Pro-Israel groups skip Ilhan Omar’s race after recent push to oust Progressives

After millions in funding from pro-Israel donors helped bring about the defeat of two members of the “Squad,” the far-left contingent of Democrats, some activists said the third target was clear.

“Yes, the removal of Ilhan Omar from Congress is possible,” read a Wednesday social media post about the Minnesota Democratic congresswoman from the account StopAntisemitism. The post featured Omar’s photo alongside those of the two members of the Squad, Reps. Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush, ousted in primaries this year. “Will this be the trifecta we’re all waiting for?”

The answer to that question is no, say the leading pro-Israel PACs. While pro-Israel activists may feel that the time is ripe for a third Squad defeat, pro-Israel money has not lined up in large amounts behind Omar’s opponent, Don Samuels, and they do not expect her to lose in her primary on this coming Tuesday. 

That may feel counterintuitive. Omar, the Minnesota Democratic congresswoman, is a villain for many Israel supporters, and two years ago, Samuels came within two percentage points of unseating her. But a pro-Israel strategist pointed to polls and the course of the race this year to argue that hopes of defeating Omar are unrealistic. 

“He’s a great pro-Israel guy and she’s terrible, but she’s doing a real campaign and has for a long time,” said the strategist, who asked not to be named in order to insulate the Samuels campaign from any damage. “We did not see it as a race in which we could make a difference.”

Patrick Dorton, a spokesman for the United Democracy Project, a political action committee affiliated with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee that poured millions into the Bowman and Bush primaries, confirmed that the PAC was not involved in Omar’s race but would not elaborate. AIPAC PAC, which is also associated with the lobby, and Democratic Majority for Israel, another pro-Israel PAC involved in targeting Bowman and Bush, likewise would not explain why they were ignoring Samuels this time around.

Not enough to get the result

In 2022, pro-Israel givers rued not noticing earlier how well Samuels was doing. UDP dumped $350,000 in the race in its last few days. But it was not enough to get Samuels over the line, a regret pro-Israel fund-raisers continue to nurture. 

“No one knew it until it was too late,” the strategist said. 

UDP is a Super PAC that by law may raise unlimited funds, and this year, it and its allies started targeting vulnerable officeholders early. They spent more than $14 million defeating New York’s Jamaal Bowman in June, and more than $9 million defeating Missouri’s Cori Bush this week. (Both candidates were seen as vulnerable for reasons beyond their esteem among pro-Israel voters, including their )

But the pro-Israel strategist said the elements that favored Samuels in 2022 — and that pro-Israel donors noticed too late — were simply not in place this time. 

For one, Samuels is trailing Omar substantially in the polls. In Bowman’s and Bush’s races, the numbers were in pro-Israel groups’ favor: Bowman had consistently trailed challenger George Latimer in polls, while Wesley Bell, who beat Bush, ran a close race before pulling ahead. Omar’s campaign, by contrast, says she’s beating Samuels by 25 percentage points. 

In addition, in 2022, Omar was substantially outraising Samuels — but not spending the money. Joelle Stangler, Omar’s campaign manager, told Mother Jones this week that the campaign recognized it “took our foot off the gas” in 2022 — in other words, it was overconfident of a win.

This time around, the campaign is not repeating that mistake. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Jewish de facto leader of congressional progressives, has campaigned for her. And her campaign has highlighted far-right Republicans who have called on Minnesotans to back Samuels in the open primary, in which members of all parties can vote. 

“Don Samuels and his conservative benefactors have a common enemy – DFL candidates and values,” an Omar campaign document said, using the acronym for the Minnesota affiliate of the Democratic Party. The document listed donors to Samuels who have given to Republicans, a tactic Bowman and Bush also employed. 

She’s also ahead in the money race. Samuels, a Jamaican-born toy designer, leans heavily in his campaigning on his history as a volunteer, and as a former City Council member. He has raised a respectable $1.4 million, including from individual Jewish donors in the state, but Omar has raised more than four times that much, $6.4 million.

'Memories of the riots no longer taint Omar'

Additionally, Omar in 2022 was the face of advocacy for far-reaching reforms to policing, and Samuels became the face of the effort to increase police funding. That brought favorable attention to Samuels in the wake of the protests and riots that ripped through the state after a Minneapolis policeman murdered George Floyd. Voters were drawn to the polls in part to reject a police reform ballot initiative identified with Omar, which ended up failing.

Memories of the riots have faded, said the pro-Israel strategist, and no longer taint Omar.

Omar also has lowered her profile somewhat among Squad members as an outspoken critic of Israel. Her campaign page highlights her calls for an immediate ceasefire to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza — but emphasizes that she immediately condemned the Oct. 7 Hamas massacres that launched the war. And while she has voted against emergency defense assistance for Israel, she does not tout that vote on her campaign page.

Like other Squad members, she absented herself in protest from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech last month to Congress. But she also gave one of the tickets allotted to her to a family member of an Israeli held hostage by Hamas. Zahiro Shahar Mor, whose uncle is Abraham Munder, stood up wearing a T-shirt calling on Netanyahu to make a deal to release the hostages and was arrested, earning Omar’s praise. 

Samuels’ campaign page calls for a two-state solution and the release of hostages held in Gaza, and says Hamas has a “fundamentalist ideology” and “can no longer be responsible for civil control of the Gaza Strip.” He also accuses Omar of consorting with antisemites, as he did during their 2022 face-off. 

And in the weeks after October 7, he made that issue a theme, accusing her of “frightening” Minnesota’s Jews.

But his campaign page also makes moves toward criticism of Israel, saying it “should curtail the spread of settlements and empower a government that sees political opportunity in peace instead of conflict.” And recently, he seems less eager to bring up the Israel-Palestinian conflict as it has intensified.

“Over time, the conflict of Israel in Palestine has become so frightening that everybody agrees it is too extreme and I do, too,” he told the Minnesota Post this week.