The primary next week for a newly drawn Democratic House seat in a deep-blue Detroit suburb would seem to be about jobs, abortion rights, beating back rising prices, and fighting Republicans. Yet Democratic divisions over Israel are subtly playing an outsize role.
Democratic Reps. Andy Levin and Haley Stevens are spending heavily to distinguish themselves from one another in the fight to represent Michigan’s 11th Congressional District, where the victor is expected to prevail in November. The candidates hold nearly identical voting records in Congress and are two-term incumbents.
But a flood of super PAC money is shifting the contours of the race as a proxy battle plays out over the candidates’ positions on Israel and other progressive issues.
Chief among them is the United Democracy Project, a super PAC launched by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which has spent more than $3 million in the race in support of Stevens, according to expenditure data compiled by OpenSecrets. UDP is the top-spending super PAC in Democratic primaries this year.
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Advertisements paid for by UDP highlight Stevens’s role in the Obama administration auto rescue and her support for abortion rights. The ads don’t focus on Israel.
Levin has seized on the spending to draw a contrast with his opponent, this month telling the Washington Examiner in an interview near his headquarters that it left a bad taste in Democrats’ mouths.
“People don’t like the idea of that kind of dark money and unaccountable money and Republican money playing in a Democratic primary,” Levin said. “It just doesn’t feel good to a lot of people here.”
Levin, too, has scored outside help, including from J Street Action Fund, a super PAC affiliated with J Street, AIPAC’s liberal foil, which has pumped more than $700,000 into the race to target Stevens.
One ad paid for by J Street Action Fund maligns AIPAC’s support as coming from Republican megadonors and a group that has also backed over 100 Republicans who voted to overturn the 2020 election.
“Haley Stevens is taking hundreds of thousands of dollars from a group that’s supporting Republicans who voted to overturn the 2020 election,” reads a narrator against a backdrop of footage from the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
UDP has raised millions of dollars from megadonors this year, including from Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus, hedge fund manager Paul Singer, and technology entrepreneur Jan Koum, all of whom have historically backed Republican causes. But they are joined by Democrat and media mogul Haim Saban as the group’s largest individual donors.
Levin has called on Stevens to reject this support. Asked for comment, Stevens’s campaign did not respond.
The nephew of the late Democratic Sen. Carl Levin and the son of former Democratic Rep. Sandy Levin, succeeding the latter on his retirement in 2018, the Levin family has long ties to the district.
Former AIPAC President David Victor, a resident in the district, has argued that Andy Levin’s family history makes his positions more concerning.
In an email to Detroit-area donors earlier this year, Victor identified Andy Levin as “arguably the most corrosive member of Congress to the US-Israel relationship.”
“Andy frequently and one-sidedly criticizes Israel, defends and even fundraises for its worst detractors … and from his seat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee authors and supports highly problematic legislation,” Victor wrote in a January letter. “And he does so as a Levin, a name which due to his uncle and father commands respect and admiration on Capitol Hill.
“To make matters worse, Andy sincerely claims to be a lifelong Zionist, proud Jew, and defender of Israel. So when Andy Levin insists he’s pro-Israel, less engaged Democratic colleagues may take him at his word,” Victor added.
A poll of likely primary voters conducted from July 18-20 placed Stevens ahead in the race by 27 percentage points, 58% to Andy Levin’s 31%. In almost all categories, Stevens leads by double digits, including with key groups of female voters, black voters, and voters aged 35 years and older.
Andy Levin is now fighting for his political life.
In a recent interview with MSNBC, the Michigan congressman argued that AIPAC was trying to end his political career because of his positions regarding Israel.
“I’m not just Jewish. I’m one of two former synagogue presidents in Congress. … I’m really Jewish. But AIPAC can’t stand the idea that I am the clearest, strongest Jewish voice in Congress standing for a simple proposition, that there’s no way to have a secure democratic homeland for the Jewish people unless we achieve the political and human rights of the Palestinian people,” Andy Levin told Mehdi Hasan. “That’s it. Last I checked, that was the policy of every Democratic and Republican administration, pre-Trump, of this country.”
The congressman added, “But AIPAC’s completely gone off the rails, and they are trying to end my career because I won’t fall in line with their view of what it means to be pro-Israel.”
UDP is the highest-spending outside group in Democrat-on-Democrat races this year, boosting some candidates by nearly $13 million and opposing others. The group spent more than $4 million opposing onetime Maryland Democratic Rep. Donna Edwards before she lost her primary.
In a bid to turn the race around, prominent liberal allies have rallied to his district, with an appearance by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) over the weekend and actress and activist Jane Fonda on Monday. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is also expected to campaign for Andy Levin this week, alongside Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI).
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Unlike Andy Levin, however, Tlaib scored an endorsement from the Detroit Free Press’s centrist editorial pages in her primary race. But the paper backed Stevens over Andy Levin, noting how the congresswoman’s “detailed grasp of issues facing manufacturers has earned her the respect of labor organizations and pro-business groups … alike.”
Other groups have also helped tilt the balance.
Women Vote!, a super PAC run by EMILY’s List, which is focused on electing pro-abortion rights Democratic women to Congress, has boosted Stevens by more than $2 million, while the progressive donor fund Future Progress has aided Andy Levin with more than half a million dollars, according to federal filings compiled by OpenSecrets.
