ties to Pittsburgh’s sizable and politically active Jewish community, while reiterating his support for Israel and condemning rising antisemitism during the campaign.

Previously, O’Connor, the son of a former mayor of Pittsburgh, served on the City Council representing the heavily Jewish neighborhood of Squirrel Hill — where he was also raised.

O’Connor will face Tony Moreno, the Republican nominee, in the November election, but the race is not expected to be competitive as Pittsburgh is a heavily Democratic city.

Before the pandemic, Mark Levine, a Democratic New York City councilmember who represents Upper Manhattan, was widely viewed as an ambitious lawmaker with a strong progressive bent. Beginning in 2014, his first year in office, Levine helped revitalize the council’s Jewish caucus into an activist vessel focused on matters impacting the Jewish community and beyond, while sponsoring historic legislation guaranteeing free legal representation for low-income tenants facing eviction.

But over the past year, Levine’s profile has risen dramatically as he has become one of New York’s most trusted public health resources on all matters COVID-19 — an unlikely role for the councilmember, who chairs the city’s health committee but has no experience in medicine. When the pandemic tore through New York last March, however, Levine emerged as an early, outspoken and sobering voice of reason, urging caution, championing science and, when appropriate, dispensing nuggets of restrained optimism from his widely followed Twitter feed — earning praise from one colleague as “the Anthony Fauci of the New York City Council.”

As the vaccine rollout continues apace, Levine’s social media presence has transformed into a veritable catalogue of available appointments as he seeks to ensure that residents across communities — particularly those that are underserved — schedule a time to get the shot.

“His platform has become one of the most important to follow for up-to-date information around vaccine access,” said Dara Kass, an associate clinical professor of emergency medicine at Columbia University Medical Center, lauding the councilmember’s steadfast effort to publicize city resources while advocating for real-time change when certain approaches proved ineffective. “I have seen him absolutely shine as a leader through this pandemic.”

David Greenfield, the Met Council CEO who worked closely with Levine during his time as a city councilmember from 2010 to 2017, said his former colleague “has attracted a citywide following” thanks to his work during the pandemic. “That has made him tremendously popular even outside of Manhattan.”

That reputation will no doubt serve Levine well as he now competes in the Democratic primary for Manhattan borough president, which will be held on June 22. While there is no public polling on the race, Levine is one of the most recognizable candidates in a crowded field that includes fellow Councilmember Ben Kallos, New York State Senator Brad Hoylman and former congressional candidate Lindsey Boylan. 

“I’m going to be a public health warrior for the rest of my life,” Levine said in a recent interview with Jewish Insider. “As borough president, I will fight really hard for a full and just recovery from this pandemic.”

The 51-year-old councilmember announced his candidacy in January of 2020, just before the first confirmed coronavirus case was documented in New York, and has since raked in endorsements from a number of prominent city figures, including City Comptroller Scott Stringer, who is now running for mayor, Rep. Adriano Espaillat (D-NY), former Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) and former City Council speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito.

Mark Levine

Though Levine was initially somewhat cavalier about the emerging pandemic, denouncing COVID-19 “fear mongering” in an early-February Twitter message featuring photos of an appearance at the crowded Lunar New Year Parade in Chinatown, his rhetoric shifted significantly when he and his wife, Ivelisse Suarez, contracted the virus. “It undoubtedly makes it more real and gives me authority to say that this is anything but just like the flu,” he said. “I see my role, as standing up for science, for equity, for compassion.”

As he takes stock of the pandemic, which has claimed tens of thousands of lives and shuttered untold numbers of small businesses in New York, Levine sees an opportunity in the wake of such devastation to advance sweeping change. Recovery, he argues, will need to address the glaring inequalities laid bare by the virus. He calls for “unprecedented investment” in universal healthcare as well as an expansion of the city’s parks system and renewed investment in mom-and-pop stores and the arts. “I’m running for borough president to take on the fight for our comeback,” he said.

Whether he will be in a position to enact such priorities as Manhattan borough president, a role that is largely viewed as ceremonial, depends on how effectively he can wield the limited number of responsibilities that fall under his purview. Levine, for his part, believes he’s up to the task. “I think the office is incredibly important, now more than ever, to lay out a bold agenda for this borough, and to use the many levers of the office to enact it,” he said, citing his ability to introduce legislation, appoint community board members and make recommendations around zoning, land use and preservation.

“What it really all adds up to is a very powerful platform for organizing, and this is how I’ve led in the council,” Levine asserted. “As one member in a body of 51, I don’t have absolute power, but we enacted right to counsel for tenants, really historic legislation, because I led a three-year organizing campaign. I think that my record as chair of the Jewish caucus proves that I can take on a role that has been seen as ceremonial and use it to organize for impact.”

Greenfield backed up that view. “I would say that he has tremendously impressive organizing skills,” the Met Council CEO said of Levine. “He really has a unique ability to bring people together, and his reign as the chair of the Jewish caucus was a very inclusive one where everybody, regardless of their background, felt welcome.”

Throughout his four years leading the caucus, Levine worked to address Jewish poverty, foster intergroup relations with other minority communities and raise awareness around antisemitism, which he personally experienced during his campaigns for City Council in 2013 and 2017. He also visited Israel on a delegation of council members. “We came under attack for that,” Levine recalled. “There’s a real double standard. There’s been delegation trips to Russia and Turkey and China that led to not a peep of protest. But our trip to Israel certainly, unfortunately, did.”

Over the summer, Levine spoke out against a questionnaire distributed by the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America asking that local candidates pledge not to visit Israel if elected. “I think it would be absurd to say that I couldn’t travel to visit my cousins,” said Levine, who has family in Israel and is fluent in Hebrew. He began learning the language in his 20s after visiting the Jewish state a number of times, and views it as “a central part” of his Jewish identity.

Mark Levine

Yiddish is on his to-do-list. “I wish I knew more,” he told JI. “The pandemic disrupted it.” Still, Levine said he has been working with a group of activist parents to create a dual-language Yiddish public school program as part of what he describes as his passion for dual-language education. “I fight hard for government communication to be more available in Yiddish,” Levine said, charging that the city’s failure to develop strong ties with Orthodox communities in New York “really hampered the public health effort” during the pandemic.

The Orthodox community has been “scapegoated in often ugly, vicious terms” throughout the course of the virus, Levine said. “I remember last March being asked by a reporter whether I thought there was something unique about Jewish ritual that makes us more vulnerable to the coronavirus,” he added. “So I’ve been outspoken about both the need for the city to be better about building ties to the community and pushing back against the kind of vicious scapegoating that has been an unfortunate feature of the last year.”

The Chicago-born politician, who grew up in Maryland, lives in Washington Heights with his wife and two sons, and attends Hebrew Tabernacle Congregation, a Reform synagogue. He first ran for City Council in 2001 and was long active in local Democratic politics before he assumed office seven years ago. “A phrase which motivates me every day when I get out of bed to do this work is tzedek tzedek tirdof,” Levine said, referring to a line from Deuteronomy that translates to “Justice, justice you shall pursue.” 

“It’s the pursuit of justice,” he said, “which our sages have taught us is such an essential value.”

“He’s not afraid to stand up for the Jewish community and for Israel,” said Greenfield. “I think that positions him well not just for Manhattan borough president but for future citywide office.”

But as Levine prepares for the June election, he swats away any speculation of that kind, even as his newfound status as a de facto public health ambassador has likely introduced him to a number of voters who were unaware of him before the pandemic. “I’ve got my hands full with this race, and being borough president would be a dream job,” he said. “So no plans beyond that.”

He is also, of course, still busy raising awareness about the virus — a job he envisions folding into the borough presidency in one form or another if he is elected. “These are going to still be urgent matters come January 2022,”  said Levine, who is hopeful that the city will soon emerge from dormancy as New Yorkers get vaccinated. Still, “it will be, undoubtedly, a main focus for me as borough president for years.”

“It’s been a year-long fight, and I have seen clear communication as just a pillar of the public health response,” he told JI. “This fight is not over.”

Liz Crotty, one of eight Democratic candidates running for Manhattan district attorney, occupies something of a rarefied lane: She is the only avowed centrist in a field crowded with progressives who have pledged to reshape the office in dramatic fashion.

While some candidates brandish do-not-prosecute lists, Crotty argues that it is not in the job description to decide which crimes should be ignored. Where many of her opponents emphasize the need for increased police accountability, Crotty calls for more cops on the subways as well as a renewed focus on law and order. And while Crotty believes that “restorative justice” is in some cases a viable alternative to incarceration, she is not nearly as gung-ho about the concept as several others in the race.

“I thought that there was a real voice missing in this race as someone who’s a 21-year practitioner on both sides of the courtroom and really standing up for the good things that the DA’s office does,” Crotty, a former assistant district attorney who now practices criminal defense law, said in a recent interview with Jewish Insider. “I really saw a lack of a voice for the everyday, ordinary New Yorker who wants to ride the train and feel safe.”

Lest she be branded as a conservative in overwhelmingly blue Manhattan, Crotty, 50, was quick to make clear that she is “a lifelong liberal Democrat” and that she wears that designation as “a badge of honor,” while cheekily adding: “The only time I voted Republican was not for [New York City Mayor Bill] de Blasio, so that’s the kind of Democrat I am.” 

Whether Crotty prevails in the upcoming election will, in several respects, function as a barometer of voters’ priorities for the next district attorney, who is poised to lead one of the most high-profile prosecutors’ offices in the country. Last year’s widespread protests against systemic racism — many of them in Manhattan — sparked a nationwide reckoning over criminal justice reform at the same time that violent crime spiked across New York City.

The recent DA race in Los Angeles may function as something of an early test case for how Manhattanites will weigh such concerns. In November, George Gascón, the godfather of the so-called progressive prosecutor’s movement, unseated the incumbent Democrat, Jackie Lacey, after she was targeted by Black Lives Matter activists for her failure to prosecute police officers.

In the Manhattan race, however, candidates have no incumbent to compete against as Cyrus Vance, Jr., prepares to step down at the end of the year after more than a decade in office. Not that he has avoided criticism from many candidates in the race, thanks in part to his decision not to pursue investigations into powerful New York figures like Harvey Weinstein and former President Donald Trump’s children.

The June primary includes a diverse field of candidates, including former federal prosecutors Tali Farhadian Weinstein and Alvin Bragg, former district attorneys Diana Florence and Lucy Lang, former public defender Eliza Orlins, state Assemblyman Dan Quart and civil rights attorney Tahanie Aboushi. 

Crotty, for her part, isn’t eager to praise the outgoing DA. But even as her views are, in many respects, out of step with her opponents, she believes she is walking a path Manhattanites will appreciate. 

“A lot of people in this race are speaking to a national, progressive platform, and not a localized, ‘what is going on here in Manhattan’ platform,” she said. “All politics are local, and I think they should speak to the problems that we’re seeing in New York — especially, since COVID, crime has risen, and I think we have to really speak to it. Being honest about what we’re seeing and what’s going on is more important than a political point of view.”

A New York native, Crotty attended Fordham University School of Law and then went on to serve as an assistant district attorney under Robert Morgenthau, whose emphasis on prosecuting white-collar criminals she vows to revive. 

After six years, she left the office to work at Kreindler & Kreindler, an aviation law firm in New York, and then started her own boutique criminal law practice, Crotty Saland PC, with Jeremy Saland, a former fellow assistant district attorney.

“There is no candidate that has done what she has, both served as a Manhattan prosecutor and been in the trenches on the other side as a defense attorney in the courts,” Saland said of his partner in an interview with JI. “I know Liz as somebody who is not just prone to getting along nor is she prone to some gimmicky slogans about justice. She’s done it, she’ll do it and she’ll believe what is right not just based on her own gut but based on facts, based on realities.”

Crotty takes a measured approach to many of the hot topics in the race. She rejects calls to defund the police, for instance, while pointing out that it also isn’t within the district attorney’s purview to implement such changes. “The police play a vital role in the running of New York City,” she said. “Now, can the police do a better job? Sure, who couldn’t?”

“Police need to be trained longer and better and paid more, and I think that that’s what we need to be working on,” she added. “They are a stakeholder in the criminal justice system because they make arrests and then we decide what — or not — to prosecute from there. But it starts with an arrest. So I’m not willing to give up on the idea that police can do better.”

As for whether she will seek fewer prosecutions on, for example, drug possession, as some candidates have promised, Crotty was consistent. 

“The legislature is the one who decides what laws there should be and should not be, and as a constituent, I’m very happy they legalized marijuana,” she said, adding her belief that misdemeanors shouldn’t always lead to a criminal record or jail time. “But I think you definitely have to hold people accountable.”

That view applies to hate crimes, which have recently seen an uptick in New York. Though Crotty sees an upside to restorative justice, which seeks a form of mediation between victim and offender, “part and parcel of restorative justice is the defendant understanding that they did something wrong,” Crotty told JI. 

“I think a lot of hate crimes, some of them do come from ignorance, and I think you have to look to education,” she said. “But I think you have to really say, ‘Listen, we’re going to hold people accountable, especially in hate crimes, and especially in antisemitism.’”

But above all, Crotty vowed to prosecute violent crime in Manhattan, an approach she says she wouldn’t necessarily have prioritized if she were running for the office a year or two ago. 

“The 2019 platform for district attorney is way different than the 2021 platform for district attorney because crime has shifted,” she said, “and I think we have to be responsive to that.”

She believes reducing crime will take a multi-faceted approach that goes beyond the DA’s jurisdiction. “What is the mayor’s next plan for homelessness, for mental health services?” she said. “These are the things that are going to drive whether or not people get arrested.”

Ultimately, Crotty is confident her message will resonate because of her status as the race’s only self-identifying moderate. “The everyday, average New Yorker wants safety, and I think that I’m the candidate who’s been talking about it from the beginning, and I’ve never wavered,” Crotty said. “It’s not like we can’t be fair, and it’s not that the district attorney’s office can’t do better. But I understand that public safety in every neighborhood should be the priority of the next DA.”

“I’m actually running to prosecute crimes.”

Freshman Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) cautioned about the rise of antisemitism in progressive politics during a wide-ranging conversation in the inaugural episode of Jewish Insider’s “Limited Liability Podcast,” hosted by Rich Goldberg and Jarrod Bernstein.

Torres, who describes himself as “the embodiment of a pro-Israel progressive,” said he is mindful of anti-Israel elements within the Democratic Party that have the ability to turn antisemitic. “We have an obligation to combat antisemitism no matter where it emerges, whether it’s from the right, from the left. It has to be fought at every turn and in every form,” he said. 

“My concern is that the pro-BDS left could be to the Democratic Party in American politics what Jeremy Corbyn has been to the Labour Party in British politics,” Torres cautioned. “It only takes a few demagogues to pump antisemitic poison into the bloodstream of a political party. And so I see it as my mission to resist the Jeremy Corbynization of progressive politics in the United States.”

Torres, a freshman representing New York’s 15th congressional district, addressed his hard-fought primary victory, which pitted him against a diverse group of Democratic candidates, from the conservative Rubén Díaz, Sr. to Democratic socialist Samelys López, who had the backing of high-profile progressive leaders and groups.

“New York City has become ground zero for Democratic socialism. In the latest election cycle, the [Democratic Socialists of America] won every single race in which it endorsed, except mine,” noted Torres, who on Thursday endorsed New York City mayoral candidate Andrew Yang.

“I had powerful forces arrayed against me — I had Bernie Sanders, [Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez], the [Working Families Party], the DSA, all endorsed Samelys López against me. And not only did I win, but I won decisively,” Torres said of his primary victory. “And I sent a powerful message that you can run as a pro-Israel, pragmatic progressive without catering to the extremes and you can win decisively in a place like the South Bronx.”

“Limited Liability Podcast” is a new weekly podcast for readers of Jewish Insider. Hear from the key players generating buzz and making headlines in conversation with two top political operatives, Jarrod Bernstein and Rich Goldberg. One Democrat, one Republican. Both hosts have extensive experience in the political arena and a deep rolodex to match. It’s Jewish Insider’s Daily Kickoff brought to life.

In his 13 re-election bids since joining Congress in 1992, Representative Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) has yet to face a viable challenger. But next year Nadler, who now serves as chair of the influential House Judiciary Committee, will face at least one Democratic primary opponent who is garnering significant attention and resources in her quest to replace the 72-year-old incumbent and represent New York’s 10th congressional district. 

Lindsey Boylan, who raised $264,657 in the last quarter, served as an economic development advisor for New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. Despite her background, she doesn’t expect the establishment to support her candidacy against the veteran congressman. “I went into this knowing I was doing it, and I’m doing this because of what I believe we need. No one is coming in to make this happen for me and that’s just the way I want it,” Boylan said in a recent interview with Jewish Insider in midtown Manhattan. 

Boylan orderly outlined the issues she feels people in the district most care about, including housing, climate change and infrastructure. But what makes her confident voters in the district would oust a sitting representative who beat his last primary challenger by nearly 80 percentage points? After all, constituents are now seeing Nadler rise to the top ranks in House leadership and becoming a leading voice in making the case against President Donald Trump. 

Boylan disagreed with the premise. “I respect his career,” she said. “What I would say is that in almost 30 years, he’s gotten three pieces of his own legislation enacted. Two of those were ceremonial. And I think when we talk of actually producing legislation, putting forth ideas that garner support and change the conversation, that’s just not something we’ve seen from him. We haven’t seen solutions to the problems we have.” 

Boylan also largely dismissed Nadler’s role as chair of the Judiciary Committee: “I think as we’ve seen recently, the agenda of the Judiciary is driven by the Speaker of the House. If we talk about the interests of the district, there’s nothing on the judiciary committee that gets specific policy funded. And I think one of the things we’re seeing is that what you have to do to become part of the establishment leadership isn’t necessarily listening to the interests of your district.” 

Boylan also thinks Nadler is “kicking the can down the road” and “politicizing” the issue of impeaching the president, rather than moving forward. “My view and the views of the people I’ve spoken with — who are supportive of impeachment in the district — really feel that we need to hold the president accountable for both rhetoric and substantive matters,” she said. “I think that [Nadler] has completely mishandled this. He has made, in many ways, what should not be a political process, a completely politicized issue. We should have been on this road months ago.” 

Boylan firmly believes voters will express their dissatisfaction with the way Nadler has been handling the issue when they enter the ballot booth. “We just heard Congressman Nadler say that this moment is reminiscent of the 1930s in Germany… that’s a pretty big statement to just put out there and do nothing about, if you really believe that.” 

Defining herself as a progressive woman, Boylan draws a clear line between her progressive bona fides and her views on Israel and national security. She sees Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) — who unseated a 10-term incumbent, Rep. Michael Capuano, in a surprise upset in 2018 — as her model. Unlike the other three members of “The Squad” — Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) — Pressley voted in favor of the recent House anti-BDS resolution.

As a supporter of Israel, Boylan says she approves of the anti-BDS resolution that recently passed with overwhelming support: “Boycotting Israel is both unproductive and unfair, at best.”

While Pressley has been promoting herself as part of The Squad, Boylan doesn’t see herself as part of any such group. “I was always way too nerdy to be a part of any kind of school,” Boylan quipped. “So the only squad I feel like I get to be part of is the one with my daughter and my husband, and my parents who moved across the country to be my treasurers.” 

According to Boylan, people across the 10th district have an interest in foreign policy — and she has a very personal connection to Israel. “I had the opportunity when I worked for the governor to do all of the policy work for the economics side of his trade mission trips to Israel,” she explained. “And that was tremendous fun because — whether we’re talking about water resource management, or technology, or life sciences — Israel is a leader in so many things in terms of innovation, that’s a topic that is of great interest.” 

Boylan recently visited Israel with her family to attend a bat mitzvah celebration for the daughter of a close friend. “It was magical,” she said of the weeklong trip. “It was the most magical trip I’ve ever been on. We went to Masada. We took so many tours of the Old City.”

Boylan said she has “a friend who’s in the intelligence community and is based in Jerusalem. He gave me a tour the Old City of Jerusalem and you see the security concerns. You see very real examples of how complicated and important security is for Israel. I’m someone who has an unshakeable support for Israel. I believe in a two-state solution, which I think is at the moment very complicated. As the daughter of a marine, as someone who’s been to Jerusalem, as someone who has an interest in long-[term] support for Israel and also a future that Palestinians can be proud of, it’s really important to me to focus on and also listen to the people in my district.” 

As the interview wrapped up, Boylan shared with JI her favorite Jewish pastry: “Sufganiyot — the jelly-filled ones.”